Chapter 1

Caerga System, Inner Core. A battle rages.

Another ISD jumped into the system and joinied its brethren above a
small world, combining its firepower with all six others on the mammoth
base covering the entire southern hemisphere of Freth, one of the Caerga
6 moons. The planetary shield had been under bombardment for weeks and
was finally showing signs of failure with power fluctuations starting to
flicker all over the place. To the casual observer it would have seemed
like a standard imperial planetary siege, but  the base below was also
imperial...

        Interfactional fighting could be horrific, but Admiral Albrach
never thought it would have degenerated into this. His primary base and
production centre would soon be destroyed, and his small empire with it.
He was nearly sixty years old now and could remember back to the
glorious days of the Empire when Palpatine had been there to lead them
all, a unifying force for a galaxy in chaos and civil war. Then there
was the catastrophic battle at Endor, and the final deaths of the
Emperor's new cloned bodies. Albrach had despaired when their leader had
died; nobody was able to even come close to a leader such as the Emperor
had been.
        Albrach had been one of the officers assigned to safeguard one
of the Emperor's storage depots, safeguarding plans and prototypes of
various exotic technologies that could not afford to be lost. When Byss
was destroyed yet more factions were created from the remnants of the
Emperor's great armada and Albrach had taken the ships under his command
and retreated here, to try and stay true to his oath of protecting the
legacy of the Empire. If he had possessed adequate resources and
manpower much of the storehouse would have been brought back into the
light and used to preserve the tattered remnants of the Empire, and to
fight the hated New Republic. If only he had been able to man just half
of the equipment! But that would probably never happen now, not with the
imminent destruction of base sigma primus. He sighed. Why did so many of
the other warlords seem to want to fight each other for dominance as
much as the republic? He had tried to rally them together but they
refused to listen, and for making himself publically visible another
warlord had immediately attacked - greedy for more worlds to control.
All the other systems had fallen one by one and his small fleet all but
wiped out. This was the final attack to wipe him out, to erradicate him
and finalise his defeat.
        "Planetary shields critical. Collapse imminent." it was an
automated warning; Albrach had lost so many men his facilities were
critically undermanned.
        Albrach stood up and regarded the base control room. Once this
last world of his was gone, he would have nothing left. Nothing to fight
with, nothing to fight for. He shook his greyed head and turned to his
aide. "Signal the evacuation. We have no choice but to flee and attempt
to regroup elsewhere." It was a testiment to his men that they had all
stayed loyal to their oaths, rather than deserting in these harsh times.
        The other two occupants of the command center sent the
evacuation signal and hurridly left for whatever ships they could find
still capable of escape. Albrach did not move.
        "Admiral sir, we have to leave. There are only minutes before
they break through!" it was his aide, voice breaking and nervous.
        Albrach was impassive. "I will not desert my post. Leave if you
will but I stay here!"
        "But sir-"
        He was cut off. "LEAVE! Quickly if you value your life! Inform
Commander Gardat that I have transferred control of all my forces to his
command. Go! Quickly!" he shouted.
        The aide stepped back in surprise at Albrach's outburst, then
nodded and left to follow his orders.
        Albrach stood alone in the command center. He slowly put his
hand on the control bank and keyed in the auto-destruct sequence.
        The computer spoke. "T minus 10 minutes and counting..."

        The evacuation fleet was little more than a ragged convoy. Deep
in one of the massive subterranean hanger bays floated a pair of strike
cruisers, a lone nebulon-B2 frigate and Albrach's lone remaining capital
ship - a neutralizer cruiser, a rare interdictor variant. All were
little more than turbolaser fodder should the star destroyers in orbit
catch them. Droid workers had already replaced the standard TIE
complements with supplies, crates of irreplaceble computer data and as
many prototypes as could be packed. If only they had had decent
construction facilities! But Warlord Albrach had known this day would
come and he spent their resources on more important items - advanced
droids for filling the empty crew slots on the ships. Such a large base,
so few men.
        As he walked up the boarding tube of the neutralizer _Growler_
Gardat saw another pair of unmanned TIEs pushed unceremoniously out of
the hanger bay to fall down and vanish into the inky blackness that
covered the vast underground docking area. They desperately needed the
room to store irreplacable equipment, most of which was still in the
containers they were stored in. He had only a partial idea just what
Albrach had ordered the droids to load, presumably the means to start
afresh once they regrouped in the outer rim.
        Commander Gardat boarded the neutralizer glad in the knowledge
that their rarity meant they likely had the only one in this entire
section of the galaxy. If the attackers had one and had already powered
up the hyperspace pulsemass generators then they would be shredded the
moment they hit hyperspace. Not good. He grabbed a turbolift to the
bridge, one of the few stations on board manned by mostly humans - he
appreciated droids for their combat use, but programming them to serve
as crewmen seemed downright dangerous. For all their robotic reflexes
and combat systems they just seemed to lack that 'special something' all
human soldiers had - combat intuiition.
        Gardat strode onto the bridge and sat down. Looking about he
inwardly grimaced at the nearly deserted command deck. Several consoles
were unmanned and numerous astrodroids were filling in auxillery
positions! By the Emperor, such a fall he thought. Gardat took a grip of
himself - he was now in charge of this bunch and he'd be damned before
he let anything fall into the hands of their attackers.
        Immediately an officer approached him and reported. "Sir, we've
loaded as much as the holds can carry. We merely await your order to
leave."
        He looked out a viewport at the base they had all called home
for the past few years and sighed. "Very well, signal all ships to
follow us at once." Gardat looked over his expectant bridge crew.
"Remember our objective is escape, not to engage unless absolutely
necessary."
        "Yes sir!" the few men chorused.
        Gardat smiled. "Good. Now lets move out!"

        Gardat's neutralizer powered up her repulsorlifts to maximum and
accelerated towards the hanger entrance a few kilometers away. They were
there within moments and closely followed by the strike cruisers and
nebulon-b2. Not a single ounce of sunlight shone down on the frosty
surface of the moon, they navigated by sensor data only as the ships
weaved their way through the giant petrified forest the covered the
mountain slopes they had just emerged from. Apparently their attacker
had gotten his hands on an orbital nightcloak system, the bastard.

        "Gardat to all ships, jump as soon as we clear the moons gravity
well. We can't afford to worry about safety procedures now."

        The orbiting fleet continued to pound on the planetary shields -
now obscured by the newly operational terror weapon. Nightcloak
satellites were dotted all over the planet in a slightly higher orbit
than the shield barrier, which finally decided that after four weeks of
continous bombardment it would collapse. A watching scout vessel
hovering just below the black darkness began to rise above and signal
the rest of its fleet to begin the ground assault when the clouds below
parted to reveal death. The two strike cruisers easily outgunned to
pitifully small scout and within a moment the flaming wreckage was sent
hurtling downards, her crew already turned to cinders. The small fleet
continued accelerating out of the gravity well, making for deep space.

ISD _Mangle_

        "Sir, the planetary forces are attempting to flee."
        "Excellent. This world is ours! Signal _Trasher_, _Urgwait_ and
_Pelogide_ to pursue. Do not allow them to escape under any
circumstances."
        "Yes sir, immediately."

Neutralizer _Growler_

        Gardat watched as three ISDs swung about to pursue. He smiled at
the irony of their mized blessing - his lighter ships were much faster
but also considerably outgunned. The three ISDs would find their
hyperdrives unable to maintain sufficient speed to keep up - both the
strike cruisers had undergone engine upgrades to bring their hyperdrives
to class one status. He relaxed in the comforting knowledge of this
fact.
        "Sir, scans have identified one of our pursuers as an ISD2!"
        Damn! They also had class one hyperdrives and one of those
monsters could take them all out with minimal effort. He swore. What to
do? It had slower sublight drives but all it needed to do was jump in
near them and it could start blasting them. Then it struck him, it was
so simple he must have been a fool not to see the answer!
        "We have cleared the gravity well sir, awaiting confirmation of
your orders."
        Gardat stood up. "Confirmed, destination unchanged. Signal the
fleet to drop out of hyperspace one third of the way."
        "Navicomputer target locked. Enagaging hyperdrive."

        The fleet accelerated rapidly and entered hyperspace. As soon as
they cleared the planet their pursuers jumped on an intercept course.
The ISD2 soon outpaced its slower brothers, the captain didn't care - he
would destroy their target and claim all the glory. A few minutes after
they left and landing barges started dropping through the atmosphere
towards sigma base, the self-destruct sequence completed itself. A
colossal flash of heat and other energy blew the southern hemisphere of
the moon to pieces, chunks of debris taking out the landing troops,
countless satellites and moderately damaging a few star destroyers.
Albrach had wreaked his revenge on the disloyal traitors at the cost of
his life.

Three hours later...

        "Sir, approaching one-third distance." it was the helmsman.
        Gardat looked up. "Are they still following us?"
        "Yes sir, the ISD2 will be here in approximately two minutes."
        Ample time. "Signal all ships to disengage hyperdrives then
bring us about and hold position." Soon their pursuers would no longer
be an issue, thought Gardat.
        The streaks of light slowed down to the pinpricks of light of
distant stars. The _Growler_ immediately swung about, facing the way
they came. Both strike cruisers assumed positions on either side and the
nebulon-b2 hung underneath. They had to be ready in case this failed.
        "Power up the hyperspace pulsemass projectors." ordered Gardat.
        Immediately a cone of projected energy flicked into life on the
holodisplay. The pulsemass projectors were similar to gravity well
generators in that they affected hyperspace travel. But while
interdictor 418s could only prevent hyperspace travel the _Grinder_, a
Neutralizer 418 made it damn well suicidal. The pulsemass generators
created a myriad of tiny spheres shot out entirely in hyperspace. Any
ship within hyperspace (entering, leaving or just passing through) that
hit the area would not be ripped out of hyperspace 'gently' - instead
they would be shredded like paper within the energy field. Gardat prayed
they would not be expecting an ambush.
        "Enemy ship approaching" reported an officer.

        The captain of the ISD2 grinned. Soon they would be his! If they
thought they could ambush his mighty ship with such a pitiful force then
they were very mistaken. He clenched his fist in the excileration of the
hunt, enjoying the feelings of power his ship gave him.
        One of the sensor operators look up. "Sir, they are directly
ahead and have assumed a block formation."
        Futile, thought the captain, completely futile. "Disengage
hyperspace ten kilometers from their position. I want to SEE them die!"
he snarled.

        The crew of the ISD2 never even realised they had hit something.
The spheres of hyper-energy directly ahead of them were not even
detected before the mighty warship ploughed right into them,
disintegrating into chunks of flaming wreckage as incredible
hyperspatial energies ripped it apart and flung the debris back into
realspace.

        "Enemy vessel destroyed!" reported the sensor operator in
relief. Then he looked up in a sudden panic "Sir, debris is heading
directly towards our position!"
        "All ships to take evasive maneauvers and open fire on
approaching debris." snapped Gardat  while taking ahold of his armrests.
        The debris was ridiculously close and they barely had time to
start moving before all the ships were rained apon with shrapnel and
broken sections of hull. Strike Cruiser _Kremin_ was unfortunate to be
struck by several large chunks, the shields strained to the point of
collapse to only just stop the near-lightspeed debris from pulverizing
her. Some pieces made it through and gouged great chunks of the hull
armor away and shearing away a couple of turbolaser barrels.
        "Status on _Kremin_?" asked Gardat.
        "Their damage control systems report two damaged turbolasers,
three blown shield generators and hull integrity reduced to
seventy-eight percent. Droids should be able to repair the damaged
systems within the hour."
        "Excellent. Helm, take several evasive hyperspatial courses then
continue on our original route. I don't want the two ISDs finding us. I
doubt that trick will work twice once they realise what just happened."
Gardat sank back into his chair as his small force re-entered hyperspace
and disappeared, thankful they could easily outrun the other two ISDs.

Tantooine

        A pair of modified R-41 starchasers dropped into realspace and
headed for the planet. They were well maintained with a purple/blue
paint scheme and sporting several battered and scorched sections,
evidently from recent battle.
        "Damn it Brimic! That's the last time we accept any job offers
from a Trandoshan - we nearly got wasted out there!" complained a female
voice.
        "Hey relax baby, we got away didn't we?" he replied
lightheartedly.
        "Brimic," she said in her most annoyed-sounding voice "we were
nearly rammed by that damn thing. Or did you miss that cruiser that
jumped in on top of us?"
        "Sorry Gret. At least we got paid half up front." he tried
sounding concilatory.
        She sighed. "Yes, and repairs are probably going to eat it all
up."
        The two mercenary pilots dropped into the atmosphere and headed
for Mos Eisley, eager to forget about their day.

Deep Space

        _Growler_ drifted through the remnants of several pirate Z-95s,
the wreckage glinting in the light of a nearby and spectacular nebula.
Nearby both strike cruisers had docked with the disabled pirate base
platform, stripping the parts needed to replace the components used by
_Kremin_ for her repairs. Lights flickered as construction droids cut
away parts of the station hull and used them to patch over the gashes in
the cruiser's armor, making ugly but effective patchwork repairs. There
wasn't a shipyard they knew of that would be friendly to an imperial
taskforce so they were forced to improvise.
        On board the platform Gardat's battle droids had the surviving
prisoners lined up against the hanger bay wall, shooting any who moved
or asked questions. They didn't need any pirate scum to help them! The
pirates looked on helplessly as their base was slowly turned into a
scrapheap before their eyes. A man in spacetrooper armor marched down a
glowing force cylinder from a cruiser to an external landing pad. He
strode inside and looked about with purpose.
        "Droids! This wall looks good."
        "We obey."
        A large contingent of droids armed with plasma cutters and
vibro-saws descended on part of the hanger, slicing the wall apart for
the raw materials without regard for the vital systems contained within
it. One of them chopped through the hanger forcefield control wiring and
the field collapsed. The pirates screamed briefly as they were sucked
out into the freezing vaccuum waiting outside, their bodies quickly
undergoing explosive decompression. The imperial in the spacetrooper
armor watched them float away impassively - both he and the droids had
magnetic clamps on their feet to keep them as solid as rock, not that it
would matter once all the air was sucked out. Already the internal
bulkheads had been cut out and soon the entire platform was an airless
vaccuum, berefit of movement apart from the untiring droids and a few
overseers.

        Commander Gardat was walking the storage bays of _Growler_
inspecting the tightly packed cargo containers with a protocol droid as
he went. It was important to work out exactly what he had to work with.
He walked up to a large sienar fleet systems crate.
        "This one?"
        "That container holds a disassembled TIE/Avenger sir."
        Gardar grunted in acknowledgement as he looked at his datapadd.
Somewhere in here was supposed to be an XM-1 missile boat and he wanted
to confirm it was packed. "How about that one?" he asked, pointing at a
distant one.
        The silver protocol droid checked the container manifest. "This
container contains four phase one darktrooper units."
        He whistled. "Nice. The one next to it?"
        The droid checked. "This one appears to be holding your missile
boat sir. What are your commands now sir?"
        Gardat handed the droid his datapadd. "Continue to catalogue all
the cargo and bring me the complete manifest as soon as you finish."
        "Certainly sir." The droid shuffled off to the next one as
Gardat to check the other ships. They all needed cataloging and although
such a menial task was far beneath his position he simply couldn't spare
the men to double check everything. If only their depot had contained
spaarti cylinders! He sighed. Of course if they'd had spaarti cylinders
none of this would have happened in the first place.

        The four captains met in the conference room aboard _Growler_ to
discuss their plans. They took seats at the table around the holodisplay
as protocol droids served drinks and handed out documents. Gardat sat
down at the head of the black finish table and flipped through a sheaf
of papers while the others settled themselves. He put the papers down in
front of him and cleared his throat.
        "Ahem. Gentlemen, I call this meeting to order at-" he looked at
his watch. "22:00 hours standard imperial time. The droids have
completed their assessment of our supply situation and you should all
have copies of our complete inventory." he waved a thick document with
one hand. "You can all go over it in depth later, summaries are on the
last page." There was a lot of paper shuffling.
        Captain Trisk of _Kremin_ spoke up. "Do we have the plans for
all these? I mean, assuming we get ahold of construction facilities
somehow, can we start building them?"
        Gardat nodded. "Before he died Admiral Albrack transferred full
design and blueprint information to the central computer core of
_Growler_. We also have multiple hard copies on holodisk for backup, so
once we get facilities plus more crewman and pilots we can manufacture
away as long as fresh materials are forthcoming."
        Vars, captain of the nebulon-b2 _Murrin_ frowned. "How can we
secure a fresh construction site? And what are we going to do for
recruits? We run the risk of being found either by another faction or
the New Republic, and we cannot defend ourselves against an invasion
force - sigma primus demonstrated that as well as anything could. I
think-"
        He was cut off by Trisk. "I think you are sounding a little
negative my friend." he smiled. "All we need do is find somewhere safe
and remote where nobody will bother us and set up a new facility. A
place where we can build afresh."
        Gardat nodded. "Exactly. Now, we are going to need to set up an
industrial base - I reccommend as far out as possible for our own
privacy - and subjugate a populace we can recruit from."
        "Where exactly?" pushed Vars.
        "The outer rim is always an option but in our weakened state,
and considering the legacy we carry aboard our ships, I think just
outside the galaxy in wildspace is our best bet." said Gardat calmly.
        "Wildspace?" Vars leaned back, brow furrowed. "That's going to
be completely off the charts."
        "Exactly. No unwelcome visitors, at least none we won't be able
to handle." nodded Gardat.
        Trisk spoke up again. "How will we secure our space from
surprises with only four ships? I mean - I agree with your plan, but we
ARE chronically short on manpower. I know I'm speaking the obvious here,
but what will we do initially for manpower to harvest food, to mine, to
build or to fight?" The others nodded.
        Gardat leaned forward. "We will have to sort that out once we
find a safe location. If the worst comes to the worst we can always
enslave an isolated, primitive planet and simply build. What machinery
we lack, we can steal." He waved his arms about. "We certainly have the
firepower to clean out a few mining or construction operations out. As
for manpower we will have to train whatever locals are able. We cannot
afford to bring in outsiders, secrecy is our key to success." He sat
back and waited for their reaction.
        "Your plan makes sense. I will follow you to wildspace." It was
captain Yursk of strike cruiser _Oart_. His silent but strong demeanour
made him a good listener who always thought his decisions through
carefully.
        "I will follow." piped up Trisk.
        "As will I." said Vars.
        Gardat smiled broadly. "Excellent. Once we have finished here we
will leave for wildspace immediately." He stood up. "I think that
concludes this meeting gentlemen. Are there any other questions?" They
shook their heads. "Very well then. Remember this day well, for today we
will begin again! A new Empire shall rise under our leadership, the
galactic civil wars will stop and the corrupt New Republic shall be
crushed like the SCUM they are. Dismissed!"
        The captains stood up to return to their ships.
        "Vars, a moment of your time before you go." said Gardat,
pouring two drinks.
        Captain Vars nodded and waited patiently until the others had
left. He turned towards Gardat and asked. "What do you want?"
        Gardat pulled a datapadd from his belt and pushed it across the
table. "I've compiled a complete list of necessary materials and
machinery we will require in order to construct a new base in wild
space."
        "You want me to collect this lot?" asked Vars.
        "Yes, but more importantly I want you to add to the list. It
will be a long journey and the fewer return trips we make, the less
chance we have of being detected." Gardat leaned back and pulled out a
holodisk. "I'm authorizing you to use any means necessary to assemble
our construction materials and industrial base. This disk contains the
locations of every single galactic manufacturer who may be of use to
us." He handed it to Vars who immediately pocketed it.
        "Is there anything I should keep in mind?"
        "Secrecy is our key. Whatever you do, don't allow anybody to
know our eventual destination. The rest is up to you." Gardat looked at
him. "Vars, you are one of the best officers I have ever had the
pleasure of serving with. Our fate is in your hands. Once you have
completed your task meet us at our tertiary navipoint."
        Vars stood tall. "I will succeed sir!"
        Gardat smiled. "I have no doubt you will. Good luck, and happy
hunting my friend."
        Vars nodded and left the room. The commander sighed and watched
the wall display of stars for a few moments, then he too left to return
to active duty.

The _Murrin_

        Vars landed his TIE shuttle among the tall piles of cargo
containers choking his hanger bay. He had barely enough room to land,
let alone keep a squadron in. He knew his mission would require more
guile than brute force - especially since he had not a single operable
TIE fighter; they had all been dumped to make way for more cargo. Heck,
he only had two operable shuttles! Within a few minutes he reached the
bridge and took his seat. The three bridge crewmen looked up as he
entered - the rest of the crew positions were droid operated. The bridge
looked more like a sea of silver instead of the dark brown it should
have. Vars plugged the holodisk into a receptor in his armrest and
watched as a galactic map appeared, covered with innumerable small dots.
Each represented a different corporation or other company that had the
equipment needed. The real question now was where should they go first?
He started examining them, looking for any easy pickings. After a few
minutes he sighed - they really needed a multi-configuration orbital
factory but how were they to get one? The things were massive and it
wasn't as though they were defenceless either. Vars smiled as it struck
him.
        "Switch our transponder to a civian code. Prepare for hyperjump
to these co-ordinates."
        An astrodroid beeped its confirmation. At least navigation was
one area where droid replacements could pull their own weight thought
Vars.
        "Jump."
        The _Murrin_ leapt forwards from the debris field of destroyed
fighters and floating pieces of the pirate platform with her oversized
engines glowing fiercely. Any debris in her way was simply smashed aside
like a child's sandcastle. Seconds later she vanished into hyperspace
and tore a path across the galaxy.
        Gardat watched them go from a bridge viewport on _Growler_. "May
the Emperor be with you."

        Vars was lying in his cabin as they took the four hour journey
to some place called Tro'seth. It was a neutral system and apparently
sold all kinds of mining and mineral processing equipment - essential to
Vars. Once they had some sort of production base they could construct
their own tibanna gas refineries and other equipment as needed, after
they possessed factory facilities of course.
        He was experiencing memories of his service under the Emperor's
command at Byss. The parades, the high morale and their unstoppable
imperial might thwarted by rebel trickery. It still made him wince as he
thought of their world devastators consuming the Eclipse-1 during their
attack on Mon Calamari. A tear came to his eye as he lay there,
remembering his lost friends and comrades. They had died serving the
Emperor but somehow the rebels seemed to take that away and make it
meaningless. Vars clenched a fist. One day the rebels would pay, and on
that day he would be there personally to exact bloody vengence.

        The repairs to _Kremin_ were completed within another hour. The
structural damage was harder to fix but the zero-g construction droids
simply re-bonded the materials on the mollecular level, making the hull
good as new - apart from the scorch marks. Damaged turbolasers had been
stripped off and replaced with fresh ones taken from the captured
platfrom, which was rapidly falling apart as they cut it to pieces.
Already an entire docking arm was drifting free, droids jetting away
towards their mother ship.
        Gardat's small fleet withdrew a few kilometers and opened fire
on the crippled station, their turbolasers eating through the unshielded
hulk in seconds. The other two docking arms started to break free as the
reactor went critical and tore the central module to pieces in a violent
explosion. The ships continued firing, targeting the debris and making
certain that no trace of their presence would remain apart from
globlules of molten metal.
        If the presence of an Imperial taskforce - however small - was
uncovered then not only did they risk interception by New Republic
forces, but also by any other faction that desired to add a few ships to
their navy. Not to mention they were basically outgunned chronically by
any decent-sized star destroyer that happened their way. At five hundred
meters for a strike cruiser and six hundred for the neutralizer, their
total mass was still less than an ISD. While they could put up a fight
and probably damage it, Gardat was not willing to find out by how much.
        "Take us out of the debris field and prepare for entering
hyperspace."
        "Aye sir."
        The _Growler_ and her two bodyguards pushed their way through
the spinning metal fragments that had previously belonged to the
platform. Moments later they too jumped away, taking an altogether
different route from that of the _Murrin_. Behind them they left nothing
more then globules of molten metal and fragments of hull, leaving not a
clue as to the attackers apart from the fury of the assault.
Vars was woken by a knock on the door. He sighed and rubbed his
eyes. Pulling himself together he drank a glass of water and sat on the
edge of his bed.
        "Enter."
        A protocol droid entered. "Sorry to have awoken you sir. We are
about to reach the Petra system and are awaiting your orders." It took a
step back as Vars got up and stretched his back.
        "I'll be on the bridge shortly. Inform sensor ops to conduct a
complete astrological scan of this system - I want the position, course
and velocity of every single ship, station and planetoid within the
light year." order Vars as he pulled on a fresh uniform and inspected
his stubble in the mirror. He needed to shave more often by the looks of
it.
        "As you command." the droid shuffled out.
        Vars pulled on his belt and fastened his holster, pausing
briefly to comb his tousled hair before stepping outside and making his
way to the command deck. The corridors of his nebulon-b2 were largely
deserted apart from the occasional astrodroid rolling past or an
internal security patrol. Most of the human crewmen were assigned to
vital ships functions such as main engineering positions and other vital
roles and as such, the security teams were largely comprised of droideka
rolling down the corridors looking for intruders. A good design if ever
Vars had seen one - he had personally overseen the upgrading of their
droid brains to full autonomity models so that if the central computer
went down the droids would remain active, although they still underwent
regular memory wipes for security purposes.
        The bridge viewscreens and system holodisplay showed several
nearby planets and a decent amount of civilian traffic. That was good -
they would not stand out too much if ships were coming and going all the
time. Vars took his seat and called for a status report.
        "Sir, our transponder code has been accepted. We should remain
undetected for the duration of our stay." reported a lieutenant.
        Vars nodded. "Good. The fabritech assembly yard IS present,
yes?"
        "Aye sir."
        "I will be taking my shuttle there. Lieutenant Prosk, you will
be in command unti I return. Major Hargos!" A stormtrooper commando
standing by the door stepped forward. "You will accompany me." said
Vars, standing up.
        The man nodded. "Yes sir!"
        Vars walked off the bridge closely followed by Hargos, assuming
a place by Vars' side as they walked to the main armoury. The entrance
room was as heavily guarded as any imperial detention block, except for
the addition of twelve battle droids hidden in conclealed wall
compartments. At the first sign of trouble the droids would spring forth
and add their might to the existing automated defense turrets and
guards. The sargeant saluted as Vars walked up the the desk.
        "Captain sir! What can I do for you?"
        "Open the blast doors."
        The sargeant nodded as he entered the security codes to make the
half-meter thick durasteel alloy doors open. With a hum of powerful
servo motors the incredibly heavy doors slid up and down, revealing
another large room. This time it was full of racks apon racks of
weapons, reaching from wall to wall. Vars walked inside to a secondary
blast door placed halfway up on one wall and tapped in several numbers
on the keypad. Hargos patiently waited as Vars reached inside and
retrieved a pair of exotic-looking blast pistols.
        He turned and offered one. "Here, take one of these major."
        Hargos accepted the weapon. "What is it? I've never seen a
blaster like it."
        "You holding one of our few guns of command. A highly effective
piece of neuroweapon tech, first developed by the Hapes Consortium."
        The major examined the weapon smiling - he could get used to
having one of these. His reviere was interrupted by Vars speaking again.
        "Equip yourself with whatever weapons you wish. We will be
travelling incognito so wear a cloak over your armor and TRY to conceal
whatever you take with you." said Vars as he took two belts of
high-yield thermal detonators from a shelf and buckled them across his
chest bandolier style. Hargos holstered his new sidearm and grabbed an
E-11 from a rack, checking the weapon as he did so. Both men helped
themselves liberally to ammunition and pulled on personal energy shield
generators. They were weak and expensive, but worth it.
        After both had satisifed themselves with their choices they
stopped off at the quartermaster stores and helped themselves to
survival gear, long dark robes and cloaks. After pulling them on they
both looked like relatively incognito travelers.
        Vars looked at Hargos. "All set?"
        "I think so sir." said Hargos as he checked himself over.
        "Good. To the hanger bay."

        Vars took his pilot seat in his TIE shuttle as Hargos settled
into the passenger compartment. He powered up the shuttle systems and
maneauvered the craft out from between the cargo containers filling the
bay and through the atmospheric forcefield keeping out the vaccuum.
Outside he smiled - piloting these craft was very enjoyable and he could
certainly see why there had never been a shortage of TIE pilot recruits
throughout any period of Imperial history. When flying such a craft it
felt liberating, as though one was free to fly anywhere you could wish.
        The shuttle accelerated away from the _Murrin_ and headed
towards the nearest planet, a sandy red ball of heat and unending
desert. As they approached, tiny specks of sliver shined in the sunlight
thrown by the large yellow star which burned untold millions of
kilometers away. As he watched the specks became dots, and the dots
became small cubes and streaks of metal. Slowly the objects grew larger
and larger as the shuttle hurtled towards them, growing into massive
multi-kilometer orbital factories and giant slipyards for constructing
the various component modules. A pair of colossal five-kilometer cargo
ships were busy loading a pair of prefab installations for delivery to
some unknown client. Numerous perimeter defense stations orbited the
planet, making Vars wonder how much pirate activity went on within New
Republic borders. He shook his head - it was as corrupt as the old
republic and one day they would sweep it aside just like the Emperor
swept aside the rotting remants of the previous galactic government.
        The comm system crackled. "TIE shuttle alpha one this is
FabriTech orbital control, please transmit your landing permit."
        Vars flicked the switch. "Orbital control this is alpha one. We
don't have a landing permit."
        "You don't have a landing permit?" The voice sounded
exasperated. "Geeze man, doesn't anybody have one these days? You're the
third ship today who hasn't had clearance."
        "Uhh. Sorry about this orbital control. I haven't been in this
part of space before."
        "I can see that alpha one. Oh well, please state the nature of
your business."
        "I'm interested in comissioning a factory unit from FabriTech."
said Vars.
        Immediately the voice lightened up. "Oh why didn't you say so
earlier?" There was a brief pause. "You are cleared to put down on
landing platform thirty-four on our central station."
        "Thanks orbital control." said Vars dryly.
        He brought his TIE shuttle about and banked towards the massive
floating disk that hung suspended over the red planet in geostationary
orbit over the north polar region. As they passed one of the perimeter
defense platforms he noticed rows of T-wing fighters lined up for rapid
launch.
        "These FabriTech people sure mean business when it comes to
security" noted Vars over the internal speaker.
        "They sure do sir. We're going to have to be careful in here."
replied Hargos.
        "I know, just remember our plan and try to stick to it."
        "Of course sir."

        The TIE shuttle swooped down towards the massive orbital control
station. It was a great solid disk nine kilometers across and at least
two thick. Every surface imaginable was covered by skyscraper-like
superstructures, docking bays, landing pads transport conduits and
arrays of all kinds. It was more of a floating city than a space
station. Vars guided the shuttle along a row of blinking lights
appearing on his HUD as directional data was recieved from the station
navigation system. Local traffic was fairly intense as they flew in,
passing several large container transports, merchant vessels of all
kinds and even a solitary MC80 calamari cruiser undergoing maintainence
repairs. Vars wondered what a military cruiser was doing there - perhaps
the New Republic just didn't care who owned what.
        "An invitation to chaos if ever I saw one." commented Vars as he
looked over the MC80.
        "What kind of government allows civilians access to military
warships?" muttered Hargos in disgust. "It's tantamount to just inviting
internal disorder."
        "A corrupt one Hargos, a corrupt one." sighed Vars. Speaking of
the New Republic always depressed him. There were many bad memories -
especially the fall of their beloved Emperor.
        Soon landing platform thirty four was visible in the distance.
It projected out from the side of a kilometer-tall skyscraper with
'FabriTech' emblazoned on the side in massive glowing letters. As they
approached Vars could make out a metallic-blue protocol droid waiting
for them on the pad. It hurridly backed away as the shuttle slowed down
to a hover and plonked down exactly dead-center on the number '34'
painted on the grey metal. The droid waited patiently as Vars and Hargos
opened their hatches and stepped outside. Hargos immediately started
checking their surroundings, looking up at the mammoth skyscraper and
over the edge at the black pit of darkness below them. He couldn't even
see the bottom, prompting memories of Nar Shaddar.
        The droid approached them and spoke. "Good day sirs. I am
protocol droid T1-RA and I have been sent by my owners, FabriCorp, to
guide you to our sales office. Please follow me."
        It abruptly turned and started walking back towards the only
open door leading off the platform. Vars nodded at Hargos and started
following the odd-colored droid out from the freezing cold wind that
whipped at their cloaks and robes.

        "I understand that you two gentleman are customers?" enquired
the smiling FabriCorp representitive.
        Vars nodded.
        "Please do take seats." He waved them into his office and guided
them to a pair of large, plush chairs. "You can call me Yemrit by the
way." The FabriCorp man looked to be in his early thirties and full of
energy - probably due to the large commission he was thinking about.
        Vars reached into his robe and pulled out a yellow holochip.
"This will best sum up what I need from you Mr Yemrit. I trust your
company can handle it."
        Yemrit accepted the chip and plugged it into his desk
holoconsole. After taking a few minutes to analyze the data he looked up
with all seriousness.
        "You really want an all-in-one design like this? A more specific
design is far more economical in the-"
        With a wave of his hand Vars silenced him. "Mr Yemrit, the
holochip tells you what I want. I know what I want and if you cannot
meet my requirements then I will take our business to one of your
competitors."
        The man shook his head. "No, no that will not be necessary. I
was just checking - you do understand I want what's best for our
customers." He smiled.
        "Can you fulfill the order or not?"
        "Well it's a tricky one. Most factory units we manufacture don't
integrate much duplicator technology apart from the basics, but I think
we can handle it." He looked at Vars. "This will mean a slight price
increase of course."
        "Cost is not an issue. I want quality, not junk." replied Vars.
        The representive looked at Hargos. "Your friend is very quiet.
Your bodyguard is he?"
        Hargos said nothing. Vars stared back at the salesman. "You
could say that. The order?" He was getting impatient.
        "The basic factory unit is simple enough, some of the more
exotic parts you require will take a little longer. I'd say we could
have one built to order for you by...." He tapped some figures into his
computer. "How does a month sound?"
        "A month?" exploded Vars. "That's ridiculous!"
        "Look about you my friend. FabriTech is working round the clock
just trying to fulfill backorders - a creature knows that if they want
quality and workmanship they need to come to us." He gave another of his
increasingly irritating smiles. "Perhaps you think another company can
offer you better? I guarantee you that you won't find another who offers
the same quality assurances we can."
        Vars glared at him for a moment. For a few seconds Hargos
thought he looked like he was about to call the deal off, then he nodded
his head. "Very well Mr Yemrit, I think we can come to an arrangement."
        The salesman positively beamed at the two. Not only was he
getting his regular commission but with the amount of credits a factory
station like this would cost, he would recieve a solid bonus.
        "A very good choice, even if I do say so myself." He chuckled at
his own joke then stopped as he realised Vars and Hargos were staring at
him. "Anyway, now that we have that done what currency would you like to
make payment in?"
        "I believe everybody takes one of these." said Vars, reaching
into his robe. As Yemrit's attention was diverted Hargos whipped out his
gun of command and fired a spray of blue sparks at the company man.
Yemrit sat motionless as his higher brain functions were suspended by
the neurological terror weapon. Hargos lept from his chair and
manipulated the holocomputer for a few moments before looking up at Vars
and shaking his head - no security systems had activated.
        "Very good major. Now allow me." Vars stood up and leaned down
by the blankly staring man, speaking directly into his ear.
        "Mr Yemrit. You will redirect FabriCorp funds from one of your
more inconspicuous accounts to pay for the factory construction. You
will believe we have paid you and fabricate evidence to that effect for
your superiors. Once the factory station is completed you will deliver
it to this nav point." He placed a datachip into Yemrit's limp hand and
closed his fingers over it. "Send the unit on a single bulk
superfreighter without any escorts and then delete all data pertaining
to the construction of the unit." Vars paused and thought. "Once that is
done throw yourself off a high walkway after composing a suicide note to
the effect of saying you are unable to live with the guilt of
embezzaling company funds." Vars stepped back to Hargos.
        "Do you understand my commands?"
        Yemrit slowly nodded. "I understand." His eyes still stared
blankly ahead.
        "Good. You will awaken in five minutes and remember nothing
about us, only that our order must be completed on schedule. Is that
understood?" He waited until Yemrit nodded again then turned to Hargos,
making a hand signal. With that they both turned and left as anonymously
as they had come. Apart from a traffic controller who couldn't identify
them and a protocol droid that would likely have a memory flush sooner
or later, they were ghosts.

The _Murrin_

        A large and intricately detailed galactic map floated on the
main bridge holoprojector. A single MSE-6 droid manipulated the
three-dimensional image as Vars studied one of his next destinations. It
was no good having a factory if there were no materials to construct
with, or no tibanna gas to fuel new starships - not to mention the whole
messy business of getting a hypermatter converter operating over a
blackhole somehere.
        "System 3456T/P87."
        The floating image zoomed in to a single system. Several planets
orbited a dull red star, evidently nearing the end of it's useful
lifespan - probably no more than a few thousand years thought Vars. He
could have asked an astrodroid for an exact figure but what point was
there?
        Vars frowned at the system layout. It would be difficult to
snatch away mole miners from asteroid belts like that - too much risk
for his ship.
        "System 6633G/J34."
        He smiled. This one was much better.

Tantooine.

        "Well Gret, looks like we still have a few creds left over."
        "Well that sure comes as a surprise. I thought we took a lot
more damage than that from that damned imperial cruiser!" she replied.
        "Yeah, I still wanna know what imperial ships were doing in New
Republic space. Reckon it's another invasion?"
        Gret rolled her eyes towards the ceiling of the smokey tavern.
"Oh sure, the Empire launches another invasion and the first thing they
target are all the pirate bases. Right."
        Brimic shrugged. He wasn't much into politics or military
strategies, just the money.
        She took a sip of her drink and continued. "Anyway, I guess
we're looking for new employers now."
        He snorted between mouthfuls of some unidentified stew. "Tell me
something I don't know. Any ideas?"
        "We could go into bounty hunting for a little while, make some
new contacts." suggested Gret as she took another sip of the brakkish
liquid.
        "How about as ship hunters? Go after wanted men and so forth."
        "Ship hunters?"
        Brimic sighed. "Gret, look at us. We're pilots for hire, not
thugs and we sure as hell aren't Bobba Fett style all-rounders - we do
what we do best and that's fly our starchasers."
        She started to reply when a shadow fell over the table. It was
Tular, a gran and also local Chirichan pirate clan underworld
representative.
        "You humans. Boss want to talk to you."
        Gret was surprised. The clan still wanted to do business with
them after the platform was lost? Granted it hadn't exactly been their
fault, but it was still a marred record.
        "What does he want with us?" asked Brimic
        "He tell you himself. You two come, now."
        The two pilots exchanged knowing looks. Tular was his old
charming self, just as always.
        "Okay, okay."
        Gret swigged down here drink as Brimic took one last mouthful of
stew before flicking a credit piece to the bartender. They stood and
went into one of the the backrooms where the bartender's holonet
terminal was kept. Tular pushed them forwards and stood behind them as
the display flicked on, revealing the disgusting and slimy face of a
hutt. Dorga Hutt.
        The visage smiled at their appearence. "Ah, so good to see my
two young pilot friends. Ha Ha Ha. I have a little job for you today."
        Gret stepped forward in curiosity. "You don't care about the
platform?" she queried.
        Dorga bellowed in long, slow laughter. "The platform
insignificant compared to insult - that no imperial attack my little
ones. It came from someone else and I want to know who!"
        The pilots were surprised. They hadn't expected to be asked to
work for Dorgo again anytime soon and now he was offering them work!
        The hutt continued. "You find out who gave me the insult and I
give you good reward. You not find out within three months and I put
bounty on you two." Dargos laughed at them. "Good deal yes?"
        "A bounty on us?" shouted Gret. "What - why on us?"
        "Ha Ha Ha. You saw attackers, you two good at finding things
before. This way we all happy but if I get no result then we BOTH
unhappy. Understand?"
        Glumly the two pilots nodded.

        Brimic felt like a stone hand had grasped him by the shoulders
and was pushing them down into a forced slump. No matter how he tried to
clear his mind Dorga's words still echoed throughout his thoughts. Three
months and no more. In the distance Tantooine's suns blazed down into
the horizon as they slowly set into a red haze, a sight he had grown up
with and wanted to see again many more times.
        Gret was standing next to him by their hanger entrance. She
hadn't said a word since they had left the tavern and still had her lips
pressed tightly together. Without warning she spun towards him and put
her hands on her hips.
        "Well?"
        He blinked in surprise. That wasn't what he had expected to
hear. "Huh?" Was all he could manage as he stared at her in shock.
        She sighed. "Listen Brimic, the price for failing may suck but
at least we found work. All we have to do is find the guys with that
interdictor cruiser and we're home free! Come on, cheer up! Remember the
time we had to track down that Reegars character flying the Z-95? He
tried going everywhere but we still found him and took him out!" Her
eyebrows were raised in hope as she looked up at her depressed wingman.
        "Yeah, I s'pose." he muttered, trying to square his shoulders.
        "Come on now, get up! It's getting dark - time to get inside
remember?" she chided.
        Brimic pulled himself to his feet and they both vanished into
the hanger, sealing the sliding durasteel doors behind them. Mos Eisley
spaceport was not the safest of places after dark on Tantooine, not by a
long shot.

Chapter 2

        Just six weeks left. Brimic still couldn't believe that they had
been searching for nearly two months now and not found a single clue. He
groaned inwardy as he leaned backwards into his padded seat, shutting
his eyes to the numerous status displays covering the console of his
R-41 starchaser. If only they hadn't been given the death threat by
Dorga the hutt, if only they had more time, if only...
        "Brimic you're drifting off course."
        It was Gret, of course. Nobody else would be stupid enough to
fly through an asteroid field just to save time, apart from him of
course. Trying to shake bad thoughts from his head Brimic tried to sound
cheerful.
        "Ah... sorry Gret, just screwing about."
        "Well watch where you screw about, this isn't a Shadaarian
whorehouse you know!"
        Gret was always one to get on his back when he screwed up, even
when accidentally. At least her attempt at humoring him wasn't that bad.
He decided to play along.
        "Ok, ok. You've made your point babe." He looked at the distance
indicator on his console, automatically spinning his fighter away from a
shower of tiny asteroids as though it was second nature. Only fifteen
thousand kilometers to go - not bad, thought Brimic. As soon as they
cleared the asteroids they could open up the engines and make Tirellen 9
in just minutes.
        "At last!" cried Gret as the two starfighters pulled out of the
intense asteroid field. "That's got to be one of the longest ones I've
ever seen. What about you Brimic?"
        Brimic began scanning the navlanes for other traffic as he
switched his transponder on, partially distracted. "Um, yeah." Flicking
his scanner through the numerous ships in orbit around the planet his
incoming traffic alarm blinked red on the console.
        "Look sharp Gret, we've got company." An unidentified nebulon-b2
popped out of hyperspace several thousand klicks away and started
towards the planet. "Whoever they are." he frowned at the ship on his
display.
        "That's funny, their transponder is off. What do you- oh hang
on, it's on now. Seems to be a private civilian code, nothing to worry
about. Probably just a system glitch." commented his wingman.
        Brimic stared at his display for a few silent moments. It
couldn't be.
        "Gret! Does that frigate look at all familiar to you?" he asked.
        Her face appeared on his HUD, silouetted against the stars
filling his cockpit. "What do you mean? We've seen plenty of frigates
before."
        "Does anything in particular strike you as odd about this one?"
As his eyes roamed a data screen he suddenly became more excited. "Run
it through your computer logs quickly and tell me what you get!" he
waited with baited breath as she did so.
        Gret blinked here eyes in disbelief. "Is that really...?"
        He nodded, a wide grin covering his face. "Yep. My log tells me
the same thing. That frigate is the exact same one at the attack on hook
station. Hull paint, battle scars, even the hull serial numbers are the
same - see?"
        "Great! Should we follow them?" asked Gret, her face lighting up
at the prospect of completing their mission. She could see Brimic had
also lost his depression and seemed to be much more alive now that they
had a positive lead.
        He shook his head. "Not with our hyperdrives. Those KDY frigates
can outrun us almost two to one, but... hey you getting a launch?"
        "Yeah, yeah I got one. Seems to be a TIE shuttle, heading
directly for the primary refinery." she smiled. "I think we should pay
them a visit."
        The engines of the two purple-blue R-41 fighters flared as they
accelerated towards the distant installation, keeping their distance
from the shuttle as it entered one of the cavernous docking bays.

        "I see it. Hey, who are those guys?" whispered Gret.
        Brimic crouched next to her behind a pile of packing containers.
He leaned towards her and whispered back "How should I-"
        He was suddenlt cut off as a passing astrodroid beeped at them
curiously before a waved blaster pistol sent it rolling away as fast as
its motivator would allow. Breathing a sigh of relief he turned to his
partner.
        "As I was saying, how should I know? I've never seen these guys
before."
        They turned back to the two hooden men standing near the
shuttle. They looked harmless enough with their robes and cloaks, much
like ordinary travellers - but appearences could be decieving.
        Brimic watched them for a few moments. "The one on the left, I
think he's the leader."
        "How do you know?"
        He turned and grinned at her. "Intuition baby!"
        Gret shook her head "Brimic!"
        Shrugging he explained himself "Well actually I heard the other
guy call him 'sir' just before now."
        He was rewarded with a playful elbow to the ribs from her. She
was giving him her best fake angry look, the one he always got when she
was in playful mood. Before they could continue a shout echoed out.
Instantly they had their blasters out and slowly peeked over the top of
the crate towards the shuttle. A jawa had sidled up to the shuttle and
was running its grubby little hands across the starboard radiator panel.
One of the man was walking over to it. As they watched the man drew a
blaster rifle from within his robes and poked the jawa in the back of
the head with it.
        The jawa turned around to see an E-11 blaster rifle poking in
under the hood of its brown robe, directly between both its little
glowing eyes. It yelped in surprise.
        "Clear off you piece of scum!" Even across the hanger they heard
that one.
        The voice sounded harsh and commanding, as though the man was
used to giving orders and having them obeyed. Military, or ex-military
perhaps? thought Brimic. The jawa immediately scuttled off towards a few
of its brethren hanging about by a hanger wall. Under the baleful glare
- and blaster rifle - of the robed man, they slowly started to move
along.
        A few minutes later another man, this time dressed in business
garb, walked into the hanger. Spotting the two men waiting by the
shuttle he strode up to them, his walk full of confidence. The two men
turned to face him, shaking hands and greeting each other.
        "Can you hear what's going on?" whispered Gret.
        Brimic had always had the better hearing of the pair and was
currently straining to try and catch glimpes of their conversation. When
they had first met she thought he had cyber-enhanced hearing or enhanced
DNA, but now she understood it was just a trait - much like family genes
or something of the kind. He waved her question away and closed his
eyes, trying to focus on the sound eminating from the distant men.
        "Something about a purchase... he's a representative... shit,
they're leaving." Brimic opened his eyes and looked at the group of men.
As they watched the small group left the hanger together for an unknown
destination.
        As soon as they left he stood up and started towards the empty
shuttle.
        "Hey, shouldn't we follow them or something?" complained Gret as
she stretched her legs, shaking her feet and arms to relieve a sudden
attack of pins and needles.
        Brimic continued up to the shuttle, now dark and silent. There
was no waiting pilot behind the transparisteel cockpit and after a quick
check he verified they had the hanger all to themselves. He pulled
something from one of his flightsuit pockets and clamped it onto the
hull, right beneath one of the panel support pylons. Giving it a few
experimental tugs he satisfied himself that the object had successfully
latched itself onto the hull.
        "What is it?" asked Gret as she walked up beside him.
        "Just a little homing beacon so we can find it later." smiled
Brimic proudly. "I got it before we left Tantooine at watto's
discounts."
        She looked doubtful. "Are you sure it works?"
        "Yeah I'm sure! I tested it out on your fighter for a week after
I got it! Trust me, this little gizmo works."
        Gret was indignant. "Hey! Who said you could go putting strange
things on my ship?"
        He took her by the hands. "Hey, I'm sorry ok? It wasn't like I
could have just stuck it on some freighter heading across the galaxy - I
might never have got it back!"
        She pouted back at him.
        "Ok, ok. I'll make it up to you! I promise! But right now we
need to get out of here before those guys come back, alright?"
        "Well.... ok, but it's your shout for dinner tonight!" She
flashed him a quick smile.
        Holstering their blasters, they headed outside and quickly
vanished into the crowds of droids and workers hauling refined ores on
repulsortrucks and robotic lifters. Dargos the hutt would be pleased at
their little find.
        "Hey Brimic." she whispered in his ear. "I think this calls for
a little celebration."

        The tavern was called Jurga's Place and the whole seedy interior
reeked of spices and inhaled drugs. Even the air was thick with yellow
smoke, reducing visibliity to barely a few meters and making the two
stumble their way to the bar. A thickly muscled human looked back at
them as they took seats.
        "Waddya want?"
        "Er, two muurian hyperbombs and a plate of tikos thanks." said
Brimic as he handed over several credit chits.
        The barman nodded, accepting the money and writing down the
order for the kitchen staff to deal with. Brimic took the opportunity to
give Gret a smile.
        "Hey babe. We did it."
        She smiled back. "We sure did. I just hope Dargos pays us well,
this last month and a half has been really tight on the budget."
        "I think he will, after all..." He leaned back with a smile and
continued. "Who else woulda recognised the same ship from a short battle
six weeks ago?" He waved his arms. "Nobody, that's who."
        Gret nodded and looked up as the bartender placed their drinks
on the bar. Taking a sip she sighed as they waited for their food to
arrive.
        "Hey Brimic, that you?" called out a gruff male voice from
behind them.
        The turned around to see a tall lanky blue-skinned alien with
yellow tubules sticking out the top of his head and a smoking pipe from
his mouth. Staring down at the seated pair briefly then focusing on
Brimic the stranger snorted in mirth.
        "Ha Ha. You change much from last meeting."
        Brimic blinked. "Do I know you?"
        The alien bellowed with laughter again. "Sure you do. How you
not remember your old sabacc pal from the _Cortizona_?"
        "The _Cortizona_?" asked Brimic. Then it all came back to him.
"Yrisk!" he cried out standing up and embracing his old friend. "It's
sure been awhile!"
        Yrisk nodded and pulled his pipe out, breathing a cloud of some
dreamy substance sold illegally on most worlds. "It has. Five years no?"
        "Five years. Wow, time sure does fly doesn't it?" He got a nod
"Um, So what have you been up to then?"
        Yrisk sat down on one of the barstools next to him and leant on
the bartop. "I work mole miner for living. Quanti-Manufacturing my
employer. Work dangerous in asteroid field but pay very good, and I like
good pay. You?"
        "Well Gret and I-"
        "Gret? That is your name young one?" Gret leaned away slightly
nervously as the alien looked her over. "Huh. No muscles, what good?"
        "Gret and I are both fighter pilots now, we fly R-41 starchasers
and-"
        She cut him off. "In a dogfight muscles mean nothing compared to
skill, Yrisk."
        The alien nodded. "Ah." Yrisk took a long puff on his pipe, and
exhaled a thick plume of red smoke. "I have sabacc game to get back to.
It has been good Brimic."
        "Uh, yeah. Nice to see you again too."
        Yrisk left the bar vanished into the yellow mists that permeated
the building.
        "Bye!" called Gret after him. She turned to Brimic. "That guy
was pretty wierd. How'd you meet him?"
        "In a sabacc game. The _Cortizona_ was an old corellion corvette
in this backwater planets navy. We served for a couple years before
quitting and heading our seperate ways, it was not long after that I met
you on Coruscant."
        Gret nodded "Yeah."
        Coruscant. The wars that had wreaked havoc across the gigantic
cities that sprawled across most of the landmass had killed her family,
leaving her a young woman trying to survive amidst the civil upheaval
that followed. That was when Brimic found her shivering in a dark alley,
trying to stay warm by the heat exhaust from one of the factories. It
had been a dark time.
        A voice broke through her trance-like state.
        "Hey Gret."
        She looked back up towards her partner.
        Brimic smiled. "Food's here."

        Brimic and Gret stood before before the flickering low-quality
holoscreen that illuminated the otherwise dark transmission booth. The
glowing image showed the leering face of Dargos the hutt, looking down
at his two pawns as though he was about to sacrifice them in a game of
chess.
        "So little ones, what warrants your interruption of my
entertainment? I hope you bring me good news." said the hutt, while
chewing with his mouth full of some still-wriggling creature.
        Brimic nodded his head respectfully. "Dargos, we have found one
of the ships that participated in the destruction of hook platform and I
have hidden a tracking device aboard one of its short-range shuttles."
        The disgusting creature laughed. "Ha ha ha. So now you found
them yes? You will follow their ship and find their hiding place. Once
you have found them, return to scar platform and I will give you payment
personally. Do not fail me humans."
        They both managed to nod their understanding before the link was
cut off, plunging the cubicle into darkness apart from the light seeping
in under the door.
        "I guess its back to the cockpit then." sighed Gret.
        She retrieved the holonet payment card from the machine and
stowed it away before leading the way back outside into the foggy
tavern. They paused briefly to have one more round of drinks before
heading directly for the hanger bays and their starfighters, eager to
get their mision completed as soon as possible.

        At an anonymous point in deep space a fleet was gathering. Two
strike cruisers and a neutralizer-class vessel watched over the
gathering ships. Every now and then a new freighter would jump into the
area to make a delivery and be immediately silenced by volleys of ion
fire, boarded by droids and the crews ejected into space. Gardat wanted
nobody to talk.
        The nebulon-b2 _Murrin_ dropped out of hyperspace nearby,
sending a greeting. Alongside them was yet another mammoth cargo vessel,
already under droid control. The largest vessels present were a trio of
four-mile long modular transports, one of which was carrying the
FabriCorp orbital factory unit 'commissioned' by Vars over a month ago.
Soon they would have assembled all the equipment and materials necessary
for their expedition to wildspace and nobody would ever find them again.

        "Status?" called out Gardat.
        "Ninety-four percent present and ready for departure. Still
waiting for the arrival of several ships, including the frefab ion
mines."
        The commander nodded. "Very well, inform me when the convoy is
ready for departure."
        "Yes sir."
        The bridge was fairly quiet for a few more hours as new arrivals
were brought under their control and their navicomputers slaved to the
_Growler_ while battle droids ensured no hidden surprises lurked on
board any of the vessels. The swarm of transports gathered together in
formation, ready for departure.
        "One ship to go sir." reported the lieutenant. "Droids securing
the habitat module now. Expected completion of task, eight minutes."
        Gardat nodded. "Good. Signal all ships to prepare for immenent
departure, and tell Captain Vars that he did his job well."
        "Sir, multiple contacts emerging from hyperspace! They're not
ours!"
        "What?!?" shouted Gardat as he lept to his feet, staring at the
screen.

        Several ominous looking dreadnoughts and a single MC80 calamari
cruiser popped into realspace several thousand kilometers ahead of them,
launching fighters and forming into an attack formation. They were
heading directly for them.

        "Ha ha ha. Now you will pay!" laughed Dargos from his
observation deck on board his flahsip, the _Hruuga_.
        The MC80 was his greatest prize yet, stolen directly from a Mon
Calamari shipyard before completion and finished by his pirate teams
working with stolen parts. His court was busy enjoying the party being
held around him, celebrating his soon to be victory over those who dared
mess with the mighty Dargos the Hutt. Dancing girls filled the centre
stage while his band played their music as loudly as possible without
using amplifiers.
        "Master, master." It was one of his cronies. "The captain
requests your permission to engage the enemy."
        "He should know better. Tell him to fight now, I will deal with
him later." said the hutt.

        "Tracking five dreadnought class cruisers, an MC80 and
aproximately eight squadrons of assorted fighters on attack vectors!"
        "Give the _Growler_ covering fire!" shouted Captain Trisk. "They
have to get away or all is lost!"
        He grabbed his armrests for support as his ship rocked beneath
his feet, the strike cruiser struck by heavy weapons of some kind. The
viewports flashed green as they returned fire with their turbolasers,
but without fighter support they were good as lost. Unfortunately none
of their ships possessed any operable fighters - they were all
disassembled and in storage to make room for more cargo; even if they
had sufficient pilots to fly them, the craft were unusable. Trisk cursed
as a squadron of Y-wings delivered a punishing blow to one of the cargo
vessels, blasting the central control module to chunks of molten metal.
        Again the _Kremin_ rocked beneath his feet, this time much
harder.
        "Status report! How long to hyperjump?"
        "Less than a minute sir, attempting to-"

        Commander Gardat watched as the _Kremin_ vanished in a massive
flash of light, the MC80 cruiser powering through to debris and heading
directly for the heart of his formation. A ship that even their combined
firepower would have been unable to stop, especially without fighters.
        "All ships to divert maximum power to engines! Outrun the
dreadnoughts and-" he paused as the deck rocked beneath his feet.
        "Shields down sir!" cried out an officer.
        To punctuate his words the deck started rumbling as turbolaser
blasts started eating away at the hull armor and smashing internal
systems. Before Gardat could continue the bridge exploded into chaos as
a near 'miss' from a heavy tubolaser burned through another part of the
bridge tower superstructure. Lights flickered and screens exploded as
power surges ran rampant through the system, several droids were caught
under a collapsing ceiling support beam that was blasted free, sparks
flying across the floor.
        "I don't care what happens to the hyperdrive, jump now!" scream
Gardat through the carnage around him.
        He realised the helmsman was lying dead over his console, flames
crackling around his still form. Immediately Gardat leapt from his seat,
steadying himself as the deck shook, staggering forwards to push the
hyperdrive lever himself.
        Immediately the battered _Growler_ and what remained of Gardat's
fleet leapt to hyperspace, escaping their pursuers and leaving the
shattered debris of two strike cruisers, assorted transports and a
pirate dreadnought behind.

        Down in hanger bay a stormtrooper looked down at the still form
lying at his feet with repressed disgust and hatred. After the deaths of
hundreds of his comrades at the hands of pirate scum like this it was
all he could do not to pull the trigger of his E-11. He looked at his
squad of battle droids with fire burning behind his expressionless
helmet.
        "Take this one to a detention cell! And search the wreckage for
any more." he snapped.
        FT-034 looked away at the smoking remnants of one of their
lambda-class shuttles, destroyed when the pirates flew their craft
inside the hanger bay as their fighters collided in the confined space.
He looked up at the towering mounds of cargo containers that filled the
cavernous area, most likely the cause of the accident, and snorted.
        "Sir, we have found a second survivor." intoned one of the
battledroids.
        It indicated a twisted form caught within the smouldering
remains of a shattered cockpit, one arm bent completely the wrong
direction. Fortunately for the prisoner, he or she was completely
unconscious from the crash - probably from sustaining serious injuries.
        FT-034 growled in displeasure but orders were orders. "Get that
one to a medical droid!"

        "Damage report!" yelled Gardat through the smoke and din of his
chaotic bridge.
        One of the surviving lieutenants coughed and tried to read his
screen through the noxious haze. "Sir, we have thirteen seperate hull
breeches." He hacked for a few moments before continuing. "Approximately
half our turbolasers are non-operational and two pulsemass generators
have sustained serious damage." He paused again to wave a white plume
from his face. "The central computer core has sustained minor damage
to-"
        Gardat lept to his feet in horror. "Minor damage to what?" he
snapped in agitation.
        If they had lost the design and construction data - or even
portions of it - his plans would be crippled. There were prototypes and
working examples of some devices, but others would be completely
irreplaceable for him. With the loss of both his strike cruisers and
much of the supplies intended for the construction of their new base,
this could be devastating.
        The lieutenant hesitated. "It's bad sir."
        Gardat jumped into the bridge pit and pushed the poor man aside.
Blinking the smoke tears away he leaned close to the screen.
        "No!"
        Nearly twenty percent of the data core had been corrupted beyond
repair, and another fifteen was filled with gaping holes. A logistical
catastophe, even beyond that of the losing half the convoy. Until they
had time to discover what had been lost he had to assume the worst.
        Gardat stared at the blinking red display for several long
moments before turning away.
        "I'm sorry commander. The ion cannon fire disrupted the matrix
before automatic systems shut it down."
        Slowly nodding Gardat climbed up the stairs leading out from the
crew pit. Collapsing into his seat he took a deep breath of the rancid
air and looked up at the surviving crewmen and droids.
        "Signal _Murrin_ and the rest of the convoy to alter course.
Plot a destination outside the galactic rim and take us there as fast as
the hyperdrive will allow."
        "Yes sir." The men turned to obey.
        "And get the repair droids in here now. If life support isn't
fully operational within the hour I'll scrap them."
        For a while the bridge seemed to settle down into an almost
tranquil setting. The white smoke clouds made the whole setting seem
very surreal, almost like the command deck was shrouded in a thick mist
that swallowed the repair droids gliding back and forth with glowing
laser cutters and blinking lights. After a while the air began to clear
and he could now make out several shattered screens, the circuits melted
from the electrical currents that had surged through and overloaded
them. A tech team arrived fresh from the engineering section, which had
fortunately suffered far less damage.
        Satisfied that the repairs were proceeding smoothly Gardat left
the bridge to his lieutenant and went straight to his stateroom. The
serene atmosphere was a welcome relief to the chaos outside as the
mid-jump repairs were conducted to critial systems. The central
holoprojector still slowly spun an incredibly detailed map of the
galaxy, holos of old imperial coruscant lined the walls and even the
writing implements covering his desk were unmoved.
        Taking a seat, Gardat quickly called up the main computer and
started scanning through the list of corrupted or deleted filenames. A
tri-D image of the storage matrix showed a deep red streak running
through the display, intersecting several datanodes. They could replace
essantial system software from backups, but the tear through the design
and construction data was irreversable. Some data was also backed up on
holodisks, but a direct hit to one of the cargo bays had annihilated
many of them. Pulling a complete list of everything remaining Gardat ran
his eyes down the list with abaited breath.
        Fortune was smiling on him. They still had blueprints for most
imperial vessels. regrettably every single rebel design was wiped - so
much for creating a civil war then. Brushing aside those thoughts he
checked the fleet designs he had picked out for immediate construction
were still there.
        They were.
        Breathing a great sigh of relief Gardat slumped back into his
seat and pulled a bottle of corellion ale from a desk drawer. Taking a
good hard slug he laughed to himself. Not all was lost, and with a
little ingenuity and searching his tech teams - those that survived -
would be able to cobble together enough for a decent array of forces.
The lost data was not completely irreplaceable - of course, there had
been other hidden depots out there created by their late Emperor. But
without so much as a hint to their location they were as useless to him
as a settlement of jawas.
        Pulling the manifests of the surviving cargo vessels he smiled.
They still had the 'special delivery' by FabriCorp that Vars had
obtained for him.
        "A good officer there" thought Gardat as he continued on.
        Much of the mining and refinery equipment had survived, but none
of the ion mines or other static defenses had made it. Not even a single
theatre shield. Wherever they ended up, secrecy really WAS going to be
necessary - even a pirate force could now wipe them out. It would be
unthinkable to let scum like that get ahold of the data Gardat held in
his grasp. He remembered when TIE defender plans had fallen into the
hands of pirates during the campaign against the rogue Admiral Zaarin
before the battle of Endor. Fortunately the Empire had stopped them
cold, but it would be impossible for him to do so - at least until they
were established.
        "We will survive." muttered Gardat. He would not allow
otherwise.

        "Ha ha ha ha. Those bandits never cross me again. Ha ha ha ha."
Dargos laughed again and again at the defeat of his enemy. Signalling
his aide to command his vessels to scour the area for battle debris,
Dargos plucked something wet, slimy and wriggling from a murky water
tank next to him. Still chortling to himself he slurped down the weakly
struggling creature as his MC80 cruiser slowly made its way forwards
through the debris.
        Salvage crews started making their ways through the floating
wreckagem heading for the smashed cargo vessels and the spilled cargo
pods. They were busy working away at collecting them together and
tractoring them aboard the _Hruuga_ when several new ships jumped into
the area. Among their number was a squadron of republic-class star
destroyers, an interdictor cruiser and several squadrons of X-wings.
        The newcomers immediately broadcast a message to the pirates.
        "Pirate fleet, this is Admiral Thurt of the New Republic. You
are hearby charged with numerous counts of grand larceny, theft, fraud,
murder and now willful destruction of stolen property. You will
surrender yourselves and your vessels and prepare to be boarded. Thurt
out."
        "Noooooo!" bellowed Dargos in frustration.

        Light.
        Bright light.
        Groaning to himself Brimic slowly opened his eyes, squinting
through the sharp white haze that was obscuring his vision. After a few
minutes his eyes adjusted to the brilliant light and the featureless
vison before him resolved into the glowing ceiling panel of an imperial
detention cell. Blinking his eyes several times he slowly tried to get
up, pushing his legs off the bunk and resting on his hands as he took in
the room. It was a gray and white featureless chamber with his bunk
against one wall, a small sink and toilet facility in the far corner and
a large grey metal door that was the centrepiece of the room.
        What the hell happened?
        Brimic strained to try and remember how he could have ended up
inside an imperial detention cell. Suddenly his memories came flooding
back in a flash of pain. He and Gret had been flying their starfighters
in the attack, seeing the relatively vulnerable hanger bay shields
collapse on the interdictor cruiser they had flown inside hoping to
wreak what havoc they could. But the hanger bay had been packed with
cargo containers. Brimic barely had time to scream before his R-41
collided with something and it all went black.
        Gret.
        What had happened to her? Was she alright?
        "Hey guards!" he stood up. "Hey! Is anybody out there?" There
was no reply.

"Commander, we are now six full days outside the galactic rim."
        "Disengage hyperdrive and initiate a full sensor sweep. I want
to know if there's anything within a hundred light years." ordered
Gardat.
        Wildspace was the sparesly filled region outside the galactic
spiral. In a sense it was still part of the galaxy, but so faint and
distant as to be almost seperate. If, theoretically, the galaxy had ten
stars for every ten light years, wildspace might have one or two for
every thousand - if that. It was as unexplored as the unknown regions of
the galaxy and apart from te occasional lost ships that rarely returned,
nobody ever came back from such unpredictable areas of space. Nobody
really knew what was out there. But soon, Gardat would.
        The bridge had been fully repaired since the battle ten days
ago. Apart from some residual scorching on some wall panels, it looked
almost good as new. The same could not be said for the rest of
_Growler_, the lengthy hyperspace journey was taking its toll on the
cruiser and the hull integrity had started to weaken over the last
couple of days. Vicous scars were dug deep into the wounded hull and
most of the damage was irreparable without proper shipyard facilities -
which they currently lacked.
        Crew casualties had put their level of combat status into the
redline. Even with droid replacements manning most crew stations, they
were less than a skeleton crew. Not a single operational fighter - those
they had were in deep storage - and half the turbolasers were out. The
only really good news was that the sublight engines had not even been
scratched one iota.
        "Detecting a total of three star systems within maximum sensor
range. System designated X/R0045 has the largest active sun." The man
looked up. "Sir, It is my recommendation we investigate this system - it
may be what we're looking for."
        "Agreed lieutenant, plot a course and inform the _Murrin_ to
investigate. I don't want to strain our hyperdrive much more than
nexessary. If it checks out, the rest of the fleet will join him."

        Captain Vars stared out of a starboard bridge viewport down at
the colossal monster below. It was just unbelievable that something so
enourmous could exist. It went against all known laws of physics,
including gravitational ones.
        "That thing is a planet? It looks like the size of a sun."
        "It is sir. This whole place is amazing - the mineral readouts
are off the scale, including several completely unknown composites
buried in the planets crust. It doesn't seem artificial, but I've never
heard of anything like this before."
        "Neither have I." Breathed Vars.
        The _Murrin_ was orbiting the king of worlds. A gigantic planet
easily larger than any small yellow sun Vars had seen. It stretched so
far it almost seemed like the dimunitive nebulon-b2 frigate was floating
above a flat plane, painted by some impressionist artist that had
happened by. By all rights so planet so massive should never even
possibly have been able to exist, instead collapsing under its own
gravity into either a dwarf or black hole. Legends about wildspace had
always made it out to be exotic, but never like this.
        "Atmosphere?"
        "Within breathing tolerances, although you're looking at a
six-month day down there. Average temperature in temperate zones,
absolute zero on the poles and an average of four-hundred and ninety
degress celcius on the equator. This place seems to have it all."
        "Lifesigns?"
        "Numerous. No signs of intelligent life though, but they could
be hiding." The lieutenant paused as his screen flashed something.
"Here's something else odd about this place. This entire planet has an
average gravity of one gee - impossible."
        "I'll say. Can you even begin to guess why?"
        "It could have something to do with the unknown minerals the
scans detected or else some sort of massive antigravity system buried in
the core. I really don't know."
        "Send down a probe droid. Get me a soil and mineral sample and
run it through a hyperspectrometer as well as the usual tests. I want an
age for this place."

        A small black sphere plummeted from the hanger bay of _Murrin_
towards the super-planet below. It took the form of a plummeting
meteorite as the atmosphere burned and scorched the metal casing,
glowing almost white-hot as the ground grew larger and larger. With a
mighty THUMP the falling drop pod landed within an immense forest that
stretched across whole mountain ranges, as far as the horizon from
orbit.
        With a hum of repulsorlifts the probe droid lifted itself out of
the crater and spun about, looking for any signs of local wildlife. None
were to be found. Hovering forwards the droid extended a manipulator
towards a nearby example of the local flora. It was just another of the
strange trees that towered up, pushing towards the sky. A small buzzsaw
extended from the arm and started cutting into the smooth, featureless
bark.

        "Getting some very strange readings from down there sir. It's -
holy crap!"

        The buzzsaw cut deeply into the treetrunk and a thick, vicous
red ooze started pumping out. With a rumble the whole tree started
shaking as though experiencing a continuous earthquake. The effect
slowly started spreading from tree to tree, until as far as the curious
droid could detect the entire forest seemed to be waving backwards and
forwards. Almost as though it was alive.
        Where the ooze had touched the buzzsaw the metal was now smoking
and dissolving as though being eaten away by a very strong acid. The
liquid spilling onto the ground was simply soaked up instantly, as
though it had never been there. With a crash the leafless branches of
the tree suddenly straightened and then started waving about like
prehensile tentacles. The alarmed droid backed away as fast as its
motivator could allow before another tree snagged it, wrapping several
thick branches around it and drawing it towards a yawning opening in the
side of the trunk. An opening with teeth.
        The droid sent one last burst transmission before it was dragged
inside the opening and the teeth closed on its armored shell.
Registering external damage the droid activated its self-destruct
mechanism, detonating violently and ripping the tree apart in a spray of
fleshy material and red gore.

        The lieutenant was staring at his screen unbelievingly. "Sir...
I think this planet might be something else..."
        Vars was staring at the surface from his viewport, also in
shock. Below on the surface the forest was rippling with such force it
was visible from orbit. Whole mountain ranges were shifting and it
seemed like a whole continent was ripping itself in half. Then he saw
it. In the very center, swelling up from below, was a giant staring eye
the size of a continent.
        "Holy shit!" He spun about white as a ghost. "Helm! Get us out
of here, NOW!"
        Immediately _Murrin_ started forwards. Its oversized sublight
drives flaring brightly as all available power was redirected into the
thrusters. Below millions of massive tentacles each tipped by snapping
mouths the size of a battle station were rising up from the surface,
heading directly towards them. The frigate climbed away from lower orbit
with the appendages in hot pursuit, slowly gaining.
        "Faster! Redirect all power to engines!"
        The crewmen struggled to comply as sweat dripped down their
fearstruck faces. No creature lke this had ever been reported before -
it was almost like being in a ficitonal holomovie, except that for them
it was very real. An astrodroid assigned to one of the comm stations
beeped in distress as the tendrils loomed larger.
        Suddenly the helmsman realised they had cleared the gravity
well. Without asking for confirmation he pulled the hyperdrive lever.
Outside one of the giant flytrap mouths closed to snap the tiny ship in
half. As it swing shut the frigate leapt forwards to lightspeed and
vanished into hyperspace, the crew breathing a collective sigh of
relief.
        Vars let out the breath he had been holding. "Well done
lieutenant." He looked at his bridge crew. "Send a message to the
_Growler_ warning them of what's here, then set a course for the next
nearest star."
        "Aye sir."

        Within an hour the _Murrin_ reverted to realspace within the
confines of designate XT/01056, the next closest system sixty-four light
years away. A medium-sized yellow star burned through the darkness,
illuminating the computer enhanced sensor displays of the worlds grasped
within its gravitational pull. Two asteroid belts circles between the
third and fourth planets, slowly spinning chunks of rock that may have
once been planets.
        "Any anomolous gravitational readings?" asked Vars cautiously.
        He had no desire to awaken another bizarre planet-creature and
neither did his crew.
        "Negative, all readings normal for local stellar bodies. The
second planet seems to be a standard M class planet, detecting varied
life signs. No signs of space technologies, nothing out of the ordinary
for a pre-industrial world sir."
        He nodded. "Good. Dispatch another probe droid and have the
engines ready, just in case."
        The helmsman nodded and he ran his fingers over his console.
"Aye sir, priming engines for immediate departure."
        Vars walked over to the nearest viewport and looked at the
planet below. For all intents are purposes it seemed normal - but as
they had just learned, appearences could be very decieving. When they
had established themselves and construction was well underway his first
action would be to return and destroy the thing. On the other hand, a
decoy transmitter orbiting the planet being might make for an
interesting way to dispose of unwanted sightseers.
        Yes, he mused, that will do very nicely.
        "Droid launched."

        The new droid dug itself out of the smoking landing crater and
examined its surroundings. It immediately collected a soil and flora
sample, determining them to be within normal limits for human life
support requirements. The atmosphere was breathable and the external
temperature just above twenty degrees celcius. The matt black droid
floated up, repulsorlifts humming, and surveyed the surrounding area. It
was within a large open valley with a waterfall cascading down from
cliffs at one side, sparkling in the sun. Long grass and small clumps of
various tress dotted over the scenic landscape until a distant forest
started. Zooming in, the robot attained the trees were a corellion
variety and did not belong here.
        Zooming towards the trees to investigate further it detected
several humanoid life forms hiding behind several clumps of brush. It
started a full-spectrum analysis examining heart rates, breathing, exact
shape and size. The results were cross-checked with the orbiting ships
database and the analysis confirmed.
        They were human.
        Transmitting its complete find to _Murrin_ the droid attained an
altitude of several hundred meters, looking down at the men. They seemed
to be armed with a variety of primitive weapons - bows, spears and
darts. One of them was carrying a sword made of hull-quality metals.
Registering this anomaly the droid continued to survey the planet,
transmitting everything continuously as it flew along.

        A few hours later a military protocol droid operating one of the
consoles turned towards the waiting Vars and handed him a datapadd with
the complete observation data. "Sir, my counterpart on the planet has
attained that it is suitable for our colonization. There is a
ninety-nine point three-two-four probability that mining operations on
the planet, and possibly the moons as well, will be successful. In
addition-" it was cut off with a wave by Vars.
        "Enough. I'll read the complete report later. Contact major
Hargos and have him join me in the hanger bay along with a droideka. I
want to find out who these local humans are before we go any further
with this."
        "Yes, of course sir.

        Major Hargos was waiting by the TIE shuttle with a battle droid
as Vars approached. Immediately he snapped to attention. Neither man was
bothering with robes this time - the primitives would likely be awed by
their uniforms and gleaming body armor. Both men were carrying assorted
weapons, including their much-used guns of command and personal light
shielding.
        "At ease major, we're heading down to check out the natives so
keep your E-11 handy. Droid, identify yourself."
        The droideka bowed its head. "I am DR-446. Your command sir?"
        "Both of you, board the shuttle. We're taking a little trip."
ordered Vars.
        "I obey." intoned the droid, before folding up and rolling into
the passenger compartment.
        It was closely followed by Hargos who sat himself on one of the
seats and proceeded to give his weapons one last check, hefting his
blaster rifle with both hands and going over the power packs. The major
eyed the droid beside him and looked it up and down. With a personal
forcefield that could withstand blaster fire the droideka would be
unstoppable against any attacks by any primitives. Hopefully they
wouldn't run into anything bigger.
        Vars piloted the shuttle out from the crowded hanger bay and
towards the lush, idyllic planet below. If it was possible, he wanted to
keep most of their manufacturing offworld in orbital stations or on the
moons - the world below would make an excellent source for nutrients and
cultivating a subservient population.
        "What should we call this place Hargos?"
        The major silently thought for a few moments. "How about
Albrach?"
        Vars nodded. "Yes, a good choice. We shall honor his service to
the Emperor."

        Waroogon stared up as the sky-chariot flew down from the clouds.
The sun reflected off the metal frame brightly, showing the master
craftsmanship of whoever had made such a vehicle. In the great city he
had once seen other chariots being drawn by many-legged beasts in the
colluseum but none of them ever resembled such as he was now seeing.
Part of his mind wanted to flee as the very sight of such an unnatural
creation, but curiosity compelled him to seek cover behind the bamboa
tree to watch.
        Before his very eyes the strange craft landed within distance of
his bow. Keeping this in mind Waroogon quickly string the wooden
implement and drew an arrow - if they were strange wizards after his
herd they would not get his animals without a fight. As he watched two
doors in the front opened. A oddly dressed man stepping out of the black
circular door, which seemed to slide aside, and another strange man and
a bizarre creature dropped out of the other pod which comprised half of
the chariot's body. The creature held his attention utterly - it was
gleaming in the light and seemed to be made entirely of metal. Where
hands should have been were two stubby lumps of metal with small rods
sticking straight out - and strangest of all, it had three legs!
Waroogon gasped as it folded up into a metal wheel and spun across the
landscape around the metal chariot, stopping and unfolding several times
before returning to the two men.
        One of looked at the metal creature as though it had said
something then turned and looked in Waroogon's direction. Cursing, he
ducked back behind the tree and hoped they would miss him. After a few
long moments he heard dry leaves cracking as footsteps approached. They
had found him! Drawing his bow he leapt out from behind the tree and
fired at the closest stranger, his arrow piercing the morning air like a
well-thrown dart.
        The surprised man was unable to react before the missile reached
its intended target, only partially ducking before the wooden shaft
collided with an invisible energy shield that flared briefly as
Waroogon's arrow shattered on the invisible barrier. His mouth dropped
in surprise and shock - these men must be sorcerors! He had been told
stories by his father about how long ago many wars were fought with
strange devices left by their ancestors, who had once travelled across
the stars. The men who commanded such magical weapons possessed great
power and he suddenly realised he was foolish to suspect anyone else
would have been in the flying chariot. Internally cursing his stupidity
in not immediately running he wondered what they would do to him, now
that he had attacked without warning.

        As he brought his E-11 up to blast the man apart Hargos noted
the abject look of fear in the man's eyes. It told of terror or a sudden
understanding that he was against a foe he could not hope to defeat.
DR-446 rolled up beside him and unfolded into battle-mode, twin blasters
at the ready and waiting for the command to kill.
        "Sir?" Hargos was not sure what to do.
        Vars halted beside him and looked the cowering man before them.
The native was dressed in hunting leathers - obviously very worn but
also of fair quality. He was very obviously human, presumably the
decendant of some explorers or marooned crew whose hyperdrive had
malfunctioned.
        "Do you understand me?" he asked.

        Waroogon was surprised at the strong accent the man spoke. He
had never heard of such a dialect being spoken before but if they had a
flying chariot, then anything was possible. He nodded at the question.

        Vars and Hargos exchanged glances. The man had understood
imperial basic, at least to some extent. Unless he had only come here
recently, it meant he must have been decended from one of the old
republic crews - imperial basic was basically a slightly modifed version
of the universal language used by the crews of the ancient military.
        "I'll handle this." said Vars to his companions. He walked over
to the native and pointed his blaster pistol directly at his head.
        "Get up." he commanded.
        Waroogon slowly put his hands up and got to his feet, staring in
fear at the obviously magical device pointed at him. The king had such
devices in his palace but the magic was long gone from them - these
sorcerers possessed gleaming new ones that almost certainly still
worked.
        "Identify yourself."
        Hesitatingly the captured woodsman spoke. "Waroogon."
        "What, is that a word or your name?" snapped Vars.
        "My name."
        "How long have your people been living here?"
        Waroogon hesitated. He started counting on his fingers, and then
more slowly in his head. After a while he then looked up with a smile.
"Twelve generations. The wisemen in the city keep records of such
things."
        Vars frowned. "The city? You mean that castle across the
plains?"
        Waroogon nodded enthusiastically. "That's the one. You from
there?"
        Holding back a laugh, but chuckling anyway Vars shook his head.
"No, I am Captain Vars of the imperial frigate _Murrin_. Formerly of the
Galactic Empire."
        "Gal-ac-tic Emp-ire?"
        He nodded and smiled. "Yes, it seems your people will have much
to learn... Waroogon."

        Commander Gardat read the transmission from _Murrin_ carefully.
A suitable location had been found, complete with a ready-to-order slave
population. Excellent.
        He looked at the helmsman. "Inform the fleet to set a course for
XT/01056."
        "Aye sir, co-ordinates set. Awaiting your command."
        "Jump."

        The _Growler_ and the surviving cargo ships dropped out of
hyperspace a few planetary diameters from their new home planet,
designated 'Albrach'. The battered neutraliser entered into a high
orbit, watching over the cargo ships as they prepared to unload their
on-board transports loaded with construction droids and materials of all
kinds.
        "The droids await your orders sir."
        "Initiate full deployment."
        The lieutenant smiled and saluted. "At once sir!"

Droid Command Imperitive:
1415626
        Sequence of command initiated.
        Orders recieved.
        Confirmed.
2235526
        Construction droid deployment initiated.
        ...
        ...
3347731
        Priority list processed 87%
        Priority list processed.
        Confirmed.
4790432
        1) Initiate full mining operations on the three moons.
        2) Utilize orbital factory to construct refineries.
        3) Increase droid workforce to 20,000
5253210
        4) Commence construction of second orbital factory.
        5) Commence construction of tibanna gas harvesters.
        6) Deploy harvesters over gas giants in system.
6263167
        7) Increase droid workforce to maximum for each new facility.
        8) Commence construction of Golan MK II battle station.
        9) Commence construction of 1,000 standard battle droids.
7362667
        1) Commence construction of 100 autonomous droid fighters.
        2) Increase mining operations by 100%
        3) Construct new headquarters and starport on Albrach 4.
8366262
        4) Construct ground-based orbital defenses.
        5) Construct full planetary shields.
        6) Commence construction of third orbital factory.
9437324
        7) Commence construction of orbital shipyards.
        ...
        9) Initiate 'Project Osiris'
0457226
        Sequence complete.
        Awaiting new orders.
        Confirmed.
1456326
        ...
        ...
        Osiris master control program activated.

Chapter 3

        Six months had passed. Six very, very long months.
        Brimic had yet to see another single soul since his internment
within the detention cell. Once a day two droids would appear at the
door, one with a tray of food and the other carrying a blaster. He had
already tried rushing them twice but both times the battle droid
stun-blasted him and the tray was left on the floor. Whoever it was that
commanded this ship - if he was still on a ship that is - certainly knew
how to break a man, Brimic ached for news about Gret. Was she even still
alive? Was she alright? Apart from his occasional screams of frustration
Brimic hadn't even heard a human voice for months, except his brief
interrogation at the hands of yet another droid. Sometimes he wondered
if there even were any humans about, or was he stuck alone in some
automated prison somewhere?
        As if timed specifically to coincide with his question, the door
slid up to reveal a visitor outlined in the bright hallway light.
Blinking his eyes Brimic tried to asjust to the much brighter hallway
lighting and take in the features of whoever it was. Male. About six
feet tall and wearing a hat of some kind. The color returned to his
vision and he could make out a grey - military grey. He groaned and
closed his eyes briefly to rest them before taking another look at the
unmoving figure who was watching him with amusement. Then the smile
vanished.
        "On your feet!" snapped the man.
        Brimic looked up at the cold face staring down at him and
realised he was staring at an Imperial officer - a captain no less, if
he recognised the rank cylinders correctly. He suddenly realised with a
cold start that the ships they had been attacking must have belonged to
some Imperial warlord, or at least they used to anyway. Since they
collected such a huge armada of cargo ships he thought it was unlikely
that they had a home base, unless they were trying to pull some kind of
daring resource raid when they hit the platform. Slowly he stood on his
shaking legs, barely used for weeks apart from pacing his cell for days
on end. He licked his dry lips and swallowed, hoping he might get some
more water before they executed him.
        "You are Brimic Aesmo correct?" The captain waited until he
recieved a nod. "Good. You will accompany me."
        "And what if I don't want to?" croaked Brimic through his
parched throat.
        The captain smiled in an unpleasantly cruel way. "I see." The
officer plucked a photograph from his tunic pocket and held it before
Brimic's face. "Perhaps you do not wish to see your young friend again?"
        "Gret! What have you done with her?" gasped Brimic, staggering
forwards until a pair of robotic hands appearing from either side of the
doorway grabbed him by the arms. They crushed his muscles ruthlessly in
their unfeeling grip.
        "Well, it would appear I have hit a nerve with you my friend."
smiled the captain.
        "What do you want?" shouted Brimic, struggling in the arms of
his droid captors.
        The captain continued to smile. "Merely your co-operation Mr.
Aesmo, but first I think I change in localle is required." He looked at
the two droids. "Bring him!"
        Brimic grunted as the droids slapped restraining binders on his
hands and started dragging him behing the fast-walking Imperial, his
feet struggling to keep up with the movement of the droids. They marched
down several lengths of corridor and took a turbolift to the hanger bay
of whatever ship they were in. He looked about and noted it looked
suspicously like the hanger bay aboard the interdictor he and Gret tried
to attacks, right before they crashed. One of several tractor emitters
was suspended directly over the cavernous pit that lead directly into
the black vaccuum outside, making him realise that even if they hadn't
crashed immediately them beam would have likely disabled them anyway.
Several internal quad-laser turrets mounted on the hanger ceiling would
likely have taken care of the rest. Brimic had never served aboard an
Imperial ship and suddenly came to realise just how foolish he and Gret
had been to even try and fly inside of the hanger bay. He briefly
thought it odd that so few people were about; apart from numerous battle
droids filling the area only a few crewmen could be seen.
        They stopped before a TIE shuttle briefly before the captain
shook his head and started towards a larger lambda-class sitting next to
it, heading up the landing ramp and into the cockpit. The droids pushed
Brimic up the ramp and forced him to take a seat across from them. Their
blasters were kept pointed directly at him as the ramp lifted and the
shuttle dropped out through the forcefield as it left the hanger bay.
Looking at one of the internal monitors he realised the ship he had just
been taken from was the exact same interdictor he'd crashed in, except
all the battle damage had been erased. Well they didn't have a workforce
shortage - that much was apparent at least. He looked back to the two
unmoving battle droids opposite him.
        "Don't s'pose you two have any water eh?" he muttered.
        One of them gestured with its blaster. "Your body is over eighty
percent water. That is enough for a human." Both droids seemed to almost
chuckle at this.
        Since when did mass production droids develop humor? he thought.
        After a few minutes the shuttle bumped slighty as it landed, the
monitor showed only green scenery and a few buildings too small on the
screen to be made out properly. The heavy metal ramp lowered and the
captain emerged from the cockpit.
        "Take him outside."
        Half-pulled and half-pushed Brimic staggered into the bright
sunlight, squinting as his eyes attempted to adjust to real daylight for
the first time in months. After a few painful moments he looked around
and took in the landscape. They had landed at the top of a series of
staggered shallow cliffs which were the centre of a manual-labor open
pit mining operation. The workers were all humans and seemed to be
wearing ragged smocks and other crude primitive clothing. None of them
seemed to be chained but as he watched he realised that all of them wore
tracking collars, much like penal colony ones - leave the programmed
area and the collar exploded. Violent, but effective. Around the edges
of the pits were crude huts and shacks with the occasional plume of
smoke drifting up from a few chimneys. Brimic assumed they housed the
workers who were watched over by a gang of brutish men armed with
stun-rods and whips. Several more battle droids patrolled the perimeter,
presumably to keep those foolish enough to try and flee from killing
themselves.
        "Here, have a drink." smiled the officer, throwing a canteen to
the dusty ground.
        As soon as the droids removed the restraining binders Brimic
snatched up the canteen and gulped down the liquid of life greedily, not
letting a single drop go to waste as he drained the one litre container.
Taking a deep breath he threw the canteen back to the captain who caught
it deftly and stowed it back in his belt.
        "Why did you bring me here?" asked Brimic.
        The man smiled. "I am Captain Vars, formerly of the Galactic
Empire and now one of the administrators of this planet. You are here
because I wanted to show you something."
        Vars indicated the miserable workers below. "Do you wish to join
them in my little penal coloney here? You are more than welcome you
know."
        Brimic shook his head.
        "Excellent. I have a proposition for you Mr. Aesmo, this world-"
he gestured towards the mining camp and towards the distant wilderness.
"-is at a pitifully primitve developmental stage. Completely
pre-industrial and in certain places not even medieval. Completely
useless except for nutrient production and our mining operations,
although most are droid operated instead of run by useless scum like
this one."
        "So?"
        "I was coming to that. Even though you are rebel scum-"
        "I'm not a rebel! Gret and I flew for money!"
        "Yes, but you flew against the wrong side yes? One cannot expect
to aggrivate the Empire - or any small portion of it - without incurring
some form of punishment." Vars smiled. "However I think we may come to
an arrangement about that. Your interrogation found that you once served
in a military, correct?"
        "Yeah."
        "Then we have a use for you. Not in any actual military capacity
of course, but the natives of this world need to be educated and while
we have constructed institutions the protocol droids seem to lack that
special 'something' with the children. Am I making myself clear or will
I need to write it down for you?"
        Brimic frowned. "I think I understand. You want me... to teach?"
        Vars smiled broadly. "Excellent! You are intelligent aren't you?
So much more than I was expecting."
        "Just what the hell are you trying to say buddy?" snapped
Brimic. "I'm not some dumb oaf you know! I can strip down an R-41 and
rebuild it without even looking at the tech readouts, ok? So don't get
me started."
        Vars stared back at him "How amusing." His smile vanished.
"Understand me Brimic Aesmo, if you will not co-operate then things will
get very... unpleasant, for both you and Miss Gret Emm. Is that clear?"
        Brimic slowly nodded. "Yeah it's clear. But listen, before I
agree to anything I want to see her alright?"
        "You are in no position to make demands. However I am lenient
and we shall discuss that shortly. Firstly, in return for acting as a
primary grade teacher for children aged between six and twelve years old
at our primary education facility in Karaumpire City you will receive a
full pardon for your crimes against us and be paid standard wages for
your work. Any attempt at escape from this world will be futile but
should you show loyalty then your stay will be pleasant. Should you use
your position to unduly influence the minds of your students then both
they, yourself and Miss Emm will be summarily executed. At all times
your work will be observes by protocol droids and any attempt at
subversion will be detected. Is that understood?"
        Brimic stared back. "Why me? I'm hardly your ideal choice now am
I?"
        "No you are not. But we lack sufficient trained Imperial
personnel for such teaching purposes. You will have two other human
teachers at your facility, one is a native liason whilst the other was
assigned there from the _Murrin_ to oversee proceedings. He will be your
superior and let me assure you that if you do not accept this job, then
you shall not live another year. I have no other use for you on this
primitive world. Your decision?"
        Brimic thought it over. "So basically you want me to help teach
kids... what, just the regular basic stuff?"
        "Correct."
        "And I'll be paid for this?"
        The captain smiled. "Yes."
        "What about Gret? I want to se her now!"
        Vars sighed. "Very well." He pulled his communicator from his
belt and spoke several orders that Brimic didn't understand before
holstering it and looking back. "I will have to apologise. She has been
detained in this penal colony for the past four months and is on her way
now."
        "What! You kept her in here!?!" shouted Brimic. "She's barely
twenty!"
        "The decision was made by someone other than myself." snapped
Vars. "Rest assured I will find those responsible and punish them
personally, just because we are low on manpower does not mean those who
commit infractions shall go unpunished."
        Down below a battle droid was slowly escorting a figure wearing
ragged and tattered dust-covered clothing up the slopes. As it grew
nearer Brimic's face lit up with recognition.
        "Gret!" he called out, breaking into a run.
        The figure stopped and looked up, stopping in surprise as Brimic
ran down the slopes to reach her. He grabbed her and lifted her off her
feet in a powerful hug.
        "Gret! I thought I'd lost you!"
        "B-Brimic." stuttered the young woman in shock.
        He reached up and threw back her the filthy hood of her robe to
kiss her then stopped in shock. Gret's face was covered in horrible burn
scar tissue down the left side, marring her once beautiful visage. Her
hair was tangled and full of dirt. Only one eye stared back at him, the
other nothing more than a scarred socket. Underneath his hands Brimic
could feel thick welts across her back from whipping. He spun back
towards Vars in black anger.
        "Who did this?!?" he screamed. "How could they?"
        Vars arrogant manner was gone, replaced by a cold white fury. He
stared in silence at the maimed prisoner before him, then suddenly
snatching his communicator from his belt.
        "This is captain Vars to _Growler_! I want all the files on
every man who was involved in the handling of the two mercenary
prisoners transferred to my shuttle! NOW!" The radio crackled its
response in confirming his order.
        A single tear started to flow down Gret's ruined face as Brimic
hugged her to him, trying to sooth her as they started to sob in each
others arms. Vars watched them silently. Whoever had done this to her
would pay! This was not what he had envisaged! He tapped Brimic on the
shoulder and stood back as the man spun around, his fist clenched.
Immediately the guards leveled their blasters and prepared to fire. Vars
waved the droids away. He could understand the anguish and pain Brimic
would be going through and even the he had a heart sometimes.
        "Come with me. We'll take her to the medical facility in
Karaumpire."

        Commander Gardat strode into a massive control room hidden deep
beneath the surface of Albrach, watching the screens spring to life at
his entry. It was one of the many construction projects completed by his
thousands-strong droid workforce that never ceased in their hard work to
build a complete industrial infrastructure to fuel his war machine.
There was nowhere near enough human manpower to run everything so they
had to improvise. The room Gardat stood in now was the nerve center of
those changes.
        He stood on a wide walkway running directly through the black
chamber that was big enough to store two AT-ATs. All the walls facing
the durasteel grate walkway that ran until the middle of the room were
covered in viewscreens. On the far wall a single massive screen
stretched across the entire vista, broken up by black computer lines
into numerous sub-screens that displayed continuous streams of data or
live images transmitted from droids anywhere within several light years.
Consoles and access ports lined the edges of the large cicular pad
terminating the walkway, their status lights blinking silently in the
darkness. Apart from the glow given off from the ever-changing
viewscreens there was just minimal lighting given off by soft blue
indicator lights dotted about the chamber. A very eerie place, almost a
shrine to technology.
        Buried within the walls and floor of the chamber, and stretching
for hundreds of meters further down was a giant megacomputer, most
likely the first of its kind. A colossal artificial intelligence that
out-computed any system built before it and given full autonomy in
developing new neural circuits and increasing program parameters to meet
new challenges. Comparing the creation of his head technician, Beel, to
a droid would be like comparing a human mind to that of an insect. This
was something completely new, a varient on the central computer cores
built into world devastators the intelligence was named 'Osiris' and it
functioned as the master control program for every single droid in
Gardat's forces.
        Each individual droid was capable of full autonomy in case of
transmission failure or leaving range of command protocols in which case
their onboard droid brains would kick in until a connection was
restored. To protect against security breeches such as hacking or
unauthorised modifications - like the damage caused by R2-D2 during the
world devastator disaster - it was impossible to modify Osiris software,
except by the master program itself. Even hardwiring was impossible
without first bypassing the massive security systems and permanent
shielding that defending Osiris from physical attack. Automated turrets
beyond count were hidden behind ceiling and wall panels, standard battle
droids and droideka were continually patrolling the corridors scanning
for foreign lifeforms and anything else out of place. Gardat was
satisifed that nothing short of destroying the entire subterranean
complex would shut down his computerized partner.
        The commander stopped before the central control consoles and
turned towards the primary viewscreen, standing at attention with his
arms behind his back.
        "Osiris, report."
        Immediately the primary viewscreen started changing, the myriad
of different images blacking out and imposed barriers between displays
vanishing. A new image started appearing in place that consumed most of
the viewscreen, with only a few data boxes at the edges remaining that
showed nothing but green steams of raw data and technical information.
        Out of nowhere a synthesized male voice spoke.
        "Commander, construction of our industrial infrastructure is
proceeding smoothly. Possible sources of hypermatter have been located
in the unexplored systems of XA/620G, a dust nebula two hundred and
forty light years further out in wildspace. I have dispatched TIE/scouts
and probots to investigate the system."
        The image onscreen resolved itself into the partially
constructed hull of a titanic eleven kilometer long dagger-shaped
vessel. It was floating within the confines of the automated shipyards
floating above them in geostationary orbit. In the background of the
image Gardat could see the comparitively tiny shape of the _Growler_
still docked in the repair bays, undergoing complete refitting to
compensate for her skeleton crew. Practically everything being built now
was totally automated except for a tiny command crew that ran the ship
with the help of innumerable crewdroids and sub-systems. Thus far Osiris
had the shipyards build just two enforcer-class cruisers in order to
testbed new automated systems and trial shipboard versions of the Osiris
mainframe, hopefully eliminating the need for continual human input
except for command and control orders. It was still more effective to
fight with a well trained human crew but Gardat did not have the luxury
of choice, necessity leaving most ship systems under the direct control
of the onboard AI mainframes and their humanoid crewdroids.
        "The vengence-class star battlecruiser _Hammer_ is eighty
percent completed. Incoming tibanna gas supplies are adequate for
subsiduary systems but construction of the main reactor has been halted
until shipments of hypermatter arrive. Utilizing increased droid
workforce number to accelerate construction, estimated time to
completion one month."
        Gardat nodded. "Understood. The local population?"
        The image switched to that of a towering tank droid standing
guard outside a gleaming imperial teaching center, built alongside the
low-tech wood and stone buildings of the local population in their main
city. The natives walking past looked at the metal giant with awe, still
coming to terms with the powerful 'magic' the newcomers had brought to
their world.
        "Local children are learning at standard rates, adults have
proved more difficult and are unlikely to be able to serve within the
military in any capacity. Estimated time until new recruits will be
gathered, ten years. Report complete."
        "Very well."

        TIE/scout pilot SR-513 watched as the steaks of light flashing
past his cockpit slowed down and resolved themselves into distant stars
and galactic formations. Before him and his two wingmen nebula XA/620G
loomed darkly like the dust cloud it was, obscuring most of the
starlight eminating from within except for a few isolated dots. A few
more dots appeared on his scope as the probots jumped in, before
vanishing again as they jumped directly into the nebula to find what
they could.
        "This whole place seems creepy." muttered one of his wingmen.
        "Quiet gamma-2, we have a mission to do. Set course for system
B4 in your navicomputer and engage on my mark."
        The two wingmen quickly complied.
        "Engage."
        A few minutes later they re-emerged from hyperspace well within
the dust cloud, their sensors barely penetrating the ambient
interference that surrounded them. After spending two hours schecking
out system B4 they started away in disgust - it was dry, apart from
possible future mining operations it was nothing but airless rocks
orbiting a dead star. Their scouting was interrupted by a transmission
from one of the probots; it had found somthing outside normal programmed
parameters.
        Quickly locking in on the signal SR-513 gave his wingmen to
go-ahead and they leapt to hyperspace once more. This time the system
was very different.
        "Shit! Is that what I think it is sir?" spluttered gamma-2.
        "Looks like it." replied SR-513.
        Directly ahead of them floated one of the most exotic
astrological phenomena known. A black hole was engaged in a binary orbit
with a brilliant white glowing light - a white hole. SR-513 had never
heard of such a thing being so close to a black hole before, but
nevertheless they had just found two sources of hypermatter.
        "Gamma-3, return to headquarters immediately and inform them
about our find. Gamma-2 and I will continue to check out-" He paused for
a moment. "Anybody see what happened to the droid?"
        The pilots looked over their instruments and found nothing.
        Gamma-2 spoke up. "I probably just fell in or something. Those
droids never did have good motivators on them."
        "Yeah probably. Gamma-3, still here?"
        "Sorry sir! On my way!"
        TIE/scout gamma-3 jumped to hyperspace as his counterparts
started circling the black hole, scanning for prime loactions to place a
hypermatter refinery installation. A few minutes later a brief
transmission filled their recievers with an automated imperial homing
signal before shutting down.
        "Sir, you get that?"
        SR-513 nodded. "Affirmative gamma-2. Our missing droid just
turned up, let's go check it out."
        "Right away sir."
        The two TIEs zoomed in dangerously close to the quasi-matter
vortex of the white hole where the droid made it's last transmission
from. SR-513 spotted it just inside the mathematical boundary that was
supposed to destroy everything that touched it.
        "Odd. Those things weren't carrying shielding were they gamma-2?
        "No sir, standard probots were all we got."
        "Then why isn't it destroyed?"
        They stared at the distant, silent droid for several long
moments.
        Gamma-2 shrugged. "Beats me sir. Maybe it's safe to go in
there?"
        "Like hell. Call another probot here and get it to do the
salvage."
        A few minutes later one of the droids appeared and jetted
towards the white phenomana. SR-513 ordered it in and slowly,
hesitatingly, it drifted into the boundary that should have destroyed it
instantly. It was still there. The droid pinged that it was commencing
retreival of the black box.
        "Come on..." muttered SR-513 nervously. Something funny was
going on here.
        Gamma-2 piped up. "Registering armor erosion on the probe droid,
its depleting rapidly."
        Shaking his head SR-513 stared. "It still shouldn't be able to
survive."
        A few seconds before it became inoperable the probot jetted back
towards safe space, out of the dangerous vortex of energy being spewed
out of the white hole.
        Immediately they downloaded the contents of the recording box
onto their computers.
        "That thing can't be a white hole!" exclaimed SR-513. "All the
black box readings are wrong, hey look at..." his voice trailed off as
both pilots watched the last few recored minutes of video footage before
the droid ceased activating.
        "Holy crap! We better get back to base, the techs are going to
wanna see this!"

        "Osiris, your analysis please."
        The screen immediately started dividing itself into four
sections, each replaying different parts of the black box recording with
text summaries scrolling past the borders. A sound analysis wave pulsed
as the intelligence spoke.
        "I have analyzed complete navigational data from the droid and
from comparisons of known black and white holes a thorough investigation
has been conducted. Four more probots were sent inside of which only one
managed to return, the rest were rendered inoperable from suffering
damage in the vortex wash. The binary orbits of the two diametrically
opposite anomalies has allowed several unknown energies to leech between
them, forming a hyperconduit."
        "A hyperconduit?" queried Gardat.
        "Affirmative. The holes have experienced changes that allow safe
passage through one and out the other."
        The commander thought this over for a few moments. "So what
you're saying is the droid fell through the black hole and emerged from
the white?" He shrugged his shoulders. "What use is that to us?"
        Osiris continued. "The probot did not return immediately through
the white hole. As the video recording in the bottom right display
shows, the droid passed through the hyperconduit and out of a completely
different white hole, before its uncontrolled trajectory brought it
within the pull of another black hole which returned it here."
        Gardat stared at the screen with sudden realisation.
        "You mean that another binary set of anomalies exists somewhere
- one linked to ours?"
        "Affirmative. Exact location of the other end of the
hyperconduit is unknown."
        "Is it safe for ships to travel in?"
        "Affirmative. Deflector shielding is adequate to prevent damage.
However travel utilizing unshielded craft is not recommended."
        Commander Gardat considered his options. They could simply
deploy a refinery above both holes and ignore whatever lurked on the
other side or he could investigate the unexplored space on the other
side - wherever it was. So far his forces consisted of two
enforcer-class cruisers, a nebulon-b2 and a neutralizer. If anything
hostile was encountered there was going to be a big problem stopping it
with only light ships, but once his battlecarrier was completed their
chances would increase dramatically.
        "Osiris, deploy hypermatter refineries and continue construction
of the _Hammer_." He nodded at the image of his partially completed ship
on one of the smaller viewers. "I want my flagship completed
on-schedule. Once my battlecruiser is operational I shall investigate
the hyperconduit personally."
        "Yes commander."

        The U.S.S. _Abraham_ darted through the cold depths of space
like a hunted man running across an open plain. Following behind two
Jem'Hadar fighters and a cruiser fired polaron beams into the rear of
their prey, shaking the ship violently as the shields neared collapse.

        "Captain, shields down to thirty percent!"
        "Engineering! How long until warp drives are back online?"
shouted Captain Rolfe.
        Acting chief engineer Stevenson's voice crackled through the
damaged comm system. "Estimate best time is eight hours."
        "We don't have eight hours!"
        "Sorry sir, its the best we can do. Half my staff have been
badly injured and several EPS conduits to the core need to be repaired."
        As though to punctuate his words another polaron blast rocked
the ship. An auxillery bridge control panel exploding in a spray of
plasma and flinging an ensign to the floor, clutching his burnt face
with both hands and writhing on the floor.
        Rolfe gritted his teeth. "Very well. Helm, set a course for that
dust nebula, we might be able to lose them long enough to repair the
warp engines."
        "Aye sir!"

        The _Abraham_ swung to port, narrowly evading a pair of purple
energy beams from the fighters as the galaxy class starship accelerated
into the unknown dust nebula at maximum impulse. Both the fighters
stayed on their target while their kilometer-long battleship slowly
swung about, preparing to unleash a devastating volley of beam fire that
would annihilate the stricken federation ship.

        Rolfe was nearly thrown from his chair as a torpedo slammed into
the aft shields.
        "Shields at eighteen percent!" cried the tactical officer as he
attempted to return fire, the rear phaser array spitting energy into one
of the fighters and eroding its already weakened shields.
        Kill or be killed thought Rolfe. "Tactical, two torpedoes."
        A pair of quantam torpedoes hurled themselves backwards at the
damaged fighter, mere seconds passing before they punched through the
fighters shields and the small ship detonated in a spectacular
antimatter explosion. In return the Jem'Hadar battleship opened fire
with its own beam weapons, stabbing into their shields and causing
alarms to sound as several large hull breaches opened up. Captain Rolfe
knew the _Abraham_ couldn't take much more of this punishment - if only
they could go faster! Suddenly the dust cloud enveloped them as the
_Abraham_ ploughed through the stellar debris, navigational deflectors
at full power to push the dust aside. At the near-light velocities they
were doing a single speck hitting the external hull would be
devastating, if not catastrophic.
        Rolfe turned to the helm. "Evasive maneauvers! Try to lose them
in here!"
        "Initiating evasive pattern alpha-gamma-four."

        With a few quick course adjustments and a great deal of luck
their pursuers vanished from sight, losing visual contact with the
_Abraham_ as the dust clouds swallowed it whole. The galaxy-class
starship coasted along silently, attempting to mimic the ancient
submarines of twentieth century Earth as all non-essential systems were
shut down to reduce their energy emmissions. Behind them the Jem'Hadar
vessels were nowhere to be seen.

        Letting out a breath, Rolfe smiled at his crew.
        "Well done everyone." he looked up at his first officer. "Nancy,
get down to engineering and see if you can't help out there." Smiling
wirly he continued. "I think the chief's going to need all the help he
can get."
        She nodded. "Right away sir."

As the _Abraham_ slunk away into the concealing mists of the
dust nebula the two Dominion ships paused to communicate. The Federation
vessel was heavily damaged and would not be able to put up much of a
fight, certainly not a credible one. The large battleship acknowledged
the arrival of three more fighters and the seek & destroy group split
up, searching for their target within the murky depths surrounding them.
Two more fighters that were late arriving stayed outside just in case
the Federation ship tried running for it while the taskforce was
sensor-blinded by the strange energies that coursed throughout the
areas.

        The bridge of the Dominion battleship was illuminated by dark
purple lighting. It eminated from narrow rectangular strips covering the
sections of the walls where they joined the tritanium floor. Several
more light panels covered the ceiling, the white glow mixing with the
purple to create an almost surreal environment, much like the dark red
atmosphere aboard the bridge of a klingon warship. Jem'Hadar warriors
manned the consoles, forever working on their assigned tasks in the
knowledge that they were serving their gods - the founders. Not a
warrior among them even considered neglecting their duties, such was
their dedication. In the command chair sat the captain, a fine warrior
among warriors.
        "Report!" he snarled, unhappy at losing sight of their quarry.
        "Baryonic tetro-radiation is disrupting the sensor harmonics.
Attempts at compensating unsuccessful."
        He grunted acknowledgment. It would be unthinkable to fail in
capturing one of the hated Federation vessels, especially with a task
force as large as the one under his command. There was a war waiting to
be fought, but to return now would be to return in disgrace.
Unacceptable.
        The Jem'Hadar captain looked at his comm operator. "Signal the
fighters to continue searching the nebula! I want that ship intact -
they have three days to find them or I execute their captains!"
        "As you command." saulted the warrior.
        The bridge doors swished open as an attractive female vorta
stepped through. Unlike the sharp and brutal armored uniforms worn by
the Jem'Hadar she wore an elegant, finely embroidered orange robe that
hung from her delecate shoulders like a cascading waterfall. A fine
psuedoleather belt with silver trimmings hugged her slim waist, from
which hung a wicked-looking disruptor pistol. Her beautiful face was
framed by thick lengths of slightly curly black hair, the tips of her
pointed ears poking through to reveal tiny golden earrings piercing the
skin. However despite the appearence of a heavenly princess her demeanor
was anything but.
        "The founders will not tolerate failure Erssk." her calm face
belied the reprimanding voice that eminated from her. "You have more
than enough ships for the task of capturing a single federation vessel.
There will be no excuse for failure."
        Captain Erssk stood and saluted. "I will not fail you mistress!
I swear it!"
        She nodded and smiled. "Good." The smile vanished as she stared
him in the eye. "You have been a promising captain in the past Erssk. Do
not let this event mar that record."
        The warrior nodded and returned to his duties under the watchful
eye of his political officer. Normally such an addition to his crew was
completely unecessary but as he was commanding over half a dozen ships
the founders had determined that it was necessary. Erssk didn't know why
for he had always showed the utmost loyalty, but he would never even
consider questioning the will of his gods and trusted their judgement in
all things.

        Nancy stared at the ruins of the engineering section. Sparks
were still flying from partially melted touchscreen panels, the
emergency lighting flickered on and off as power fluctuated and barely a
handful of personnel were still standing - the rest were either dead
where they lay or being attended to by medical personnel. Acting chief
engineer Stevenson's legs were quickly vanishing as he started crawling
into one of the many access tunnels running all over the ship, a toolbox
in one hand and a tricorder in the other.
        "Stevenson!" she called out. "Need a hand?"
        Without stopping his crawl he yelled back. "Yeah, grab a
tricorder and follow me!"
        Together they crawled on their hands and knees past several
meters of blown EPS conduit, the plasma damage evident from the scorch
marks covering the interior of the tube. Stevenson stopped at one of the
relays and turned around into a kneeling position.
        "Nancy, I need you to help me reroute the inverse power coupling
through the trans-phasic inverter." Holding out his tricorder he started
scanning the damage, shaking his head. "Damn. Looks like the entire
introstatic conversion system is blown, that's going to take some work
replacing."
        It was going to be a long, quiet night.

        "Awaiting final authorisation."
        "You may proceed Osiris."
        Putting both hands on his hips to admire the view, Commander
Gardat looked over his new bridge. It was much like his old one on the
_Growler_ except much more spacious, the triangular transparisteel
windows still forming a ring around most a third of the chamber. Two
large crewpits were sunk two meters deep into the floor and innumerable
control panels covered the surfaces of every console bank. The only
thing missing were officers and crewmen - he had none to spare. The
central computer core of the _Hammer_ and several other core systems had
been replaced by an AI mainframe carrying a copy of the master control
program, that in effect ran the entire ship in place of a crew. Less
that ten people roamed the eleven-kilometer battlecruiser as it sailed
through the cold darkness, each doing little more than overseeing the
smooth running of the fully automated vessel.
        Everything, right down to turbolasers and lighting, was under
control of Osiris. Once it would have been considered dangerous to put
so much power into the figurative hands of one entity but for Gardat
sheer necessity made such concerns irrelevant. In effect Osiris WAS the
ship, fully autonomous and capable of fulfilling all the functions
normal crewmen carried out through the tens of thousands of onboard
maintainance and crewdroids. Should someone ever attempt to hack their
way into the shipboard mainframe, they would discover the master control
program just as well protected as its planetary counterpart on Albrach.
        Gardat had ordered the rest of his small fleet to remain behind
and guard their new homeworld against any unforseen intruders. Both he
and Osiris considered it extremely unlikely that someone would come
across them but stranger things had been known to happen, such as the
giant planet-being that Vars had run across. Later scouting expeditions
had been unable to determine just what in the galaxy that thing was
except that it was stationary and hostile towards basically anything, so
he'd simply marked the system as 'permanantly under quarantine'. Should
someone else happen across it, then tough luck for them. He was glad it
wasn't mobile - his fleet as such currently consisted of just the
_Murrin_, _Growler_, and the two small enforcer class cruisers. Of
course the battle station would help but wouldn't stop an all-out
invasion by some hostile force by itself, not that one was likely to
spontaneously venture into their region of unexplored wildspace anyway,
but precautions never hurt.
        So he had taken only his flagship, the vengence-class
battlecruiser _Hammer_, out by itself to explore the unknown space
existing on the other side of the hyperconduit. If there were hostiles
then Gardat was certain the innumerable turbolasers and couple hundred
droid fighters the ship carried would be more than sufficent to silence
them. He watched from one of the transparisteel bridge viewports as they
powered away from Albrach towards the unkown, the blue-green planet
quickly receeding into the distance as the powerful sublight engines
pushed them forwards with tremendous force. A few seconds later the
stars became streaks of light as the hyperdrive engaged and they hurtled
towards the dust nebula at impossible speeds.

        Sighing, Rolfe checked the latest status report from
engineering. It looked like some of the damage was more extensive than
they had previously thought. One of the primary EPS conduits was
completely fused and constructing the necessary bypasses would take
days, the warp core was currently undergoing a complete overhaul and
would need to be completely re-initialised. It also didn't help having a
third of the engineering staff killed in the battle.
        Putting the datapadd back on his desk Rolfe looked around his
ready room. The standard issue fishtank installed on every galaxy-class
starship had cracked and his goldfish Pebbles was currently floating
about in a type four cargo box filled with water. Trying to forget about
the stress of the past few hours Rolfe picked up the container of
fishfood from his desk and sprinkled a small amount into the water.
Pebbles immediately swam to the top and started eating away, mindlessly
gulping down the bready crumbs that drifted about on the surface.
        "There you go Pebbles. Eat it all up, there's a good boy."
murmered Rolfe.
        He watched the innocent creature swim about in complete
ignorance of the world outside, feeling envious that he coldn't go and
hide inside a holodeck and shut out his problems. But of course, they
didn't have the power to spare or the time. Placing the fishfood
container back onto his desk Rofle looked at the photograph of his wife,
wondering if he would ever manage to see her on Earth again, wondering
if the Federaton would win the war with the Dominion.
        His comm badge beeped. Rolfe sighed again and tapped the
reciever.
        "Captain we've drifted into sensor range of a rather strange
binary anomaly. I think you should see this."
        "I'm on my way lieutenant."
        Rolfe strode out of his ready room and onto the bridge. The main
viewscreen showed a strange pulsating white anomaly that seemed to be
emitting whisps of energy, flowing through space towards a distant point
whereapon they circled together and vanished. He stared.
        "Lieutenant, what is that thing?"
        "Scans indicate the two astral bodies are a white hole and a
black hole, both in binary orbit with one another. The event horizon of
the black hole and several energy emissions from the white hole are not
consistant with this type of phenomenon."
        "A white hole? I've never seen one of them before."
        The lieutenant nodded. "Yes sir, they are extremely rare
astrologically speaking."
        "Well no point wasting a good opporunity. Start conducting full
scans on the anomalies and dispatch a class four probe for a good close
look."
        "Aye sir."
        This was what starfleet was really about - exploration, not
fighting conflicts. The opportunity to study a bizarre phenomenon such
as the black/white hole replationship was a godsend for morale. His crew
would love getting their hands on every single bit of data they were
able to gather, and the astrophysicists would pour over the information
like children with a comic book. He'd never heard of either type of
anomaly being in such close proximity to one another - when they
returned to DS9 they might make history with their finding! The recorded
data alone would be priceless, let alone what they could uncover with
the fullness of time. But until could happen Rolfe and his scientific
crew set about gathering all they could, well aware that they might be
attacked at any moment.

        Gardat stood before the frontal bridge viewports, staring into
the temporal energies that coursed over the heavily shielded hull of the
_Hammer_ as the mighty ship pierced the rippling streams of color. White
energy mists flowed over and around the command tower as the needle
point of the hull ploughed through some kind of spatial disturbance in
the vortex, the deflector shielding keeping out the destructive wrath of
nature.
        "It's just like watching the holo footage, isn't it?" came a
voice.
        Spinning about Gardat saw his first officer standing by a port
window, taking the opportunity to observe the wonder of the hyperconduit
first hand. Noticing the attention from Gardat the heavily built bald
man sharply saulted and stood at attention, his black goatee making him
look positively evil.
        "Lieutenant Kane reporting for duty, sir!"
        The commander nodded in acknowledgement. "Good to see you again
Kane, I was beginning to wonder if we hadn't left you behind by
accident."
        Kane had been his first officer aboard the _Growler_ and had
been heavily injured when the bridge suffered damage during the pirate
attack in the outer rim. However when once he had fully recovered Gardat
made certain that his new command would have a competant officer to
assist him in the strategic operations of the flagship. Somehow, he
always seemed to come through when he was needed and had made an
excellent advisor thus far.
        "Ah, my apologies sir. The rest of our team are conducting last
minute checks and settling into their new stations. As for myself, I
underestimated the size of the ship and attempted to walk here from the
hanger bay."
        "From the hanger bay?" asked Gardat with some surprise.
        The hanger was over two kilometers away, not counting the myriad
of passages and walkways.
        Kane gave a half-smile. "Yes, although after an hour I gave up
and took the nearest turbolift. I did not anticipate getting lost, but
several design features depart from the KDY standard."
        "I see. Next time ask one of the droids for directions."
        "Of course sir."
        The synthesized voice of Osiris eminated from the speakers. "We
are approaching the exit point of the hyperconduit. Standby for entry
back into normal space."
        "To your post lieutenant."
        Kane nodded silently before moving to an auxillery systems
control console on the command deck, watching the readings himself as
the vortex around them twisted and spiralled towards a single point in
space.
        Sighing Gardat sat in his command chair and activated the
internal comm system. "This is commander Gardat to all crew members. I
understand that because this is our maiden voyage you have not fully
settled in yet, but your presence is required on the bridge. You have
five minutes before detriment points will be awarded."

        Major Hargos stepped into the empty turbolift wondering what was
the hurry. He had respect for Gardat but his manner was just so
different from his old commanding officer that it was taking some
getting used to. It was a pity Vars had been assigned to the command of
their homeworld fleet and was not here now - his attitude of doing the
dirty work himself had endeared him to Hargos. On the other hand of
course, he would sleep better knowing his new homeworld was in good
hands while they were away.
        The lift stopped and two women in technicians uniforms stepped
inside. He recognised them from the shuttle that had dropped them off in
the hanger bay. One of them was called Beele, the other he wasn't sure
about. He made a mental note to try and chat one of them up at some
point when he was off duty. The local women on Albrach were just too
backwards in their thinking to interest him - although some of the more
open minded cityfolk had promise. His broodings were interrupted again
as the lift stopped once more for yet another entrant.
        All thoughts of women vanished as commander-air-group Urisk
stepped inside, the permanantly grim-faced man stared briefly at him
before standing straight with both hands behind his back. A real model
imperial officer that one, thought Hargos. A spine so straight you could
almost see the rulebook holding it up. Not likely to be much fun at all
from that one.
        Again the turbolift doors opened, this time to reveal the
bridge. As the occupants of the lift stepped off Hargos noted the four
wicked looking first-stage darktroopers that had accompanied them
onboard had already taken up places on opposite sides of the bridge,
each cybernetic doom warrior standing next to his respective combat
partner. Their vibro swords and energy deflecting armored shields were
perfect for defending the bridge against a sudden attack - firing heavy
or even light weapons near critical systems consoles was heavily frowned
apon, even with the Osiris program running almost everything.
        Immediately the two technicians climbed into the port crewpit
and took their places. CAG Urisk stood before a 3D projected holomap of
the surrounding space and started checking the launch status of the
numerous on-board fighter craft from his console. Lieutenant Kane was
already on the bridge at the primary tactical station, ready to issue
commands to the system and relay the commander's orders. As for the
commander himself, Gardat was calmly seated in his command chair and
watching his small crew get to work. With a gulp Hargos realised the
gaze was suddenly centered on him, making him turn away and seat himself
at one of the auxillery helm stations. Of course the Osiris program
could have run everything by itself, but good human crews always
displayed better battle results in the simulations.
        Suddenly the swirling energies that were flooding in through the
transparisteel viewports stopped, replaced by the dirty grey-brown mists
of the other dust nebula. They had made it.
        "Ship status?"
        "Hull undamaged, shields barely affected." reported Kane. He
looked back towards the commander. "We came through that without a
scratch."
        Gardat was impassive. "Very good. Osiris, passive scan the
area."
        "Affirmative commander. Scans indicate the binary anomaly is
identical to the one in system B4 however electromagnetic spectrum
analysis and isolated temporal residue indicates we have travelled an
indeterminable distance away. Further analysis on our location will need
to be conducted from outside the nebula." The voice paused and a 3D holo
image of a strange looking craft appeared floating before Gardat's
command chair. "In addition an unidentified alien ship has been
detected. It does not match any known production model and appears to be
heavily damaged."
        He stared at the vessel. It looked rather strange - a large
saucer shaped section was affixed to an elongated main body, which in
turn had two glowing blue rectangular engine nacelle leading off it.
Several sections of the shining white hull were marred with scorch marks
and blackened panels as though it had been in recent battle. Gardat
wondered who had built it; the design looked completely bizarre.
        "Go to active scanning, I want every single piece of information
about that ship!"

        Captain Rolfe and his bridge crew stared at the monolith before
them. Just as the class four probe was nearing the white hole a giant
dagger-shaped vessel began to emerge from the swirling vortex of
uncontrolled energy. It was huge!
        The lieutenant commander standing at the tactical station
frowned. "Sir, I'm having trouble scanning the alien vessel. They seem
to be employing some kind of jamming system that's interfering with the
sensors."
        "Lifesigns?"
        "Unknown. It appears to be approximately..." he paused in
disbelief. "eleven kilometers long!"
        Rolfe frowned. "You must be mistaken. Nobody would build a ship
that big, not even the borg have done it."
        "No sir, the class four probe confirms it. Getting further
data... the energy readings are extremely high sir, almost completely
off the scale! Visual scanners tracking numerous turreted weapons
emplacements of unknown type."
        "Their propulsion?"
        Harry shook his head. "I cannot detect any warp emissions
detected but that may be due to the jamming. Subspace sensors are at
virtually zero capability. As for sublight engines, the probe has
spotted a massive bank of eleven engines that seem to be emitting ion
particles. The power output for the drives is enourmous. Sir, whoever
built this ship has power technology on a scale we've never seen
before!"
        Taking a deep breath Rofle looked at the image on his screen.
"Magnify the image. I want a closer look at this thing."
        The main viewscreen zoomed in until the alien vessel reached
from corner to corner of the large rectangular screen. The image flicked
closer again, and again until they were staring at a small one kilometer
section of the heavily armored grey hull as it slowly glided past. Rofle
could make out some kind of notches running the edge of the hull, broken
up by tiny uncountable turrets of differing size and shape. He realised
that to be able to make out the turrets at their current magnification
implied they must be enormous! Yet there were even more smaller ones
dotted all over the hull, presumably for precision targeting or
something of the kind. Whatever this ship was there was no mistaking its
function - a vessel of war.
        The hull continued to glide past and a comparitively small tower
protuded a few hundred meters above the upper hull, most likely the
bridge or some kind of command tower. After a few more seconds the hull
stopped widening and terminated with a massive bank of enourmous
sublight engines of assorted sizes, the largest of which could probably
swallow the _Abraham_ whole. It was an amazing yet somewhat terrifying
sight to see, and knowing that they now faced two potential threats in
the nebula made Rolfe very uncomfortable.
        "Tactical, give me an evaluation."
        "They are actively scanning us but have not yet aquired
targeting locks." He looked at Rofle. "I would hazard a guess that given
the power readings they have more than enough firepower to destroy us if
they choose to sir. If their shielding can survive the tropomophic
energies from the white hole then they are likely to be of a magnitude
greater than our own. In short, that is an immensely powerful ship."
        "Tell me something I don't know." said Rofle, shaking his head.
        Harry grinned. "How about this? They're on an intercept course."
        Rofle stared in surprise. "What? Raise shields and attempt to
hail them. Let them know our intentions are peaceful and that we mean
them no harm." As if we could harm them anyway, he thought to himself.
        "Aye sir."

        "The alien vessel is attempting to open a communications link."
said Kane.
        "Very well." acknowledged Gardat. "Let it through."
        Immediately the holopad erupted with a three-dimensional display
of static, flickering and crackling as it attempted to play the message.
        Gardat frowned. "Osiris, identify the transmission problem and
fix it."
        The synthesized voice floated back. "The alien transmission is
an ancient video protocol not compatible with the holonet system. I am
decoding their transmission protocols for the holoprojectors as we
speak. Translators activated... task complete."
        "Put them on immediately."
        The static cleared and was immediately replaced with a
two-dimensional flat screen floating in midair. To Gardat's surprise he
found himself looking at a screen full of humans all wearing some kind
of skintight wetsuit or jumpsuit. One of them was standing about wearing
red shoulder pads, looking towards the screen.

        An image flickered into lucidity onto the main viewer, several
static lines crossing the screen briefly before the picture cleared up.
To his surprise Rofle found himself looking at a humanoid alien dressed
in a severe military uniform with several unidentified color bars -
presumably rank symbols - attached to the breast of his dark grey tunic.
The man looked remarkably like a middle-aged human. Before Rofle could
introduce himself the imposing stranger broke through his thoughts with
a harsh commanding tone of voice.
        "Unidentified vessel, you will identify yourself immediately."
        "This is Captain Rolfe Jerrison of the Federation starship-"
        "Sir!" Cut in Harry.
        Rolfe span about to demand an explanation from his tactical
officer. Before he could speak the lieutenant continued his hasty
report.
        "Sir, the Jem'Hadar have found us! Two ships closing!"

        A pair of Dominion fighters emerged from the continually flowing
clouds of dust at maximum impulse, heading directly towards the damaged
galaxy-class starship. Upon realising they had very well armed company
they hesitated, unsure what to do.

        Gardat cut the link and watched the newcomers as they approached
their position.
        "This is interesting. Lieutenant, are they the same manufacture
as the first?"
        "Difficult to tell sir. None of the ship designs match any known
types but the coloring and overall design scheme seems to indicate a
different force, possibly the one that caused the battle damage visible
on the original vessel. The newcomers have halted and encrypted
transmissions are taking place between them."
        This was getting complicated thought Gardat. He had no wish to
announce his presence to every single alien species he encountered; who
knew what they would be like? If the area was hostile then there was
only one way to make certain that his presence went unreported.
        "Osiris. Target all the alien craft and prepare to fire on my
mark."
        "Confirmed."

        "Captain I am tracking multiple weapons locks on our primary
hull. Also registering similar locks on both Dominion craft."
        Damn, this could get messy thought Rolfe. "Transmit our
intentions again. Remind them our intentions are peaceful and that we
have no quarrel with them."
        "No response sir."
        Well they wouldn't go down without a fight. He tapped his
combadge. "This is the captain. Red alert! All hands to battle
stations." He turned to Harry. "Load the torpedo tubes and prepare to
fire."
        "Against that thing?" Harry was incredulous. "Captain, I don't
think our entire payload would even make a dent!"
        Rofle frowned. "I am well aware of our chances Harry but if they
fire upon us, we will defend ourselves! Is that clear?"
        "Yes sir." muttered the lieutenant, nervously eyeing the
dagger-shaped vessel.

        Gardat watched as the both of the unidentified alien corvettes
seemed to fade away into nothingness. So they had cloaking devices then.
Well they would soon learn how useless they were against a CGT array,
such as the one installed on his command tower. Odd how they had glowing
purple engines compared to the blue ones on the original vessel - though
it was probably just design aesthetics. After all, rebel turbolasers
fired red blasts but they were fundamentally identical to standard
imperial weapons in all aspects apart from a few small components and
design differences.
        "Osiris, track the cloaked vessels and relay the co-ordinates to
all command stations."
        "Getting the data now sir." reported Kane. "One of them has
vanished into the clouds, probably going for help. The other is holding
steady a new location two thousand kilometers away from its starting
location."
        "This is interesting. I am curious to see what they will bring
here." He looked back to the holodisplay. "Osiris, relinquish the
weapons lock on the remaining cloaked vessel but keep tracking them with
the array. I want them to believe we have lost sight of them."
        "Targeting matrix dropped. CGT scanning continuing."
        "Excellent. CAG prepare for fighter launch but hold until my
command. I do not want them knowing our full tactical capabilites until
it is necessary to deploy them, is that understood?"
        Urisk nodded and saluted. "Yes sir!"
        Staring at the two ships on his scope Gardat pondered over his
options. He could of course just blast them and be done with it, but
where was the fun in that? Besides which they offered him potential
sources of information that might later prove to be important about this
new place. Thus there was the choice of either just standing by and
watching, or offering assistance to one of the groups. Which would he
choose?

**********

Chapter 4

        "Kane."
        "Sir?"
        "I want you to start scanning that damaged vessel with every form
of sensor bombardment we have. We can use pretty much anything at this
point; look for power signatures, lifeform readings, you name it.
Everything."
        "I'm on it."
        Abandoning the command chair, Gardat joined Urisk standing by a
tactical holomap projecting from one of the auxillery command consoles. The
blue dots identifying the locations of the unidentified ships glowed like
pinpricks in the fabric of space. The strategic map was dark. The
sensor-dampening effect of the dust prevented Osiris from constructing new
starcharts from their surroundings, at least until they cleared the field
and could start scanning the surrounding few hundred light years. Given
enough time scout probes would return fresh information as well, hopefully
good.
        He wondered what the strangers thinking about them. The answer came
almost immediately.
        Kane spun around in his chair to face Gardat. "Sir, the human
vessel is registering an energy spike."
        "Weapons?"
        "Scan indicates beam weapons of unknown type and antimatter
torpedoes."
        "Antimatter?" Gardat frowned.
        Raw antimatter was very rare for anti-ship weapons - shielded craft
were the norm and with shields in place a direct matter-antimatter reaction
between the device and the target was impossible unless the shields were
breached. Of course the antimatter reacted with the casing of the delivery
device but it was a much reduced effect compared to what a direct hit would
achieve. If the devices were non-directed then dispersion in space would a
direct energy reaction against hulls and shields inefficient at best.
Antimatter was effective enough against planetary targets; a few dozen
bombs were more than enough to utterly devastate most worlds but planetary
shields made such weapons outmoded by galactic standards.
        "We can probably take them, if their weapons yields are anything
like galactic standard they'll be no match for the _Hammer_."
        "Anyone else?" asked Gardat, surveying his bridge crew.
        Beel piped up. "Sir, I've been looking at the readings for their
main power core." She tapped some keys. "It doesn't look like they could
even make a hyperjump with the levels I'm getting. Way too low."
        "Comparable to what?"
        She paused. "Well the frigate is heavily damaged but... it looks
equivalent to one of our auxiliary reactors for one of the turbolaser
turrets."
        He stared. "Are you serious Lieutenant?"
        "Yes sir, although their main reactor might be powered down at the
moment. The readings I'm getting aren't located in what looks like their
main engineering section. They're coming from the saucer section so they
could be on backup." She tapped some more keys. "I'm getting some very
strange subspace energy signatures from their engineering section though,
like nothing I've ever seen before."
        "Run the results through Osiris, see if it can come up with
anything."
        "Yes sir."
        "How about the other vessels, similar readings?"
        "Can't tell at the moment. With their cloaks up, all I can get is
the CGT reading."
        "Alright then, I'm guessing a bit here but we probably outmatch
them. If they want a fight, they'll die." declared Gardat. He glanced at a
nearby console screen that was scrolling the scan information on the
federation ship. Turning from the tactical holodisplay he faced the few
crew members in the sunken bridge pits and folded both arms behind his
back. "Keep a close eye on them all. We won't start a fight with our new
neighbors just yet, but if they open fire then blast 'em."
        Urisk and Gardat watched intently as the blips representing the
dominion ships wisely backed away out of jamming range. One held position
while the other continued on its vector, vanishing into the giant dust
clouds.
        Urisk looked up. "Sir, they've probably going off to report our
presence." His next words were straight out of the textbook. "Permission to
launch interceptors sir?"
        Shaking his head Gardat continued to stare intently at the display.
"No, I want to see what they do next. It looked like they were chasing the
other ship so I'm guessing this area of space is probably under their
general jurisdiction. Or else there's a war going on."
        Calling up a rotating holo-image of the remaining dominion fighter
the fleet commander examined the image, taking in the details. "We might
have traveled to the unknown regions and there could be an entire fleet out
there. And if they look here for some missing ships..." He left it hanging.
        Urisk nodded. "Retribution's possible, but if their power output
doesn't indicate good defensive systems we could eliminate them quickly
under jamming and word shouldn't get out."
        "Perhaps."
        "Sir, I have over two hundred droid manned avengers ready to launch
at a moment's notice. Give the word and I'll sweep them from our screens!"
        "Not yet, I want to find out what's going on out here first."
        
        Erssk stared at the recording of the fighters' sensor logs for the
second time. It was unforeseen they would have to initiate first contact
protocols under such circumstances but then he was a jem'hadar after all.
He would never fail the gods in acting as an arm of founder policy. He
flexed his forehead muscles from within his command chair and formulated a
battle-plan. It took his well-trained and genetically enhanced mind mere
moments before an adequate schema was formed.
        His eyes shifted from the viewscreen to the back of the head
belonging to the communications operator. "Comms, summon all other ships to
our location then proceed under cloak to the federation vessel. They won't
escape us another time."
        "As you command!"
        Erssk switched his vision back to the viewscreen to take in the
details of the unknown vessel. It was large, but then so too were many of
the fleet support craft they too possessed. The power readings were of
concern though - what craft had reactor power levels higher than an entire
planet? It was definitely food for thought.
        "Erssk?" A gentle feminine hand caressed his roughly skinned cheek
from behind.
        His concentration broken by the interruption Errsk turned his head
slightly in annoyance. "Yes?"
        The beautiful female face bent down next to his and whispered in
his ear. "I feel that the founders will be very interested in the alien
craft. You won't be too... aggressive here, now will you?" Her breath was a
heady perfume that even a mighty warrior would have found difficult to
resist, but then he was no ordinary warrior.
        "No mistress!" Attempting to dismiss the mental disruption her
intrusion brought about in his ponderings, Errsk glared at his
subordinates. "Prepare a beta-4 split-wave attack pattern and get the
fighters in formation when they arrive!"
        As they went about their tasks his warrior mind could not help but
ponder again about the alien vessel. Where were they from and why did they
dare intrude on Dominion territory? Still it would soon not matter - they
would either submit or be destroyed. Just like all the others.

        In lulls during stressful times Gardat liked to reflect. He focused
his mind back on the days before the Empire was shattered into a thousand
warring shards. Once a first contact situation such as this would have
meant an entire fleet sailing forth to make a grand gesture about the
mighty strength and seemingly limitless resources of the Galactic Empire.
But now... there was no Empire. Only self-proclaimed warlords whose loyalty
to their oaths were as hypocritical as their insufferable policies. And
since there was no fleet waiting to crush any resistance he had to tread
carefully. Going on the scanned shield levels none of the small alien
vessels could likely withstand even a single blast from even one of the
heavy turbolasers but their offensive powers were still unknown. It was a
mystery to him as to why they mounted so few weapons systems - surely any
military understood the need to maximize the number of weapons carried for
offensive output? Then again, he mused, their reactor levels didn't
indicated minimal power output anyway. Perhaps that was the reason. Then
again, missiles didn't exactly rely on a high power output for
effectiveness. They might well have ship-busting torpedoes concealed within
their tiny hulls. Then again, maybe not.
        It was time for orders. "Osiris, if they fire allow a few shots to
impact before initiating point defense. I want an approximation of their
weapon power."
        "Confirmed commander." A few seconds later and without any warning
the holodisplay of the surrounding space vanished to be replaced with a
series of floating projections, obviously more craft similar to the two
cloaked vessels but with a substantially larger vessel accompanying them.
"Five unidentified craft in an attack pattern are approaching our position.
Active cloaking fields detected."
        "Looks like their help arrived." murmured Urisk, silently wishing
they had launched interceptors when they had the chance.
        Gardat stared at the display for a moment, thinking. "Right, keep
holding fire for the moment." He jabbed a finger at the largest vessel.
"Designate this target their command vessel and use ion cannons to disable
it if they try anything."
        "Targeting matrix locked."
        The commander stepped away from the display and returned to his
seat in the center of the command deck. Relaxing into the comfortable chair
Gardat watched the slight bustle of activity. Before him the few other
members of the crew worked away in the spacious bridge pits,
double-checking battle systems and response times across the ship. The
unmanned monitors and consoles seemed to possess a life of their own as
data flowed over them at speeds impossible for an unaugmented human to
read. It was almost as though an invisible crew was working away at their
stations as the master control mainframe silently guided the _Hammer_.
        Lastly the four darktroopers still stood silently at their posts,
showing no sign of having moved. Of course that was not unusual - the
cybernetic enhancement process was extensive both physically and mentally.
The massive reflex improvements alone took their toll on an ordinary human
mind and only the most dedicated stormtroopers had been selected for
conversion. Gardat could only wonder what actually went through the mind of
a man who was an armed killing machine twenty-four hours a day. Their
glowing red eyes gave away nothing.
        The unemotional male voice of Osiris spoke again, filling the
bridge with its reassuring yet somehow disturbing presence. "The
unidentified craft have halted outside our effective subspace jamming
range." There was a brief pause. "One corvette has decloaked and is
attempting to communicate."
        Gardat nodded to himself. "Put it through."
        With a crackle and flicker of static the ugly face of a repulsive
looking alien appeared before him. Poking up from the collar of it's
obviously military uniform a clear tube filled with some kind of white
substance vanished beneath the skin of it's neck. It stared at him with
dislike before speaking in a harsh tone.
        "Translator processing... new routines enabled." The message was
replayed in basic.
        "This is dominion territory. Identify yourself and your intentions
or be destroyed."
        The commander stared back for a few moments. "I am fleet commander
Gardat of sector fleet Kappa-98. My intent is to determine the sovereignty
of this territory. Care to return the courtesy?"
        It was clearly not the response the alien was expecting. The screen
went blank as the transmission was halted and another few seconds passed
before it flickered back into life. The creature was most likely conferring
with whoever was in command on the large cloaked vessel.
        "What is your affiliation and what relation do you have with the
federation vessel?"
        The strong stress on 'federation' made it plainly clear to Gardat
that the two organizations were probably hostile towards one another - he
had heard many such conversations before during the more expansionistic
years of the Empire, usually from one warring faction or another struggling
for control over a star system.
        Gardat's eyebrow raised. "You don't recognize our hull markings?"
He smiled. "How interesting. Perhaps your superiors on that cloaked vessel
ten kilometers from your starboard would be interested in discussing this
matter further?"
        If the alien was surprised at the revelation it hid its emotions
well from the commander. Gardat gave it no time to reply before continuing
        "As for this 'federation vessel', as you call it, we have no
interest in local squabbles." He waved a hand dismissively. "You may do
with it as you please."
        Again the alien transmission stopped. The bridge crew was silent as
they waited for a reply, nearly a minute passed before the image flickered
back into place. The ugly alien gave no hint as to his thoughts when he
opened his mouth.
        "We will take the intruder with us. Do not attempt to interfere
Gar-dat or your ship will be destroyed." It's almost black eyes stared at
him for a few moments, sizing him up. "You will hold your position until
otherwise instructed."
        Gardat didn't move. "I will." He paused before continuing,
returning the steady gaze. "But understand that it is because I choose to
do so, not because of any threats you make."
        The alien said nothing. Jem'hader had no need for posturing.
        With the flick of a switch on his armrest Gardat cut the link.
        "Keep those fighters ready Urisk."

        The _Abraham_ found itself being covered in shadow as the immense
length of the Hammer moved overhead, blocking the strange lights emanating
from the anomaly. It's comparatively diminutive form found itself gripped
in the steely hand of several tractor beams, each emanating from one of the
circling Dominion craft. It was a fearsome sight.
        Pulling alongside just over a few kilometers away, the battleship
uncloaked. With just one poleron blast, the galaxy's already damaged shield
generators were blown and deck seven was blasted open to space. Dozens of
squads of Jem'Hadar soldiers started beaming over. It was a quick,
well-rehearsed operation.
        
        "Attention. Unauthorized transport beams detected on all decks.
Intruder Alert..."
        Rolfe pulled his phaser from his belt and swore inwardly. They
should have run at the first opportunity and now the Jem'Hadar and their
unknown alien friends had them trapped. He knew they had to capture the
ship to determine if they had managed to get off a transmission of the data
to any other federation vessels, so if they could just hold off the
boarding parties then they had a slim - very slim - chance of talking their
way out of here.
        As the flashing red lights bathed the bridge in a ruddy glow he
swore to himself. Who was he kidding? A ship full of science personal and
the wounded against Jem'Hadar soldiers? They needed a miracle.
        "Weapons hit! Torpedoes offline."
        "Internal sensors just went offline! I can't get through to
engineering!"
        "No response from shuttlebay one!"
        Rolfe and Harry nodded to one another. The federation would just
have to make do without the survey data their mission had collected. So
much for miracles.
        Rolfe spoke first. "Computer, initiate emergency self-destruct.
Authorisation Rolfe 528, Alpha-5, Rover Sigma 433."
        "Computer, authorisation newton 646 gamma-9 4F4."
        The unmistakable sound of a rejected command bleeped depressingly
from the speakers.
        "Unable to comply. Main computer offline."
        He swore again, uttering several words not even the universal
translator was programmed for. Damned system centralization. Rolfe looked
back at Harry.
        "Issue phasers to all the crew members, I'll try to make it to main
engineering."
        It never happened. Several humming glowing shapes materialized
amongst the crew members scrambling for the weapons lockers. A hail of
disruptor beams raked their bodies, one lifting an ensign clean off his
feet and into a wall panel prompting a massive eruption of sparks. As one
jem'hadar punched the captain out another spoke into his communicator.
        "Bridge secure."
        Four warriors remained behind while the rest cloaked and went off
to support their fellow invaders.

        The nearby _Hammer_ focused every available ventral monitoring
sensor on the nearby battle. As one group of resistance fell or another
group of alien troops appeared out of nowhere with the accompanying energy
signature, special notes were added to the bridge feed. Soon it was all
over and two fighters locked the crippled _Abraham_ in tractor beams for
the long haul back to Dominion space.
        Aboard _Hammer_ the calm voice of Osiris spoke. "Incoming message."
        "Put it on."
        Again the ugly face of one of the aliens appeared. It spoke
confidently.
        "Commander Gardat, I am captain Errsk of the dominion empire. It
seems we have matters to discuss."
        "Agreed. There are a few things I'd like to know. Firstly, is this
area under your sovereignty? Secondly, who does that craft you captured
belong to?"
        "We are eight lightyears outside the borders of the dominion
empire." Errsk frowned. "Do not presume that you can expand into this
sector of our quadrant. We may not have a presence here yet but we will
soon. The craft is a federation galaxy-class battlecruiser. We caught it
trespassing inside our borders without permission. They refused to
surrender so we pursued them here. You saw the rest yourself."
        "Who are the federation? A trade organisation?"
        For a moment Errsk almost snarled. "A pitiful bunch of
self-righteous fools who think they own everything and believe everyone
else should be like them. Their fleet intelligence ignored our expansion
into this area and established colonies right before us, thinking we
wouldn't dare attack defenseless civilians and the area would be theirs."
He smiled slightly. "They were wrong. But their intelligence services cover
their tracks well and fabricated evidence that we had attacked without
warning so we are currently at the edge of full-scale war."
        "Hang on a minute, you mentioned a quadrant – which quadrant is
that? Part of a cluster or rim territory?"
        "Rim territory? The gamma quadrant is quarter of the galaxy!"
        Gardat frowned, thinking. "Lieutenant, transmit a basic galactic
chart. Errsk, if you would oblige me, please highlight the gamma quadrant."
        There were a few seconds of silence from the other ship.
        "This isn't our galaxy."
        Again, there was silence - this time on the _Hammer_ , the distance
of their journey dawning on the bridge crew as Osiris started processing
madly.
        A new face, a female alien face, appeared on the holodisplay. "I
think we have a lot to talk about. Will you permit me to beam aboard?"
        "Beam?"
        "Yes, as in matter transporters?"
        Gardat was shocked and disgusted. Did they really value life so
little that the thought of dying just to avoid a quick shuttle jaunt was
actually appealing?
        She was looking at him with a puzzled expression. "Commander are
you alright?"
        "I'm fine. You can come aboard in a shuttle but you can forget
about ever beaming aboard my ship. In fact don't even think about doing it
near me, is that understood?"
        A smirk. "How quaint. Well I shall see you shortly commander."
        
        Nethra watched through the viewport as her shuttle ascended towards
the primary docking bay of the strange craft identifying itself only as the
_Hammer_. As the female vorta pondered her imminent meeting, the Jem'Hadar
warrior seated next to her who acted as both bodyguard and pilot
manipulated the shuttle controls. Anything other than a smooth flight was
unacceptable for a passenger of her status. A robotic voice crackled
through the speakers demanding the pilot relinquish control of the shuttle
to tractor guidance. She nodded once to the warrior who replied with his
confirmation. Within moments the shuttle was rapidly swung past the
metallic grey hull, liberally decorated with weapon turrets of assorted
shapes and sizes. If the inertial dampers hadn't been functioning both
pilot and passenger would have been crushed against the starboard wall of
the shuttle as the tractor beam almost recklessly - but efficiently -
yanked them upwards into a relatively flat docking bay that was almost
concealed under the dorsal surface of the vessel. While small compared to
the rest of the vessel, its size was in stark contrast to the miniature
bays on most ships known to the dominion. Transporters had largely
eliminated the need for conventional transport, which suggested the
newcomers perhaps lacked that technology. Still, even for shuttlecraft the
bay was just too large to explain away - it must serve another purpose, she
thought. Repair bay? Fighters? 
        For the dominion, unplanned first contact situations were rare. A
stellar nation with shapeshifters and a massive, heavily armed and cloaked
battlefleet could essentially scout out anywhere they liked, when they
liked. Most encounters were either with primitives unable to remotely match
their technology or with large taskforces more than capable of destroying
any opposition. It was with such tools that the Dominion Empire became as
large as it was - the power in the gamma quadrant. Others either submitted
or died - such as the Federation which was targeted for destruction. But
since such a taskforce was currently lacking, and she personally doubted
they outgunned the eleven-kilometer long surprise, a 'normal' diplomatic
encounter was the next option. After all, the dominion would know exactly
what they were dealing with soon enough.

        As his droid squad entered the turbolift Hargos pulled on his
stormtrooper helmet and checked his armor's internal systems. All
functioning properly, just as he expected. Beside him floated two rather
odd looking droids, about the same size and shape as most humanoids. The
difference was that they had no legs, or for that matter no lower torsos
either. Instead they hovered about on repulsorlifts. One arm terminated in
a vicious three-fingered claw and the other ended as a three-barreled
blaster cannon. Fast and deadly hunters, that's what they were. Apart from
them six standard battle droids stood to attention.
        In short order they stepped out into one of the small hanger levels
used mainly for shuttles and small fighter craft. The dominion shuttle was
just being guided in by tractor beam as they took positions by the entrance
to the rest of the ship. With a clump the tiny shuttle landed and the vorta
disembarked. With her also came three jem-hadar warriors openly carrying
weapons.
        One of the battledroids turned to Hargos. "Attention sir, my
sensors have identified the warriors as clones."
        Hargos nodded in acknowledgement and grimaced inside his helmet.
Clones. That meant they probably placed little value on the lives of their
troops. Hopefully none of them were going to try anything.
        Stepping forwards he extended his hand. "Welcome aboard the
_Hammer_, I'm Major Hargos. I'm sorry but you're going to have to leave
your weapons with me before you got any further." He indicated a durasteel
box held by one of the battledroids and motioned for them to deposit their
weapons.

        The group stopped and the women smiled at him. "Major..." She
positively purred as she took his hand. "I am consular Nethra and these are
my bodyguards. Would you have me travel without proper protection as
accorded to someone of my station?"
        "Shipboard security is extremely heavy. Believe me, no harm will
come to you or your bodyguards - I can guarantee it." He didn't bother to
add that there was practically nobody on board who could wish them harm
anyway.
        "I don't think you quite understand Major, I'm not concerned about
your security." She smiled arrogantly. "To harm a servant of the founders
is to invoke death upon oneself. However these are my bodyguards and I will
have them accompany me, armed."
        Hargos smiled thinly behind his helmet. "Let me put it this way;
give me your guns or you can all go home."
        The jem-hadar warriors looked at him with distaste, obviously
itching for an excuse to vaporize him on the spot. But Nethra remained
calm, albeit annoyed.
        "It seems you give us no choice, so very well.  But if any harm
comes to me the dominion will hold you personally responsible Major."
        "Of course." Hargos held out the box. An impressive array or
disruptors and knives were dropped inside in short order. "Thankyou for
your co-operation. It'll all be returned to you when you leave." He turned
to one of the droids beside him. "Take this to security control for
holding."
        "Yes-sir." It grasped the box in a three-fingered durasteel claw
and skimmed away.
        "Right, this is a protocol droid that we've assigned to you." He
indicated a gloss-green droid with light-emitting eyes that looked at the
visitors with curiosity. "It's your guide around the ship. Feel free to ask
it anything you like."
        It spoke.
        "Welcome aboard. I am MA-DN-T1, military protocol droid. Commander
Gardat awaits your arrival in conference room 1-B. Please follow me."
        Nethra took a quick glance at their surroundings as they walked
off. The small tertiary docking bay they had eventually landed in was
hidden amongst the vastness of the artificial cavern outside but still had
more than enough room for a half-dozen other shuttlecraft. They were parked
alongside two other craft vaguely resembling undersized starfighters
without cockpits. Most odd, probably automated she thought.
        MA-DN-T1's blue-black body was already walking away quite stiffly,
almost as though the designer of the robot hadn't bothered to put proper
joints in. As no better option was apparent, they followed with Major
Hargos in tow.
        A quick lift ride later and they were walking along a spacious but
surprisingly empty corridor an unknown distance away. It was deserted apart
from a squad of identical looking robots carrying unfamiliar weapons that
marched past without so much as a glance. It looked like all the regular
crew was staying out of sight.
        As they walked along the vorta picked up her pace slightly to match
the droid. Time to learn as much as possible before confronting the
commander. Hopefully something valuable would slip out too.
        "Gardat identified himself as a fleet commander, I was wondering
where this fleet of his actually is." A long shot, but loose lips were a
surprisingly common occurrence.
        "Elsewhere. The battlecruiser is his personal transport."
        She was stunned. A ship eleven kilometers long was one man's
personal transport? This was certainly going to be an interesting meeting.
        "Where exactly is the galactic empire located in your galaxy?" It
was a laughable name of course - there was surely no truly galactic empire.
The confines of warp travel had only been transcended by the borg, and even
they had their limits.
        The droid rotated its head to face her, not even slowing down.
        "It was located everywhere."
        "Was?"
        "When the Emperor died during an assault on a republic world when
his command ship was consumed by berserk world devastators. Currently the
New Republic controls most of the galaxy."
        World devastators? That didn't sound very good.
        "It sounds there might be a great deal to this story, can I get
more information?"
        "You may be given that information in due course. It is up to the
commander." It's head turned forwards. "We have nearly arrived. I suggest
you do not make any sudden moves in the conference chamber - the guards
could be described as very highly strung."
        They stopped alongside a pair of doors which looked exactly the
same as the last dozen or so they passed, except for the indecipherable
writing covering the space above a small wall panel. As the doors parted
MA-DN-T1 waved them through to destiny.

        Gardat was nervous. It was one thing to be blustering about on the
bridge of a mighty star battlecruiser but quite another to play the
diplomatic game with an unknown stellar nation, especially one right on his
doorstep. This had to go well or things could get very bad, very quickly.
Not to mention that his weapon of choice was the turbolaser and not the
pen. In the space of just a few short years he'd progressed up the ranks as
attrition killed either his superiors or the other officers competing for
the same promotions. It wasn't the best way to make commander and now he
was a full-blown petty warlord with a small fleet at his disposal and the
ability to slag whole worlds. And now it was time to become an ambassador
as well.
        "Makes me wish I took those extra classes in the academy." he
muttered to himself.
        Then the doors swished open. He stood up as they entered.
        He smiled. "Welcome aboard. I hope that this meeting results in
something positive for both of us."
        "As do I commander, thankyou."
        Nethra and her jem'hadar assistant took seats opposite the
commander while the other two took positions standing behind them, arms
folded behind their backs in what Gardat assumed was an at-ease stance.
        "Now then, it seems we have a matter to discuss. Who are you and
what relation do you have with the vessel you captured?"
        She smiled. "The Dominion Empire stretches across an entire
quadrant. That vessel comes from the Federation, they found a wormhole and
started expanding into our territory aggressively and refused to leave. We
repulsed them and they now attempt to infiltrate us." She laughed.
"Completely futile of course, their spies were utterly ineffective so now
they resort to intruding into our space with vessels such as the one you
saw earlier. Few escape."
        "Would it be appropriate to say your nations are at war?"
        "If we were at war commander, the Federation would no longer exist.
No, instead they provoke us with continued intrusions - supposedly for
'scientific research'. Soon our patience will wear thin."
        A cold war then, he mused. "Are we in Dominion space right now?"
        "In a manner of speaking. We laid claim to this region of space
first though we have little permanent presence yet. The wormhole is twenty
lightyears away so we have days to capture the intruders."
        "Is our presence going to cause a problem?"
        "It might." Her eyes narrowed. "Enough questions from you, I have
some. What are your intentions?"
        He leaned back and returned the look. "I ordered the _Hammer_
through the hyperconduit to ascertain what was on the other side. That's
all."
        "That was all?"
        "That's all."
        "Where do you come from?"
        "You might say I represent the Galactic Empire, at least part of
it."
        "Part of it?"
        "We're... not as unified as we once were. The New Republic has
risen to power and controls most of the old territories. Now we look to
survive and find ways to strike back. It may take time, but mark my words -
the Republic will fall. And anybody who gets in my way will be crushed!" He
clenched his right fist.
        "I see. Well I think I have a solution you may want to consider. If
my government so decides you may be allowed to join the Dominion Empire and
once the Federation are no longer an issue your problem with the Republic
could be... resolved."
        He almost laughed out loud. "Join you? I don't think so. I want to
rebuild the Empire Nethra, not subjugate it. You can tell your government
I'll entertain formal relations but at this time any form of an alliance is
out of the question, at least not until we know a lot more about each
other."
        "Of course. Such a move would need to be analyzed in great detail
anyway. With your permission I'll depart and inform my government about our
meeting?"
        "Be my guest."
        "And will you discuss our meeting with your own people Commander?"
        "I am my government. I'll talk to my officers though."
        "Well I'm certain the Dominion Empire will be most interested in
this meeting Gardat. Expect my return in twenty four standard hours."
        He nodded. "And I'll be waiting."
        

One day later.

        "Your proposal is intolerable Nethra! I will not engage in
technology sharing with aliens - do you really think the galactic empire
seized the galaxy by passing around it's secrets?"
        "You still lost the war."
        Gardat slammed his fist on the table, livid with fury.
        "The only reason it tore apart was because of power struggles
within the admiralty! We maintained technological superiority over our
enemies at every single point. When the rebels introduced their advanced
starfighters we retaliated with the defender project. It damn well would
have worked too if Zaarin hadn't turned traitor!"
        "Yes, the frailty of solids within your civilization is as apparent
as anywhere else. You needed a stronger leadership, one which has no petty
struggles and commands respect."
        "We had one. Or did you forget me telling you he's dead?"
        "Not at all commander. I was thinking more of the admiralty, they
hardly stayed united in a time of crisis now did they?"
        Gardat looked uncomfortable for a moment.
        "No. Your point?"       
        Nethra smiled. "Do you not see? It is the leadership that forges
victory, not the machines and other toys that surround us. Torpedoes are
useless when the fleet is impotent - a lesson the dominion intends to teach
one of our neighbours."
        "Us?"
        "Not at all. We have no quarrel with you - yet. It's the federation
who invoke our wrath."
        He waved a hand dismissively. "Not my problem."
        "Consider this commander, we are the only power worth mentioning in
the gamma quadrant and within a few years the alpha quadrant will be under
our control. That's half the galaxy. I will be honest with you, you present
a very interesting opportunity to my superiors. If you join with us you can
take part in sharing the spoils of war."
        Gardat was silent for several long moments, thinking. His forces
were still weak, on the level of a single faction of the old rebellion or a
very well-financed pirate clan. Alone they could conduct hit and run raids
on the republic, harass shipping, nothing really substantial. If the
dominion could be trusted they might prove to be a useful ally, at least
for a while. He would have to discuss the matter with the other officers
and come up with some kind of consensus, and it certainly wouldn't hurt to
carefully scout out other parts of this new galaxy to verify the accuracy
of the dominion's position.
        "Get something concrete from your government, like terms and so
forth, and I"ll discuss your proposal with my officers. In the meantime
we'll stay away from your borders. You said this nebula was outside your
frontier?"
        "At the moment, yes."
        "Good, then our presence here won't cause any problems?"
        "Not at this time."
        He toyed with a pen, twisting it in his fingers. "Very well, you
talk to your people and I'll talk to mine."
        'She didn't tell me what would happen if I said no.' he thought to
himself.

        A week later.
        
        The bridge of the USS _Turtledove_ was a hive of activity. On a
routine investigation of a stellar cluster that showed abnormal
electromagnetic flare activity the nova-class science vessel had been
surprised to find an unidentified ship in orbit around the small yellow sun
of Yagala-4. It corresponded to no known designs and there was no trace of
warp drive, puzzling the crew. The alien vessel was over twice their length
at just under six hundred meters long. It looked much like two boxes joined
by a length of pipe with two thick fins at the front. Its weapons were
powered down but an energy shield hampered their sensors.
        A man with wildly spiky blue hair shook his head. "They're not
responding to our hails."
        The vulcan captain leaned forward in her seat attentively. "Could
it be because of the electromagnetic interference?"
        "That's possible. It's definitely degrading our sensor capability."
        "Contact starbase 36 and request any information they have on ships
of this design."
        The comms operator pressed several buttons on his console before a
belated beep caused him to frown. "Sorry captain there's too much
interference to get a signal out. Makes me wonder what they're doing out
here."
        She nodded. "Mr Green, download the sensor logs to a class nine
probe and send it to starbase 36."
        "Aye captain. Launching probe, it should reach them in twelve
hours."
        "Captain! The vessel is firing thrusters and is changing course."
        "On screen."
        The odd craft had moved into a closer orbit towards the sun, moving
dangerously near the vast flares erupting from the boiling surface.
        "Follow them Mr Clarke, but keep our distance. I don't want to make
any aggressive moves."
        "Aye sir."

        The _Turtledove_ fell in behind the _Murrin_ as she started flying
through the outer periphery of the star. Already the temperature outside
her shields was climbing rapidly towards levels that would be dangerous for
an unshielded craft. A sudden gout of flame spat up from the surface below
and struck the starboard fin. Immediately the frigate started listing to
the side, venting plasma as her shields collapsed under the strain.

        "They've lost shields!" shouted the tac officer, her black hair
framing her slovakian face.
        "Minor damage to the starboard fin. Must be a control surface or
something - she's losing orbit." Clarke looked to the captain. "Sir if we
don't do something they're going to fall into the sun in less than two
minutes."
        Starfleet directives were clear in this situation: render aid to
the stricken vessel. Not only would it help save lives but it would help
them diplomatically with a first encounter.
        "Lock on a tractor beam Ericka, get them out of there."
        Mr Green studied his console. "Captain, I'm getting a distorted
audio signal. They report fires and heavy internal damage. They're asking
us for assistance."
        Captain Kear nodded. "Lower shields and prepare to beam over an
away team. Ericka, Mr Clarke, you're with me." She tapped her comm badge.
"Kear to sickbay. Doctor, have a medical team report to transporter room
one."
        "Right away sir."
        Green frowned again. "Captain I can't get an internal lock on the
ship. It must be those flares causing all that electromagnetic
interference."
        "Thanks Mr Green, well I guess we'll take a shuttle."

        Vars grinned as the small vessel dropped her shields.
        "Lieutenant, send the signal."

        Kear and her away team were riding the turbolift down to the
shuttlebay when suddenly the ship rocked. The lights flickered as the lift
ground to a stop partway between floors. They looked at each other in
concern before she tapped her comm badge.
        "Kear to bridge, what just happened?"
        The response crackled badly, as though the internal comm system was
shorting out.
        "Captain, this huge ship just popped out of nowhere and fired on us
with some kind of ionized particle weapon. The proton controls are dead!
Main computer running at quarter capacity and-."
        "Get us out of here!" she snapped urgently.
        "I can't! They took us by surprise! Everything's offline, they've-"
        The signal cut off.

        Gardat laughed at the holo. "Well done Vars. Any sign of a distress
signal?"
        "None that I saw."
        "Good, now turn your shields back on and get the hell out of here.
See you back at homeworld."
        Vars grinned. "Yes sir!" the image vanished.
        The commander smiled. "Osiris, tractor the enemy ship in. Hargos,
get a droid detachment and go secure that ship. I want prisoners!"
        The major saluted. "You'll have them sir."
        It was a fairly short operation - the federation science vessel was
small even by their own standards and the crew complement was equally low.
In no way was it a fair fight. There were barely fifty crew members on the
tiny federation corvette, no defensive autoguns, chokepoints or heavy
weapons. The defense was sporadic and pitiful. Scientists and other
noncombative personnel were running around or standing in the open wearing
nothing but jumpsuits for protection. Their hand phasers were useless
against the shielded destroyer droids and gas grenades were only too
effective at ferreting out isolated pockets of resistance. The handful of
security personnel onboard were almost ridiculously overwhelmed by the
hundreds of droids that poured in through through the airlocks and
shuttlebay. In less than ten minutes it was all over, the survivors
unconscious and carted off to the detention blocks. Slicer droids hacked
through the main computer core while technicians onboard the _Hammer_
picked at the nova's hardware.
        A few hours (and several thousand lightyears) later they were
powering back through the hyperconduit to Albrach. The prisoners were
dumped in a labor camp for interrogation and several days later, after
initial testing was finished, Gardat sat down with a copy of the report.
        As he paged through the thick document he saw much of it was
supposition based on their limited knowledge of federation technology and
what they'd sweated out of the crew. It was mostly technical data on warp
fields, computer power, control systems, starfleet doctrine and of course,
weapons. The little science vessel had proved a remarkable source of
information about the federation military - their civilian and military
fleets were apparently one and the same. Not only did they have small
things like a complete cultural database, weapons yields, important bases,
federation ship schematics, but also the bulding blocks for attempting to
replicate such technology if they were so inclined. A pity it would likely
take an entire science department at the academy a year to begin to
decipher half the bizarre technologies. But more importantly, everything
mostly corroborated the information given to them by the Dominion. The only
major difference was it looked like the Dominion were the aggressors.
Nothing unusual there, both sides in a conflict usually portrayed the other
as the initiator of conflict. The true cause would probably remain unknown
for quite some time.
        The federation stardrive seemed insufferably slow and damaging to
subspace fabric, although the tactical implications were interesting.
Theoretically, gravity wells should make them nigh-useless. The problem was
they didn't have any - currently the keel for a Dominator was being laid
but it was months away from completion. The phaser-beam weapons tested on a
surplas freighter were light-yield as long as the shields held - after that
point they became highly destructive. Photon/antimatter torpedoes looked
somewhat more dangerous, capable of damaging or destroying an imperator if
fired in high enough quantity. Fortunately the blast was of the undirected
variety - great for bombardment but less useful against shields. There was
a footnote from Kane indicating that they could only assume Dominion
weaponry was similar but somewhat on the more powerful side, if the
captured intelligence files were to be believed.
        But what really caught his interest was the section of society and
culture. Communists! In space! How on earth did that happen? The lack of
free thought and creativity slowed technological development significantly.
Historically every single collective-based society in the Old Republic was
either a concealed dictatorship or else relied on comprehensive use of
brainwashing and mind control to succeed. The federation looked like the
latter - especially once he saw what constituted 'proper' behaviour. The
poor citizens. Perhaps once the Empire was restored they would be
liberated.
        Another report from Vars made their situation very clear. If
construction of a meaningful military force was to occur in any amount of
time they needed more minerals fast. Even the relentless strip mining of
the entire system could only proceed so quickly. What they needed was
something that could really speed up production.
        Gardat tapped a button on his desk.
        "Station one, this is Gardat. Put me through to Captain Vars."
        "Vars here."
        "I was just thinking, we didn't build a world devastator because of
two reasons. The first was that we had no planets to really spare and we're
already mining everything local anyway.
        "Yes." said Vars carefully. They'd been over this before.
        "And we can't rip apart galactic planets either in case somebody
notices and gets curious right?"
        "Pretty much." There was a pause. "You want to send one through the
hyperconduit don't you?"
        "You read my mind Vars, you read my mind."
        It'll take about a year or two to build one though. The _Hammer_
really sucked dry most of the surface mineral deposits around here. We're
digging deeper but it's taking time."
        "What if we got some processed ore from somewhere else?"
        "That'd be great. Thinking of raiding the federation?"
        "Maybe." He pondered. "If we align ourselves with the Dominion we
can use their war to steal the resources we need."
        "From the federation or the dominion?"
        "The federation - they don't have a warfleet on our doorstep."
        "So the alliance is go?"
        "I think so."
        "Gardat, I have to tell you this - we ran a simulation based on the
figures we've managed to get and it's not good. We have a seventy-eight
percent chance of being assimilated into the Dominion once the war is over,
if not before. We just still don't have a fleet, hell we don't even have a
taskforce. All we've got is your battlecruiser, a couple frigates and a
bunch of freighters. Oh, and this battlestation isn't going anywhere."
        "What are you saying?"
        "What I'm saying is that we might be biting off more than we can
chew if we ally ourselves with them. I mean they aren't going to just
expect us to turn up in a few battles or send some support staff along -
they'll want ambassadors, advisors, people to keep US in line."
        Gardat sighed. On one hand Vars was right, but on the other they
couldn't just hide in wildspace for the next few hundred years building
ships - they'd all be dead and the ships would be laughably out of date
when they returned to the core.
        "Look, I can see what you're telling me but what other option do we
have? They're probably the best chance we'll have to take down the republic
in our lifetime, short of going on a million suicide raids with an
eclipse." He laughed briefly, shaking his head. "It'd probably take us a
decade to build one anyway."
        "Commander if it's all we have then what the hell right? Just watch
our backs."
        "You bet I will. Gardat out."