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| - “I have a bad feeling about this,” Anakin swallowed, his eyes straining out the viewport towards the approaching Baci vessel. It was probably three times the size of his own craft, not quite a warship but capable of putting he and Padmé on the run if it wanted. Or worse. “Just hold us steady,” Padmé advised. She sat peacefully beside him in the transport’s cockpit, looking unalarmed by the turn of events. “Let’s not give them any reason to suspect us.” Anakin heeded her words, but not happily. His first instinct was to cut and run, protect what they carried. But she was right, it was too important to be in position when the signal came to scare off so easy. They didn’t have a very active role, but it was a vital one. The shields not only had to be down for the fleet to attack, but for Mara and the Jedi to infiltrate the Dintellion to see his mother and uncle out safely. The enemy ship loomed closer. Its sickle shaped form swam around their position like a firaxan shark and its prey. He felt his skin break out in a nervous sweat. The comm crackled suddenly, and a female voice muttered in almost unrecognizable Basic, “Enemy ship, you are infringing on the agreed division line into space claimed by the Premier. Retreat at once.” Anakin threw Padmé a pained look, waiting to hear her thoughts. He was inclined to do as they said, even though then they would be out of range. “Charge the shield strippers,” she said softly. “What?” he whispered, incredulous. The Baci woman kept hailing them. “Enemy ship, comply or be destroyed.” “Charge them. Now,” his grandmother’s voice was hard as durasteel. He climbed out of his seat and scrambled to the hold and began the power up sequence. He could hear her speak from the cockpit, “Understood. We will move as soon as our engines engage. We’re having a little problem with the thrusters, one of them’s clogged.” “I do not care,” the voice snapped. “You have three minutes, or we will open fire.”
* * * Jacen was not pleased. He was stuck on the bridge of a Star Destroyer, literally as far from true danger one could get in a battle, while it would be a miracle if the rest of his family made it out alive. It was Anakin’s fault, he had volunteered him for the position, and no one had really given him a choice. So there he was. Trapped with nothing to do but watch. “General, we may have a problem,” one of the workers in the tech pit raised his head and shouted to Wedge. Jacen, standing beside him, scowled. It could be something minor, but the tremulous tone of the man’s voice suggested otherwise. “What is it?” Wedge asked. “You might want to come look for yourself, General,” the technician suggested. Sighing, Wedge slipped out of his command chair and marched down the aisle to lean over the screen. Curious, Jacen followed. What he saw froze his blood like a space vacuum. Anakin and Padmé were being harried by a Baci ship, one quite large enough to destroy it. Did the Baci know what was there, or was it by blind luck they had stumbled across the means of their own undoing? Wedge straightened up with a jerk, giving a sharp intake of breath. His eyes fixed on Jacen. “Tell Anakin to activate the shield strippers. Do it now.” “It’s too early!” Jacen protested. “Only by a few minutes,” Wedge argued. “We have to do it now.” He spun away from Jacen and yelled to his second in command, “Give the ready order! We attack as soon as the shields are down. And inform Queen Tenel Ka to strike at will.”
* * * The power-up sequence had thirty seconds to go when Anakin felt his brother’s presence flare inside his head. Jacen’s voice rang loudly in his ears as if they stood side by side. Now! it barked. His chest heaved with the momentous command, and he sent back a soft acknowledgement. “Padmé,” he bellowed towards the bow, “I have the signal!” “Oh gods,” she appeared in the doorway, looking frazzled, her silver hair spiking out in pieces from her usually neat braid. “But they’re right there! They’ll know it’s us!” “Their shields will be gone, we can shoot them down,” he said, but it still seemed frightening. But he had his orders. Questioning them wasn’t his job. Anakin jumped from his haunches, where he had been crouching next to the machinery, and circled towards the control desk. The charging period had passed, it was all green. He glanced once again at Padmé. Doubtful, she nodded once. He pushed the button. The ship gave a slight tremor, and then the weapon began to hum loudly, indicating its function. “It’s working!” he exclaimed. She had already disappeared back to the cockpit. He followed, eager to watch the process through the viewport. A blue haze appeared across the entire Baci fleet, and then with a bright flash…was gone. “Emperor’s ashes,” she breathed, fingers grazing the transparisteel. “It worked.”
* * * “It worked!” Jaina howled delightedly from the cockpit of her fighter. A chorus of similar yelps of joy rang across the comm frequency. A smile on her lips, Jaina tapped her headset and said, “Vornskrs, escort formation. You have your orders.” The Jedi squadron split into shield trios, two per each ship. The Falcon and the Sabre moved towards their destination, and Jaina and her crew kept pace. The overall situation had quickly dissolved into chaos, and the Baci had decided to attack. Both sides charged through what had previously been the no-fire zone, clashing like two mammoth titans in a bloody snarl. The Jedi team swerved in and out of the mess, determined not to get caught up in it. They had a higher purpose. The Dintellion, their goal, had stayed put at the far end of the Baci defense line. It would be quite a fight to get to them. And then, suddenly, everything went wrong. Reports started singing over the comm that the shields were still up, the Baci hadn’t been incapacitated after all. The Chiss weapon, their hope, had failed. Or been destroyed. Jaina’s heart leaped in her throat at the thought. But no, she hadn’t felt Anakin die. He was all right, so Padmé must be as well. So what had happened?
* * * The ship lurched forward and then back as if struck by a giant hammer. The humming ceased, and then everything went deathly still. “Wait! What’s happening?” Anakin stared out the viewport in horror as the blue haze slowly returned to the enemy fleet. “Oh no,” Padmé groaned, one hand over her heart. Her eyes were locked on the hulking form of the Dintellion, where her children were now trapped. Anakin was already rushing back to the hold. Sparks were flying from the system, the heat palpable. It shuddered gently in a way that suggested failing health. Anakin leaped forward and smacked the off switch, and it all quieted. The lights flickered off. Without hesitation, he ripped off the access plate where it had been sparking and examined the contents. The wires were melting, it was all overheating. It was too great of a power to be contained. “Blaster bolts!” he swore, and then winced, hoping Padmé hadn’t heard his foul language. The yacht jerked violently once again, but this time from an outside source. “Anakin, we’re under fire!” Padmé yelled. “You’re going to have to dodge them til help comes,” Anakin replied, rolling up his sleeves. He was going to have to hotwire the thing back together and hope it functioned. He dropped onto his belly and shimmied forward, getting closer to the cables.
* * * “What just happened?” Jaina yelled into her comm, at no one in particular. Panic was rising steadily inside her. “The shields are still up,” Han answered, his voice tense. “I know that!” Jaina said even as she pushed her stick forward into a nosedive. Two finnies were close on her tail. She spun and jerked, growling in frustration as more hits pinged off her hull. “Anakin and Padmé are under attack,” Mara’s voice came loud and clear in her ears. “We have to go help them.” “That’s not the mission objective!” Jaina protested. She sensed help on the way, and suddenly both finnies disappeared in a ball of fire. A Wookiee roar cut through the comm. “Thanks, Lowie,” Jaina sighed in relief. They came back together, side by side, and hovered over the flat disk of the Falcon. Numa, their other wingmate, had already perished. “The objective is impossible until those shields are down,” Mara snapped. “Vornskrs, follow us.” Jaina bristled at someone else giving her squadron orders, but held her tongue. It wasn’t the time for pettiness. She double clicked, acknowledging the command.
* * * It seemed like every ship in the fleet was bearing down on their position. They weren’t, but it felt that way to Anakin. They took hit after hit, jarring the deck so bad his teeth clacked together. It was hard enough trying to figure out the mechanics of the weapon alone, nevermind being tossed all over the place while doing it. “Anakin, we have a new problem!” He groaned deep in his throat. What else could go wrong? “What is it?” “Tractor beam!” His heartbeat quickened to a frenetic pace. “What can we do?” Padmé appeared in the doorway, stoic and crushed. “Nothing. They’re pulling us in.” He cursed again, and this time didn’t care whether she heard him or not. “Get in here,” he ordered. “Lock the blast doors. Maybe we can get this operational before they get to us.” She did as told, sealing and locking the doors to the hold. She suddenly looked very old to Anakin’s eyes, frail and small. He felt a pang of sorrow that after everything, this is probably how they would die. It just wasn’t fair. There was a clang of metal on metal, and he knew they were connecting the docking rings. The hiss of air pressurizing came to his ears. His fingers worked at an insane speed, grappling with wires, fusing some, disconnecting others. Footsteps could be heard, he sensed six Baci presences right outside. It wasn’t until a harsh knocking came at the door that he stood up and said, “I think I have it.” He initiated the power up. Padmé scurried to the control panel, her hand hovering over the button, waiting for the timer to hit zero. The knocking morphed into a heated buzz, and suddenly a blast ripped open a human sized hole. He heard Padmé scream, and then he was whipping around, lightsaber in hand at high guard. The Baci poured in through the hole, blasters raised but not firing. “Hold! Don’t move!” the leader yelled. Anakin froze, his lightsaber a thrumming shield between him and the lasers. Padmé had no such protection, and there was no way to get over the equipment between them to her. The armed Baci motioned her weapon at Padmé. “Drop your weapon or we kill the woman. Drop it! Now!” Anakin glanced at his grandmother, torn. Her eyes were on the timer. He followed her gaze. It was on zero. When he looked up, she was staring at him. Her hand still floated over the switch. “No,” he breathed, understanding the sadness of that look in the deepest part of his soul. She smiled forlornly, and there was love in her brandy eyes. “We take what life gives us, Anakin Solo, and do what we must.” She pushed the button. The Baci fired, and she crumpled into a heap on the floor like a shapeless doll.
* * * Cale’s eyes widened in astonishment, and he barely ducked out of the path of her lightsaber. Leia didn’t let up. She pulled back and swung again, slicing towards his chest. His saber met hers halfway there, and they held the pose for a heartbeat. Then Leia was dancing forward, cutting towards him in an unrelenting assault. He matched all of her blows, and a swift kick to her left shoulder sent her spinning away from him. The crowd blasted cheers down from their seats, almost deafening. She kept her feet, her lightsaber up in a classic defense, and met his ebony eyes. There was no fear in them, as she would have hoped. Only rage. “You’re insane,” he snapped, circling her slowly. She matched him step for step, never letting her gaze roam from his sword hand. The Force was a crescendo of power inside her, greater than she had ever felt. “What makes you think so?” “You’re never going to kill me here, in front of all my people. You’re going to die, Leia,” a sneer curled his lips. She laughed, and the sound was cold. “Not unless you come with me.” He pounced, driving forward in an attack that was brutal and without form, but dangerous nonetheless. She sidestepped and weaved, then hacked over her shoulder at his back. She felt the tip of her blade graze flesh, and a piercing wail of pain cleared the air. She pivoted around to face him, and found Cale reeling away, clutching a wound in his left side. It wasn’t deep, barely there, but would burn like hell. She snickered at him, thinking of all the times and ways he had caused her pain. She thought of his hands on her skin, his terrible invasion of her mind, and the anger swelled like a fountain inside her. “You witch,” he spat. “Now I’m not just going to kill you, I’m going to make you suffer.” “Come on then,” she beckoned. “I’m right here.” A warning of danger sent her flying in the air not a moment before a cloud of dirt exploded right where she had stood. She landed behind him, already in a headlong charge. He managed to block her calculated strikes by a hairsbreadth, always just a second from certain death. In the back of her mind, Leia heard Luke’s voice call to her. It was full of encouragement and hope, as well as caution to reel in her feelings. He saw the doom of her fall just as she did, and knew the consequences of it. He begged her not to bring things to that. They parted suddenly, each to a side, circling once again. The fire in her soul burned with the same heat as her lightsaber, but part of her knew that wasn’t right. She couldn’t kill him that way without losing herself in the process. She would fall into darkness, and there would be no way back out. Leia took a deep breath, then drew herself up short. “I’m going to give you a chance to surrender,” she said stiffly, the words tasting bitter on her tongue. “Put down your weapon and I will spare you.” Her thoughts filled with reminders of her training, of the Jedi Code. If it came to the worst, if she had to kill him, she had to do it for the right reasons. She had to do it as an instrument of the Force, to kill because he was a danger, because she had vowed to uphold justice. She had to kill with a cold detachment, devoid of passion. She had to kill because it was her duty. Cale laughed at her, a short barking sound that grated on her eardrums. “I’m not letting you off that easy,” he growled. And then, he did something like out of a dream. He stepped forward and thrust his lightsaber straight towards her, like a spear. And it seemed, for a split second, that Leia was in the past watching a very similar moment between herself and Jaina the day she began her training. Only then, she had been on the other side of the arrangement. Everything was blindingly clear. Leia fell nimbly backwards onto the support of her hands, back arched and knees bent at a ninety degree angle. The pose only lasted a moment. She kicked up, one leg tucked to her chest and the other extended to full length as she rolled backwards. The extended leg caught his sword hand on the forearm, and by the time she had flipped over to land on the bent knee his weapon was skidding across the sands. She called it to hand, and all of a sudden Cale was facing down the heated tips of both weapons. Cale’s eyes enlarged with fear at the realization of his situation. He turned a panicked look to his right, and Leia followed his gaze. He was staring at Zeya, who was leaned comfortably against the wall, still behind the partition. His eyes begged, and Leia grasped at last that he was expecting her to intervene. Instead, the look she gave him was so filled with cold dispassion it sent a chill down Leia’s spine. She didn’t make the slightest move to intercede. Zeya was going to let him die. His head whipped around to stare at Leia, open mouthed with amazement, and the surprised look in his eyes was the last thing she saw as she crossed the blades over his throat and uncrossed them again in one fluid motion. The head of the former Premier of the Baci Nation bounced along the ground like a rubber toy. His body dropped to its knees, then fell flat on its chest at Leia’s feet. She stood there a moment, staring wide-eyed at what’s she’d just done. Abruptly the sound of her lightsabers was the only thing to be heard. The entire assembly of Baci spectators had gone completely still, shocked and aghast. They had just witnessed the death of their leader, and no one had lifted a finger to stop it because no one had believed it would really happen. Soft footsteps crunched towards her. Leia turned her head to look. Zeya walked slowly out onto the battlefield, her black gaze on the corpse. At last they stood across from each other, the body in between. Zeya looked up and met her eyes. There was a sad sort of fortitude in them, and Leia understood everything in that look. She had done what she had to do for the sake of her people. Cale had to die, and Leia was only Zeya’s instrument in gaining that end. Quietly, reverently, Zeya dropped onto one knee, eyes still locked on Leia. Then she bowed her head and said, “Premier.”
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