Star Wars Endgame: Episode II, Chapter One

STAR WARS: ENDGAME

Episode II: The Dying Sun

   Timeline: 40 Years After the Battle of Yavin (ABY)

CHAPTER ONE

-3956 Years Before the Battle of Yavin-

   Captain Oris Bruvar felt his heartbeat quicken as he strode down a corridor on board the Dying Sun. He knew that it had been the Sith Lord's request that he disturb him only when they reached their destination, which they had just now. But Oris could just tell that he would be executed for the disturbance anyway.

   Reaching the door to Darth Glovoc's chambers, Oris took a deep breath before pressing the panel to open the door and entering. After letting the door close behind him, plunging him into darkness, the captain said tentatively, "My lord?"

   "You had better have a good reason for disturbing me, captain," an icy voice replied.

   Oris gulped. "My lord, we have arrived in the system. What are we to do next?"

   "Leave that to me."

   Emerging from the shadows was a tall man with pale skin and venomous black eyes. His black cape, which folded out of the crevices of his silver armor, swept the floor as he strode past Oris and exited his chambers, headed towards the bridge. Oris followed him, feeling his heart pound against his chest.

   Once they had arrived, Darth Glovoc made straight for the viewport, setting his gaze on a faraway planet.

   "There," he said. "Take us to the fifth planet."

   The bridge crew acknowledged his command and advanced the ship towards the planet. Once they had reached it, Oris glanced at the Sith Lord. "Is this the world you saw in your visions, my lord?"

   "Yes," Glovoc hissed. "Commence a survey of the planet."

-Now; Nyriaan-

   He had lost the thief.

   Jaden Korr checked his ship's sensors again and again, but with no luck. The courier which he had been pursuing through Nyriaan's atmosphere was gone, as if it had never been there in the first place.

   "Arsix, run a diagnosis on the systems," he said. "Maybe he's trying to jam us."

   R6-O3 beeped an acknowledgment and went to work. In a few minutes, he reported that everything was functioning properly.

   Maybe he has a cloaking device on his ship, Jaden mused. He reached out with the Force but instantly came up with nothing. It was almost as if something was blocking him out.

   "Find a place for us to land," he then said to R6. "If none of our senses can find him, then there's no hope in continuing our search in the air. We'll have to go to ground."

   R6 made a moaning sound and Jaden knew why. With the thick fog of the atmosphere beginning to cloud up his viewport and block out the communications systems, landing was going to be hard than he thought....

-The Ralroost's lobby room-

   "I hope everyone's made pace with their life, because this'll be the last time we'll get to enjoy it."

   Lieutenant Arek Cobalt lifted his eyes from his datapad to stare at the Kel Dor sitting across from him, a member of the reorganized Rancor Squad.

   "What are you talking about, Yin?" Arek asked.

   A foreboding look creased Yin Zarn's already-wrinkled face. "We're going into the Trans-Vulta Sector. Odds are, we'll go to Nyriaan in search of Jaden. I've heard the stories...."

   "Not this again," groaned Reeda Kanu as she put her head in her hands.

   "That planet is cursed. First the Starveil crashed there over four thousand years ago. Then the Corporate Sector lost the Commerce during an orbital scan. Then the Locus crashed-"

   "Yin, all of those incidents were centuries ago, before even Palpatine was born!" Arek said. "Technology's advanced since then. Nothing will go wrong."

   The Kel Dor trooper managed to look shocked even with his anti-oxygen goggles covering his eyes. "By the Baran Do... you have doomed us all by saying that."

   "Does he have an off-switch?" growled Sirul Rosk, Rancor Squad's Shistavanen demolitions expert. "Or at least a mute button?"

   Arek simply rolled his eyes. He did not envy their commander for having to command this handful of a squad. If it weren't for him and Reeda being the only members to stay on the squad over the years, and thus help discipline the new guys, the commander would probably have them decommissioned for their unruliness.

   With all of the bickering going on, none of the troopers noticed the door to the lobby open until a gruff voice said, "Is this what rancors do in their spare time?"

   Arek and the others turned to see their commander, Devon Zanab, standing in the doorway, a wry smirk on his hard, scarred face.

   "I hate to interrupt this... shouting match, but we've arrived at Vulta. No evidence that Jedi Korr is there or not, but hey, it's worth a shot and totally worth our time."

   Arila Vurn, the squad's Sullustan communications expert, raised her hairless eyebrows. "You sound sarcastic, sir."

   Devon snorted. "Someone give that girl a medal. Of course I'm being sarcastic. I don't see why it has to take two Jedi and six troopers to find one single Jedi Knight."

   "Well, he was chasing someone who stole a Sith relic, wasn't he?" Reeda said. "Odds are, that thief is a Sith or Dark Jedi, which means they're dangerous."

   "Bah," Devon scoffed. "What's one Sith? It's not like he's got an army with him. What's the worst he can do?"

   "Oh, stars," Yin murmured, clutching his head. "I knew I should have stayed on Dorin."