CHAPTER TWELVE
The Millennium Falcon dropped out of hyperspace, followed closely by an entourage of X-wing fighters and another Corellian freighter carrying the rest of Iella Wessiri’s resistance group. The planet of Ord Mantell laid up ahead, with the pirate corvette and star yacht they had been pursuing already way ahead of them and entering the planet’s orbit.
“Looks like they’re landing in Worlport,” said Jagged Fel, sitting at the Falcon’s controls along with Chewbacca. “How should we go about this? Just follow them straight there?”
“Too risky,” said Iella Wessiri over the Falcon’s open comm channel. “They would surely open fire as soon as they spotted us. Even with ten X-wings and two freighters, we wouldn’t last long against a Hammerhead corvette. Plus, we don’t want to risk injuring or killing any of our friends on board.”
“We should split up and land at different locations,” suggested Wraith Leader Piggy. “We can then converge on wherever they land the star yacht. I’m sure it’ll stick out like a thumb, even in a city like Worlport.”
“Agreed,” said Iella. “Have five of your Wraiths escort the Falcon, while the rest—”
“Wait!” Jagged heard Wallen Nix said over the comm. “Something’s dropping out of hyperspace behind us.”
No sooner had Wallen said this that Jagged detected a blip on his navigation board. It only took him a few seconds to bring up a visual of the mysterious object and his heart instantly sank into his stomach when he saw the box-shaped vessel appear on his screen.
“It’s the prison ship that attacked us earlier,” he murmured.
“The what?” asked Piggy.
Before Jagged could elaborate further, the Falcon trembled as it was struck from behind by a laser bolt. Chewbacca roared as he maneuvered the Falcon to get out of the black ship’s line of fire while Jesmin Tainer and Trey Courser opened fire on the turrets. Over the comm, Jagged could hear Piggy barking out orders to his fellow Wraiths before the Gamorrean’s modulated voice dissolved into static.
* * *
“Keep firing. Don’t stop until that ship is destroyed.”
The other Knights of Ren did not say anything as they carried out their master’s orders, though their confusion and irritation could be felt through the Force. Behind her mask, Karis glanced at Kylo Ren as he stared straight ahead at the Corellian freighter they were pursuing, which was returning fire from both its top and bottom turrets. The ten X-wings that were accompanying the freighter split up and flipped around, flying at the Night Buzzard with guns ablaze.
“There’s no way we’ll be able to take them all at once,” grunted Kuruk, jerking the ship’s controls to avoid the oncoming fighters. “We’ll need to break off our attack at some point.”
“No.” Kylo Ren gripped the back of Kuruk’s seat. “Destroy that ship. Destroy all of them if you must. But I want that piece of junk obliterated.”
“Master Ren, with all due respect, we don’t have time for any of this,” said Vicrul. “You told us that we had an appointment on Ord Mantell that we couldn’t miss. If we keep this up, or if they manage to destroy us—”
“They won’t destroy us,” Kylo growled.
The ship lurched as Kuruk banked the vessel to the left to avoid a strafing X-wing. Karis stumbled, grabbing onto something in order to maintain her balance. Not once did Kylo falter in his stance, remaining rooted to the deck.
“These fools will only continue to get in our way,” he went on. “Best if we rid ourselves of them here and now.”
Karis heard Vicrul sigh through his mask but the other Knight of Ren did not say anything further. The Night Buzzard continued to maneuver against the X-wings as it exchanged fire with the YT Corellian freighter. Just as Kuruk got a solid lock on the freighter, one of the fighters broke formation and flew straight at the Buzzard, firing its guns. The Buzzard fired its own guns on the X-wing and the starfighter exploded in a ball of fire.
“Do you see what I mean?” Vicrul said. “We are outnumbered and overwhelmed. I know you are not one to admit defeat, but we should—”
“I am in command here!” Kylo Ren snapped. “You shall do as I say or suffer the consequences.”
Vicrul’s hands rolled into fists as he stepped closer to the Master of the Knights. “If we die because of your stubbornness,” he said in a low voice, “what will the Supreme Leader think?”
At these words, Kylo Ren’s body stiffened, his shoulders drawing tight. Karis observed her master in silence, unable to get a read on what was going through his head. The ship continued to lurch as it banked in different directions, getting pelted with firepower each way it turned from the freighter and the remaining nine X-wings.
Finally, after a moment that felt like it had been stretched into an eternity, Kylo Ren spoke.
“Break off from the attack. Make a jump to one of Ord Mantell’s moons.”
Karis felt what almost seemed like relief ripple from the other Knights. Kuruk was quick to execute these orders in quick succession, veering the Buzzard as far away as he could from the enemy ships. He then punched in a few commands into the nav-computer before pulling the hyperdrive lever. Like a bullet, the Buzzard jumped briefly into the blue tunnel of hyperspace only to reemerge mere seconds later, arriving at a reddish-colored moon.
Karis released the breath that she didn’t realize she had been holding and staggered back, slumping herself against a wall. The other Knights, for their part, did not embarrass her with any snickers of derision; they seemed just as rattled as she was feeling.
“Micro-jumping,” muttered Ushar. “You’re crazier than we give you credit for, Kuruk.”
“At least we’re alive,” Kuruk retorted. “We’ll need to wait a while before heading back to Ord Mantell. A stunt like that puts a lot of stress on a ship, especially on one as old as the Buzzard.”
“Don’t make it too long of a wait,” said Vicrul. “We have an appointment that we can’t miss.” He tilted his head towards Kylo. “Don’t we?”
Kylo Ren said nothing. Instead, he turned on his heel and stormed out of the cabin, retreating into the back of the ship.
“Typical,” Vicrul sighed. “Stars know what goes on in that guy’s head.”
“Makes me miss the old Ren even more,” said Ushar. “At least he had his head on straight.”
Karis frowned in confusion behind her mask. “What do you mean by ‘the old Ren?’” she asked. “Are you talking about a different person called Ren?”
Vicrul and the others snapped their heads to her, as if suddenly remembering she was there.
“That’s right,” Vicrul murmured. “You don’t know, do you? I doubt Kylo would have even told you.”
“Of course we’re talking about a different person,” grunted Trudgen. “You think we named ourselves ‘the Knights of Ren’ after that guy?”
“Keep it down,” grunted Cardo. “He might overhear us.”
Karis looked from one Knight to the other. “What happened to him? This other Ren?”
Vicrul waved a dismissive hand. “Kylo killed him as part of a test that the Supreme Leader set him up for. That’s how he got to become our new master. Nothing more to it other than that.”
“So, anyone who kills the current Master of the Knights becomes the new Master?” Karis asked. “Is that all it takes?”
“Don’t start getting ideas, kid,” Trudgen said. “If it were that simple, do you think we would still be following him?”
Karis had nothing to say to this; her mind was still reeling from this blatant display of distaste towards Kylo Ren that the Knights were showing her. Up until this point, she had never seen this much contention among the Knights, especially towards their own leader. Indeed, they were never ones to express their feelings on anything.
Realizing that the others were not going to elaborate any further on the matter, Karis turned her head to stare out the viewport, gazing at the red Junk Moon of Ord Mantell as the Night Buzzard slowly glided past it.
* * *
“All right. Give me a damage assessment.”
“We lost Comm Boy.” Even with the vocoder, Iella could still hear the raw emotion in Piggy saBinring’s voice. “The Falcon took some hits, though she’s holding up. Other than that and a few scorch marks on some of our fighters, we’re fine.”
Iella knew that he was using “fine” in the loosest sense of the term. She chose not to dwell on it. “In that case, let’s get down to Ord Mantell before that ship comes back. The plan remains unchanged; just note that we are now down one fighter.”
“Copy that,” Piggy replied. Jagged and Chewbacca gave a similar response from the Millennium Falcon.
As the entourage of ships resumed their journey, Iella slumped back in her seat, situated behind Xemer and Shadow as they piloted their freighter towards the planet up ahead. Sitting next to her, Wallen swiveled in his own chair to face her, his expression grim.
“Any idea who just attacked us?” he asked.
Iella shook her head. “I wish I knew. Whoever they are, they clearly don’t want us to reach Ord Mantell.”
“Think they’re with the Cabal?”
“It’s possible, thought we don’t know enough to be sure.”
“I’ve seen that ship before,” Jagged Fel interjected over the open comm. “It destroyed the speeder that General Antilles and the Wraiths brought to Kor Vella when they met up with me. It’s an Oubliette-class transport, manufactured on Osseriton. The Chiss have had encounters with such vessels before.”
“Interesting,” Iella murmured. “Any idea who it belongs to?”
“When we got separated from General Antilles and Captain Solo, we were fighting these mysterious masked warriors,” Jagged continued. “One of them had a red lightsaber, I believe. I get the feeling they might be the ones flying that ship.”
“Great,” Wallen sighed. “I thought we had seen the last of the Sith after that Taral guy.”
“We don’t know that they’re Sith yet,” Iella pointed out. “Even so, we should still consider them a threat to our operations. Everyone should be on their guard, in case they come back to try and finish us off.”
She turned her chair back around to face the front ship, staring out the viewport as Ord Mantell drew closer and closer.
* * *
Aboard the Queen’s Hammer, Toah Jarsan and Han Solo were led onto the Hammerhead corvette’s bridge just as the ship came out of hyperspace. The Toydarian who had been escorting them had kept them waiting outside for a good ten minutes or so, as if wanting to time their entrance just right so as to make a theatrical entrance. If that was the case, then it wasn’t working; not a single soul cheered or even so much as acknowledged their presence as they were led onto the bridge.
Situated in the center of the bridge was an impromptu throne that looked like it had been welded into the deck. Seated upon it was the pirate queen Kestora herself, whom Toah recognized from the hologram that had Sal Tyrius had spoken to. The Toydarian beckoned for the droids escorting Toah and Han to stop before fluttering ahead, coming up to hover besides the pirate queen. After an exchange of whispered words, Kestora rose and stepped around her throne, facing Toah and Han as they stood before her in shackles.
“I’ve never been one to believe in such things as ‘the will of the Force,’” she said, her voice modulated by the fearsome mask she wore. “But the fact that the two of you just so happened to be in the same location as my star yacht… well, it’s enough to make one question where their beliefs lie.”
“Spare us the bantha fodder,” Han Solo muttered. “Mind telling us what your deal is here?”
“Well, originally, my ‘deal’ was merely to recover the star yacht that had been stolen from me by Tyrius and his ilk,” Kestora replied. “But then I found out that not only was the Dowager’s daughter here… but the infamous Han Solo as well.”
Han narrowed his eyes at her. “And what exactly is it that you want with me?”
Kestora gestured to the viewport. Just outside, the First Light could be seen flying beside the Queen’s Hammer as it headed towards Ord Mantell. “I am aware that you have a history with this particular star yacht, do you not?”
Han frowned. “Not much of a history. Just a run-in with a crime boss during my early smuggling days. The holo-films exaggerate a lot of the details… or just get them plain wrong.”
“Such as?” Kestora pressed.
The ex-smuggler rolled his eyes. “Look, I was involved in the production of a lot of those films. They all wanted to tell my life’s story, but only had so much time to tell it. Some people had to get merged into one, some events had to happen over the course of a couple of days instead of a couple of years—”
“You have all the time in the galaxy, Captain Solo. Please, enlighten us all with the truth.”
Toah realized that the rest of the bridge’s crew were now paying attention to them, despite having displayed ignorance just moments before. He glanced at Han, whom he could tell was uncomfortable with being put on the spot like this, before letting his eyes drift back to Kestora. He felt as if the Force was trying to tell him something in regards to her. Perhaps there was some ulterior motive behind what Kestora was doing, as if she was trying to lead Han into saying something he did not want to say. Or perhaps there was something else; something Toah had yet to realize.
He still did not know why Kestora wanted him here in the first place….
Han’s voice broke through Toah’s thoughts as the retired smuggler spoke up. “The people who were involved with that yacht… they didn’t play as huge a role in my life as those films make them out to be,” he muttered. “Tobias Beckett, for instance; he was never really my mentor. Just the guy who happened to be running the coaxium heist at the time. Dryden Vos, again, just another crime boss. I also didn’t make the Kessel Run during that time, nor did I win the Falcon from Lando. Those movies are all just a condensed version of what really happened.”
“What about Qi'ra?” Kestora asked. “Who was she, really?”
A tense silence descended on the room and Toah knew that the pirate queen had touched a nerve. He glanced back at Han, watching as the other man glowered at the masked woman.
“Yeah, I might have had a fling with her,” he grunted. “Was never much more than that. We certainly weren’t childhood sweethearts or anything. Pretty sure the script writers just conflated all of the love interests I’ve had over the years — at least the ones I’ve told them about — into one character so as to make me look like some romantic hero or something.”
“Interesting,” Kestora mused. “Perhaps your relationship with her was even more one-sided than I thought.”
Though he did not display it on his face, Toah could sense Han was feeling apprehensive. “What do you mean?” the ex-smuggler asked.
“My mother had always been guarded about who my real father was,” Kestora went on. She turned on her heel to pace down the length of the bridge, gazing out at the First Light as it flew alongside her flagship. “As I got older, I realized it was out of both heartbreak and resentment. She didn’t want me seeking him out for fear of me suffering the same emotional torture that she had went through. Perhaps she knew he would deny having anything to do with my conception. But as soon as I had figured out the truth of my parentage, I made it my goal to make myself a daughter that my father — my real father — would be proud of.”
Han sucked in a breath, staring at the pirate queen with wide eyes. His voice was hoarse as he said: “Who the hell are you?”
Kestora raised her hands to her mask and unclasped the latches near the back of her head. As she pulled the helmet off, revealing brown hair tinged with silver tied up in a bun, the pirate queen turned around to face the two men. As he gazed upon her smooth light face, barely lined with wrinkles, Toah felt himself freeze up in shock.
No. It can’t be.
“My name — my true name — is Danielle Kieran,” the woman said. “And I am your daughter.”
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