Star Wars - The New Jedi Order - Force Heretic I - Remnant - Book 17

by Sean Williams

  Star Wars

  New Jedi Order

  Force Heretic I - Remnant

  Sean Williams and Shane Dix

  With the New Republic shattered and a Yuuzhan Vong conquest looming, it is up to Luke, Leia, and their loved ones to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. . . .

  There are three ways to defeat your enemy. The first, and most obvious, is to better him in a trial of force. The best, way is to have him destroy himself. . . The middle way is to destroy your enemy from within. Judicious application of the middle way shall make your blows more effective if you later take the way of force. From the middle way it is also possible to push your enemy onto the path of self-destruction.

  -UUEG TCHING of Kitel Phard, Fifty-fourth Emperor of Atrisia

  PROLOGUE

  Saba Sebatyne knew the moment she emerged from hyperspace that Barab I was burning. Where the planet normally displayed a cloudy, gray face lit by the glow of its primary, a sullen red dwarf, her infrared sensitive eyes now saw a fiery inferno. Smoke billowed high into the planet's atmosphere as the surface below boiled in outrage at some recent violation.

  Wanting to suppress the dread welling up inside of her, wanting to deny what she was seeing, Saba banked her X-wing into a steep dive toward the surface so she could take a closer look.

  This couldn't be happening, she told herself. There had to be someone left alive down there, surely.

  But her monitors were empty. There were no ships in orbit; no transmission sources; no signs of life.

  "This iz Saba Sebatyne," she spoke into the comm unit. "If anyone can hear this broadcast, please respond. Anyone."

  Silence was her only answer, scratched with static.

  She shook her flattened, leathery head, hoping in vain to lose the vision, the thought, the truth. So many worlds had fallen since the Yuuzhan Vong had first invaded the galaxy-but not Barab I. While a part of her had always known it was a possibility, she hadn't really imagined that it would ever actually happen to her homeworld.

  She clicked the comm to try again-not because she seriously expected a response, but because there seemed nothing else to do.

  "Reswa?" Her voice broke on the emotions rising at the thought that her hatchmate might have perished in those cruel fires. It was for Reswa she had been returning to her home planet in the first place. Her hatchmate was to embark on her coming-of-age ritual shenbit bone-crusher hunt, and she had asked Saba to be her witness in this. It was an honor to be asked, and a rejection of the invitation was regarded as highly insulting-especially when the one asking was a close family member.

  Family .. . the word had never sounded so empty as it did now. Friends, family-they were all gone. Nothing could have survived the flames that now ravaged her homeworld. And the closer she came to the surface of the planet, the more horror she saw. Alater-ka Spaceport was a smoldering crater; the shenbit reserves were now nothing but bubbling lava plains; the Shaka-ka memorial was sliding inexorably into a steaming sea . ..

  She guided her X-wing through the upper reaches of the atmosphere, the ship buffeted by the upthrust of hot gases rising from the smoking ruins of her homeworld.

  "This one should have been here," she whispered. It was a foolish notion, she knew. Even had she been here she wouldn't have made any difference to the-

  All thoughts ceased.

  She saw them.

  Slipping around the limb of the planet, a small contingent of coralskippers-four in all-were breaking from low orbit, where they had been out of her scanning range. They were escorting a ship the likes of which she'd never seen before a huge, vaguely ovoid mass, its movement slow as it labored against the pull of Barab I's gravity. It reminded Saba of a bloated balloon ready to burst.

  Whatever the ship was, it and its escorts were all that remained insystem of the attack fleet that had destroyed her world. A mopping-up squadron, perhaps. Whatever. It didn't matter. If there had been a hundred Yuuzhan Vong battle cruisers out there, her response would have been the same .. .

  She allowed the grief inside her to rise unfettered, feeling it blossom into a rage that felt perfectly satisfying, immediately easing her emotional pain. That pain, she knew, could be eased still further by action.

  Gritting her razor-sharp teeth, Saba veered off to intercept the coralskippers. They didn't see her at first, clearly assuming that all resistance had been quashed. She was able to get in close before they realized she was even there. Only when she was practically on top of them did the skips break formation, three of them peeling away to come about on an attack vector. It was too late for the skip closest to the balloonlike ship she emptied a round of laserfire into it, crying out in rage as she did so. She didn't really expect such a crude attack to achieve anything except to get their attention, so was surprised when the coralskipper exploded in a violent flash of crimson that flung shards of the craft far and wide.

  The explosion had the unexpected effect of clearing her mind. The skip must have been already damaged, its dovin basal disabled from recent battle with the Bara-bels. Such a simple victory, so soon in the battle, startled her. Perhaps, she thought, she hadn't expected victory at all. She had simply gone into the fight expecting to die- no, wanting to die. Her people were dead, and so deep down she reasoned that she should be, too.

  Now she was in a fix-and one she might not be able to get herself out of. Two of the remaining skips were coming at her from behind, unleashing streams of molten plasma in her direction. She didn't want to die, and her reflexes agreed. She avoided the fate of her fellow Bara-bels by rolling her X-wing and skewing down and around her attackers. Some of the plasma reached its target, however, instantly depleting her shields.

  She didn't have time to check if the skip had stayed on her tail. Her R2 unit tootled an urgent warning off to her port side another skip was coming in fast. She pulled up sharply, rocking unsteadily in her cockpit as plasma balls flickered past. Saba winced. That last shot must have sheared a millimeter of paint from her wing.

  She barely had time to thank her droid for the heads-up before the first two skips returned to make another pass at her. It was too much, she knew; if she remained on the defensive like this, then sooner or later they were going to get her-and out in the open, she had no choice but to be defensive.

  With this in mind, she moved her X-wing nearer to the larger Yuuzhan Vong craft. She kept her flying tight, swooping in close to the massive, bulbous vessel, feeling the craft's dovin basals tugging at her shields. They weren't as effective as the dovin basals on the other ships she'd come across in action; these no doubt had a different purpose, although she couldn't guess what that might be.

  Sweeping under the belly of the thing, confident that she was safe on at least one side, Saba gave pursuit to the . skip whose buddy she had destroyed. It tried to shake her by swerving abruptly from side to side, but she was able to stay on it long enough to get a bead on its dovin basal. When her target-lock flashed, Saba loosed one of her torpedoes. She had done this enough times to sense when she'd fired a good shot, and the second her finger squeezed the trigger, she knew she had the skip beaten. The torpedo detonated on target, effectively downing the skip's defenses and allowing her to blast the rocky craft into oblivion with a hail of laserfire. She called out in delight as the coralskipper fell apart in a stutter of explosions.

  She was quick to bring her emotions into check, however, when she banked her X-wing to come back around and once again saw her planet burning. This was not a time for celebrating, she reminded herself.

  Another
warning from her droid. This time she didn't even pause to check where the attack was coming from; she just rolled her X-wing in toward the main ship. The surface of the thing seemed to move in strange and subtle undulations as she passed near it-almost like a sac filled with water-although at all times it remained as rough as the exterior of the coralskippers. She noticed something else, too huge tentacles that unfurled from the stern of the craft, flailing around as though reaching for Saba's ship.

  "What iz this?" she said aloud, not really expecting a reply. Nevertheless, the R2 unit behind her tootled a response. She didn't need to check her translator to know that the droid didn't have enough information to be able to give her a proper answer.

  She kept herself close in to the huge ship, veering constantly to avoid the writhing tentacles. She swung around the underside of the vessel when one of the skips came in too close and risked taking a couple of potshots at her. She avoided the attack easily enough, and the plasma shot harmlessly into the space away from the balloon-ship. The skips wouldn't fire if she stood between them and their charge.

  What iz it? she asked herself again. And why were the skips being so careful around it? It had no defenses to speak of, except for the small escort of coralskippers, and its only weapon seemed to be the tentacles that constantly lashed out at her. If there was anything else, then why didn't they use it?

  There was no time to dwell upon the matter, though, Time was running out for her. She couldn't stay defensive indefinitely. Others from the fleet would soon be making their way back to assist their comrades, she was sure.

  She pitched the X-wing again, jinking to avoid one of the tentacles while at the same time spraying a cover of laserfire at one of the incoming skips. The shots were easily absorbed by the dovin basal's black hole, but it was enough to make the pilot swerve out of her way. That bought her a few valuable seconds to get herself into a better position. She pulled her fighte r up into a backward arc, coming around the top of the massive saclike vessel and down onto the skip that had just swung past. She didn't wait to get the dovin basal properly in her sights this time; she simply fired. The torpedo detonated too soon to be of any use. Saba silently cursed her rashness; a wasted shot!

  There was no time to bemoan her luck. She quickly brought her ship around again to pursue the lucky skip. It released blazing plasma from its side cannons. A handful of the globules struck her forward shields. The ship shuddered under the impact, and she snarled as her R2 unit reported a further 12 percent depletion to her shields. Determined, Saba went after the skip, doggedly tailing it around the body of the larger vessel and keeping its dovin basal at all times in targeting reticle. Finally, with a lock on her target, she went to depress the firing trigger. At that moment the remaining skip crested the top of the main craft, loosing a volley of plasma. She brought the X-wing sharply around, heading directly for the incoming skip, her forward shields taking the full brunt of the hot plasma and being reduced still further as a result.

  A tentacle whipped after her, snaking through the vacuum to strike. Instinctively, she pushed the nose of her ship down, leaving the coralskipper behind her to plunge broadside into the thick and unyielding appendage, effectively stripping half the craft's hull from nose to tail and causing it to spin out of control. Saba pursued it, pounding the damaged skip with laserfire, not stopping until it disintegrated into a ball of vapor.

  An exclamation of joy died in her throat when, a split second later, she saw the remaining skip abruptly emerge' from the vapor cloud of its fallen comrade. Saba moved easily enough to avoid it, missing the craft by about five meters. She swung her X-wing smoothly and deftly, a confidence returning in her that had been missing since the battle had begun. Now that she had reduced the odds, she felt she had a much better chance of survival. All she had to do was stay focused-and be mindful of those tentacles!

  The skip tried to lead her away from the main craft. She didn't mind anymore. With only the one skip remaining, she no longer felt the need to use the huge vessel as a shield. Without the others around to trouble her, she could take this last one out with little difficulty.

  She chased the skip for several thousand kilometers out from the tentacled vessel, waiting for a decent shot. The skip opened up with its plasma cannons, filling the space in its wake with streams of molten plasma that rained down upon Saba's X-wing.

  Her R2 unit whistled a warning her shields were totally depleted. It didn't matter; Saba had to stay on target until the opening came. When it did, she stutterfired at the skip's dovin basal and launched a single torpedo. A perfect shot, she knew-the instinct confirmed a moment later when the dovin basal overloaded and the skip was left defenseless. The alien pilot attempted desperately to evade Saba's pursuit. But it was no use. She depressed the firing button of her laser guns, and watched in satisfaction as the bolts made their way into the rear of the enemy craft, quickly tearing it apart with a blinding flash.

  Saba found herself wanting to laugh out loud at the victory. It was an emotion empty of joy, containing only bitterness and grief. What was victory when her planet hung burning behind her and her people were dead?

  She hissed savagely as she brought her X-wing around to attack the remaining Yuuzhan Vong vessel. It swelled before her like a hideous, living moon-a target almost impossible to miss. She didn't bother with her targeting computer. She simply aimed and fired, releasing her three remaining torpedoes into the huge ship with grim

  satisfaction.

  They sank easily into the hide of the craft. Three detonations occurred in quick succession, deep within its belly. A rent appeared in its side, outgassing fire. The tentacles flailed crazily, as if in pain.

  "For this one's home," she whispered. "For this one's people."

  She banked for a final pass to finish off the ship, he heart racing as she thrilled at the thought of her impending revenge on the enemy. It was a moment she would savor for many years to come, even as she grieved for those she had lost.

  Laser bolts peppered the side of the craft, widening the rent and creating numerous new ones. To Saba's surpris and disappointment, however, the ship didn't explodi Instead, the sac burst from top to bottom, stretching lik a fruit left too long in the sun. From the tear poured strange translucent gel, followed by what appeared to b a thousand six-pointed stars.

  Stars? She relaxed her grip on the laser cannon trigger. How could that be? There were thousands of them, tumbling into space, glinting in infrared starlight. They couldn't be weapons, or the strange ship would have deployed them earlier. They couldn't be bounty, either, for nothing of value on Barab I matched those peculiar shapes. . .

  She reduced speed, coming in cautiously for a better look. Her R2 unit plucked one star at random from the jumbled mass and brought it up on her display. A sickening sensation flowered in her gut as she saw just what the points of the "stars" were.

  Two arms, two legs, a head, and a tail.

  Nothing of value. . .

  The thought rang in her mind as the horror of what had happened sank in. The Yuuzhan Vong didn't value metals or jewels. Their biological sciences had no use for Barab I's usual bounty. They did, however, take captives- and they had to transport them somehow.

  My people!

  Saba watched helplessly as the ship continued to spill its contents into the cold vacuum of space. Her entire being shuddered to a grief that burned more intensely than the fires raging on the planet below. Her last thought before tears obscured her vision was a despairing, soul-tearing cry

  What have I done?

  Part One

  Intersection

  Three Months Later

  "I say we fight on!"

  The voice echoed through the vast, domed hall that was serving as a replacement for the Grand Convocation Chamber on Coruscant, where the Senate had previously met. With Coruscant currently in the hands of the Yuu-zhan Vong, Mon Calamari had been selected as a temporary capital and now played host to the representatives of the Galactic Alliance-a group mu
ch smaller than a full meeting of the Senate had once been, before the Yuu-zhan Vong invasion, but still several hundred strong.

  They responded to the call to fight in the fashion preferred by their individual species. There were whistles, grunts, shrieks, and subsonic rumbles. Some waved appendages; others stamped their feet. And others still, Leia Organa Solo among them, remained silent. She stood completely motionless, gently extending herself into the Force to feel it crackle and flare from the conflicting emotions of those gathered around her.

  The speaker, a sour-faced Sullustan by the name of Niuk Niuv, paced the floor with an energy that belied his size. Clearly agitated by the sudden commotion, he lifted one hand to his ear to indicate his discomfort, while the other attempted to motion the crowd to silence. Even with his audio dampeners in place, the level of noise around the hall still hurt his sensitive ears.

  "We have them on the back foot," he said, his large black eyes roaming the assembly. "They are overextended and ill prepared to defend themselves. They didn't expect to have to defend themselves so late in the game-which is precisely why we must drive home this advantage! To ignore the opportunity we have been given would be like putting our collective head back on the chopping block!"

  "And who took it off the block in the first place?" The call came from the far side of the chamber. Leia immediately recognized the voice as belonging to Thuv Shinev of the Tion Hegemony.

  Niuk Niuv's face contorted into a fleshy snarl. "That is irrelevant," he said irritably.

  "Really?" Shinev bellowed. "I wouldn't have thought so. Too long have some among us treated the Jedi with contempt and suspicion. If we do have the chance now, finally, to force the Yuuzhan Vong back, then we should at least acknowledge their opinions on the subject!"

  "If you think it necessary/then by all means thank them," the Sullustan retaliated. "I'm not saying they don't j deserve that. But to do anything less than strike back at the Yuuzhan Vong would be madness, no matter what the Jedi say! We must prove to the Vong that we cannot be subjugated and will not tolerate their oppression! I They have done enough. It is time for us to show them who this galaxy really belongs to! We must strike back hard, and we must do it now."