Star Wars®: Dark Nest I: The Joiner King

by Troy Denning

  And, most clearly of all, Jacen felt the presence of Jaina, her mind ablaze with machinelike calculation.

  The Jedi meld filled Jacen’s mind, a psychic feedback mechanism between himself and the other Jedi. He was impressed by the meld’s power, and by how it had grown since he’d last experienced it on Myrkr. There, it had been a mixed blessing, but then the Jedi war party at Myrkr had been divided among themselves. Here, they were united in a single purpose.

  Jacen’s sensitivity to the Force had grown within the meld, and he was aware of the other lives around him, the non-Jedi pilots of Twin Suns Squadron, and others nearby, particularly the disciplined minds of Jagged Fel’s Chiss squadron, which flew to port and slightly behind them. Jag had volunteered his squadron for this fight, even though they weren’t technically a part of Kre’fey’s command. Once Kre’fey had been reminded that Jag’s veterans had originally been a part of Twin Suns Squadron before being split off, he’d accepted Jag’s offer.

  “Listen up, people.” Jaina’s voice came again on the comm. “I know we outnumber the enemy, but that doesn’t make the ordnance they’ll shoot at us any less real. This isn’t a drill, and you can get killed if you’re not careful. I want everyone to stick with their wingmate and keep an eye open for an enemy maneuvering to get behind you. Streak,” she said to Lowbacca, “I want your flight to our right, a couple of klicks behind. Tesar, you’re flying above and behind.”

  Above was a meaningless term in space, but it was easier than saying “ninety degrees from my and Lowbacca’s axis,” and Tesar knew what she meant, anyway.

  “Copy,” Tesar said, and Lowbacca gave an answering roar.

  “Remember that Jag Fel’s to our left. Understood?”

  There was a chorus of acknowledgments.

  “Right then,” Jaina said. “Let’s teach these traitors a thing or two.”

  Jacen was impressed. He hadn’t realized Jaina had become such an effective leader. Her performance was even more impressive because, through the Jedi meld, he could also sense her scanning her displays while she was talking, minding her comm channels, and worrying about her inexperienced pilots while trying to work out tactics that would keep them from killing themselves.

  Jacen kept his fighter tucked into formation behind Jaina’s, an extra wingmate for Twin Leader. His eyes scanned the displays and saw that Kre’fey’s entire armada had by now entered realspace, three task forces grouped as close to Ylesia as the planet’s mass shadow would permit. Each of the three groups was the equal of the entire Peace Brigade fleet, and they had the enemy force trapped between them. The only hope for the enemy commander was to leave orbit instantly and attack one of Kre’fey’s task forces, hoping to smash through it before the others arrived to overwhelm him.

  Moments ticked by, and the enemy commander made no move. His only real hope was slipping through his fingers.

  And then the enemy fleet moved, choosing as its target Twin Suns Squadron, and the task force behind it.

  The Chief of State of the New Republic was in the middle of his address to the Ylesian Senate when one of Thrackan’s aides—the human one, fortunately—came scuttling down the aisle of the Senate building and began to whisper in Thrackan’s ear. Maal Lah, who was watching the speech from another seat nearby, suddenly became very preoccupied with talking into one of the villips he wore on the shoulders of his armor.

  Thrackan listened to the aide’s agitated whisper, then nodded and rose. “I regret the necessity of interrupting,” he began, and saw the Senate’s malevolent gaze immediately turn in his direction. “A fleet from the New Republic has appeared in Ylesian space.” He watched the august Senatorial heads turn to one another in growing panic as a buzzing filled the hall. Thrackan turned to the Chief of State of the New Republic.

  “You didn’t tell anyone you were coming, did you?” he asked.

  If it weren’t a dire emergency in which he might be killed, Thrackan might almost enjoy this.

  “These are rebels!” the New Republic Chief of State proclaimed. “Rebels against rightful authority! They wouldn’t dare fire on their leader!”

  “Perhaps,” Thrackan suggested, “you’d care to get on the comm and order them to stop.”

  The Chief of State hesitated, then came down from the podium. “This is the sort of misunderstanding that can only be cleared up later. Perhaps we should, umm, seek shelter first.”

  “An excellent idea,” Thrackan said, and turned again to the Senate. “I suggest that the honorable members proceed to the shelter.” As a few bolted at top speed for the exit, he added, “In an orderly manner!”—as if it would do any good. His words only seemed to accelerate their flight, desks overturning as the founders of the noble Ylesian Republic jammed shoulder to shoulder in the doors.

  Thrackan turned to Maal Lah and suppressed a shrug. These people hadn’t betrayed their own galaxy out of an excess of courage, and he couldn’t say he was surprised by their behavior.

  The Yuuzhan Vong commander was barking into his little shoulder villip. His translator sidled up to Thrackan.

  “Commander Lah is ordering the forces that were already in transit for the joint maneuvers to come at once.”

  “Very good. Will the commander be going to his command ship?”

  “The distance to the spaceport is too great.”

  Especially if you’re traveling at the pace of a fat ugly Hutt-sized reptoid, Thrackan thought.

  “I can offer the commander room in our shelter,” Thrackan said.

  “The commander has no need of the shelter,” the translator said. “He will instead take charge of the troops here in the capital.”

  “Excellent! I’m sure we’re in good hands.”

  Maal Lah finished his one-sided conversation and stalked toward Thrackan, his fingers curled around his batron of rank. “I will need to take command of your Presidential Guard and your paramilitaries.”

  “Of course,” Thrackan said. “Be my guest.” He feigned thought, and added, “It’s a pity the Yuuzhan Vong gods are so opposed to technology. If they weren’t, we’d have installed planetary shields and be perfectly safe.”

  Maal Lah gave him a murderous glare, and for a moment Thrackan’s kidney tingled at the thought that he’d gone too far.

  “Will you lead your forces into battle, Excellency?” Lah demanded. “Or will you seek shelter with the others?”

  Thrackan raised his hands. “I regret that I have no warrior training, Commander. I’ll leave all that to the professionals.” He turned to Dagga, who had been waiting politely behind him all this time. “Come, Marl.”

  He left the room at a rapid but dignified pace, Dagga falling into step by his side and half a pace back. “Will you be going to the shelter, sir?” she asked.

  Thrackan gave her a sidelong smile. “I know better than to hide in a hole with no back door,” he said.

  Her cold grin answered his own. “Very good, sir,” she said.

  “I’m going to the docking bay in back of the Presidential palace and take my landspeeder on the fastest route out of town.”

  Dagga’s smile broadened. “Yes, sir.”

  “Can you drive fast, Marl?”

  She nodded. “I can, sir. Very fast.”

  “Why don’t you drive, then? While I make use of the razor I’ve stored in the backseat, and change into the fresh clothes I stored there.”

  “Shadow bomb away.” Jaina’s voice came over Jacen’s headphones. “Altering course, thirty degrees.”

  “Copy that, Twin Leader,” Jacen said.

  Jacen remained tucked in behind Jaina’s X-wing as the fighter lifted out of the way of the enemy fleet, which was set to come rampaging through this part of space in about ten seconds, and he used the Force to help Jaina push the shadow bomb on ahead, toward its target, a Republic-class cruiser that was spearheading the Peace Brigade escape attempt.

  “Enemy fighters ahead. Accelerating…”

  Jacen had already felt the enemy pilots in the F
orce. He opened fire at where he knew they would be, and was rewarded with a flash that meant an enemy pilot hadn’t powered his or her shields in time. Jacen shifted to another target and fired, another deflection shot, but the bolts slammed into shields and flashed away. The target formation burst apart like a firework, each two-fighter element weaving away from Twin Suns’ attack.

  At that moment Jaina’s shadow bomb hit the enemy cruiser, and its bow blossomed in a blaze of fire.

  Jacen was following Jaina after the corkscrewing enemy fighters—E-wings—and the Jedi meld rose in his perceptions. He felt Corran Horn making a slashing run at an enemy frigate, the Wild Knights methodically destroying a flight of B-wings, but the knowledge wasn’t intrusive—it didn’t demand attention, or take away from his piloting, it was just there, in the back of his mind.

  “Stay close, Vale,” Jacen told Jaina’s wandering wingmate.

  “Oh! Sorry!”

  “No chatter on this channel,” Jaina admonished. “I’m breaking right…now.”

  Vale wandered even farther from her assigned position during this maneuver, and through the Force Jacen sensed the intense concentration of an E-wing pilot trying to get her into his sights. Jacen deliberately wove out of his assigned place in an S-curve, and as he did so he was aware through the Force-meld that Jaina knew exactly what he was doing, and why.

  “Turning left thirty degrees,” Jaina said, which swung her fighter and Vale’s into what the enemy pilot certainly thought was a perfect setup…

  Except that it led the enemy right into Jacen’s sights. He touched off a full quad burst of laserfire and saw the E-wing’s shields collapse under the concentrated barrage. Jacen fired again, and the E-wing disintegrated.

  Jacen’s heart gave a leap as the E-wing’s wingmate chanced a deflection shot and scored a triple laser burst on Jacen’s shields—which held—and then Jacen wove away, the E-wing in pursuit, until Jaina’s own fighter swirled through a graceful, unhurried series of arcs, and she and Vale blew the Brigader and his craft to atoms. As she overtook Jacen he could see Jaina’s grim satisfaction through the cockpit, and she waggled her wings at him as he slid once more into position.

  Then he sensed her mood shift, and he knew she was receiving orders on the command channel.

  “Twin Suns,” she said. “Regroup. Re-form on me. We’re going to cover the landing party.”

  Jacen knew she was reluctant to leave the combat once it had begun, but he also knew that the fight was going well for the New Republic. The forces were evenly matched in numbers, but the Peace Brigade personnel simply weren’t up to the mark. Some mercenary pilots in starfighters were giving a good account of themselves, but the capital ships weren’t fighting very well, and some of them were shedding escape pods even though they hadn’t taken critical damage. A pair of enemy starfighter squadrons were fleeing the battle as fast as they could, with A-wings in pursuit. Kre’fey’s two additional task forces would soon be on the scene, decisively tilting the odds even farther toward the New Republic, and at that point Jacen wouldn’t be surprised to see some of the Peace Brigade ships surrender.

  It was good to feel the enemy in the Force again, Jacen thought. The Yuuzhan Vong were an emptiness in the Force, a black hole into which the light of the Force disappeared. These Peace Brigaders at least registered as a part of the living universe, and because he could feel them in the Force, Jacen could anticipate their actions. Compared to the Yuuzhan Vong, these people were easy.

  Easy to destroy. He tasted a whiff of sadness at the necessity—these targets shouldn’t be targets; they should be fighting on behalf of the galaxy against the invaders. Instead they had chosen to betray their own, and Kyp Durron and Traest Kre’fey were determined they pay the penalty.

  Twin Suns Squadron re-formed, and Jag Fel’s Chiss squadron fell into place on their flank. The blue-and-white sphere of Ylesia grew closer. Jacen saw the landing force separating itself from the closest of Kre’fey’s task forces.

  “We’re going to take out the spaceport,” Jaina said. And also to draw fire, Jacen knew, so they could learn where the defenses were and knock them out before the ground forces, in their lightly armored landing craft, attempted their assault.

  “Configure your foils for atmosphere,” Jaina said.

  The X-wings took on an I-shape as the foils drew together to become wings. The blue planet rolled beneath them…and then they saw a patch of green, one of the small continents coming up, and Jaina tipped her fighter toward it, with Jacen and the others after.

  Jacen’s craft rocked to the buffets of the atmosphere. Flame licked at his forward shields. If he looked over his shoulder he could see sonic shock waves rolling over his foils like spiderwebs. The green land drew closer.

  Then new symbols flashed onto his displays, and his own voice echoed Jaina’s cry. “Skips! Coralskippers, dead ahead!”

  The enemy fighters were rising from the spaceport, two squadrons’worth, their dovin basals yanking them clear of the planet’s gravity. And in their wake came a much larger target, a frigate analog. The Yuuzhan Vong were clearly aiming for the landing force, which was swinging above the planet in high orbit, guarded by a pair of frigates and the Screamers, a rookie squadron of X-wings under a twenty-three-year-old captain. The escort could probably handle the attackers—eventually—but in the meantime the Yuuzhan Vong could cut up the landing force badly.

  “Accelerating! Maximum thrust!” Jaina called, and Twin Suns poured power to their engines. They were in a good position to bounce the enemy as the Yuuzhan Vong clawed their way up through the atmosphere. Jacen looked at his displays and calculated angles, trajectories…

  “I’ve got a shadow bomb, Twin Leader,” he said. “Let me take a run at the frigate.”

  Through the Jedi meld he felt Jaina duplicating his own calculation. “Twin Thirteen,” she decided, “take your shot.”

  Jacen dipped his nose and aimed for the patch of air he thought the frigate would pass through in another twenty standard seconds or so. The moment of release was difficult to judge—he couldn’t find the frigate analog in the Force, and Jacen would have to make a guess based on how it appeared on his displays.

  Suddenly he felt the power of the Force swell in his body, as if he’d just filled his lungs with pure universal power. Calculations stormed through his mind, faster than he’d thought possible. And distantly, he found he could detect the enemy ship—not as a presence in the Force, but as an absence, a cold emptiness in the universe of life.

  There were Jedi nearby that hadn’t yet engaged the enemy—Tahiri, Kyp Durron, Zekk, and Alema Rar. Since they hadn’t been distracted by combat, they had just loaned him their power through the Jedi meld, sending him strength and aiding his calculation.

  He felt the cold metal of the bomb-release mechanism in his fist, and he pulled it. “Shadow bomb away.” And then, as he pulled back the stick and fed power to the engines, he fired a pair of concussion missiles.

  The shadow bomb was a missile without propellant, packed instead from head to tail with explosive, and would either drift toward its target or be pushed with a little help from the Force. The lack of a propellant flare made the bomb hard for the Yuuzhan Vong to detect, and the extra explosive gave it tremendous punch when it hit.

  The two concussion missiles were intended as a distraction for the Yuuzhan Vong—if the enemy were paying attention to the two missiles, coming in on a different trajectory, then they’d be less likely to see the shadow bomb dropping toward them.

  Thanks, Jacen sent into the meld. And then he felt the others fade from his perceptions as first Kyp, then the others, entered combat.

  The three parts of Kre’fey’s fleet had just united, Jacen thought, with the Peace Brigade forces trapped between them. The Brigaders were about to lose their whole fleet.

  The nose of Jacen’s X-wing pointed higher, toward the distant glowing exhaust ports of Jaina’s squadron. This put the frigate below in a perfect position to shoot at him, the
fire heading practically up his tail. He saw the plasma cannon projectiles and missiles coming, and he jinked wildly for a few seconds, until his shadow bomb hit the Yuuzhan Vong ship and blew its nose off. Along with the nose went the dovin basals that were being used for defense, so even the two concussion missiles slammed home.

  What doomed the Yuuzhan Vong frigate wasn’t the damage, but the aerodynamics. If the frigate had been in the vacuum of space it probably would have survived, but its fate was sealed by Ylesia’s atmosphere. The frigate began to weave through the air like an out-of-control skyrocket as the wind seized hold of its torn bow section. Parts tore off and flew away, spinning downward; and then the frigate lost control completely and began a death spiral toward the planet below.

  Jacen’s attention was already on the combat above him. Jaina and Jag Fel had bounced the coralskippers and had killed at least three of them, their wrecked hulls plunging downward in the atmosphere with tails of flame, but now the battle had become a melee. Again aerodynamics worked to the advantage of the New Republic: a coralskipper had all the aerodynamics of a brick, but the X-wings, with their foils closed, made decent, maneuverable atmosphere craft. Still, Jacen sensed Jaina’s tension through the Jedi meld: half of Twin Suns Squadron were still rookies, easy meat for an experienced enemy; and the Yuuzhan Vong were flying like veterans.

  An X-wing trailing fire plunged past Jacen as he climbed, and he saw a flash as the pilot ejected. Fragments of burning yorik coral crashed onto Jacen’s shields as he climbed: that meant another coralskipper accounted for.

  He would be at too much of a disadvantage if he climbed straight into the fight, so he avoided the battle and got above the furball before rolling his craft into a dive. He felt control surfaces biting air as the X-wing accelerated, and found a target ahead, a coralskipper maneuvering onto the tail of an X-wing that seemed to be wandering around randomly, like a dewback looking for its herd—doubtless one of Jaina’s rookies. Jacen chanced the deflection shot, quadded his lasers, and opened fire, and only when he saw the coralskipper explode behind him did the rookie panic, flinging his fighter all over the sky to avoid a menace that Jacen had already destroyed.