CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“All wings, report in.”
As the members of Rogue Squadron called in with their designated call signs, Rogue Leader Tyreez Vitrus stared ahead at the five Star Destroyers that lay ahead, TIE fighters flying out from their hangar bays. It had been sixteen years since he had last faced these fighters as enemies, flying as a hotshot Latero pilot during the Battle of Coruscant. While he had matured and mellowed out greatly since then, helped in part by the horrors he had experienced during the Glorian War, he had not lost his fighting spirit. As the approaching TIEs began to close in on them, his heart pumped with adrenaline as the last of the Rogues reported in.
As soon as Rogue Twelve had said their designation, Tyreez gave the next order: “Lock s-foils in attack position. Split up and flank them on all sides. I’ll lead Flight One; Rogue Seven, you lead Flight Two.”
“Copy that, Rogue Leader.”
Splitting up into two groups of six, the twelve X-wings evaded the black-plated TIE fighters as they came roaring in, energy cannons ablaze. With Rogue Two on his wing, Tyreez pulled his T-70 X-wing around and opened fire on the TIE fighters, scoring one in the wing and sending it careening into its own wingman, destroying them both.
While the part of Tyreez that was still a reckless hotshot wanted to revel in this victory, the better part of him took over and reminded him that this was only just the beginning. Sure enough, green laser bolts zipped past him as another TIE fighter came roaring up behind him. His astromech droid R7-GD warbled in alarm and Tyreez banked his fighter to the right to evade the TIE fighter’s barrage of plasma bolts.
“Easy there, Geedee,” he said to his astromech. “We’ve got this. It’ll just be like that time at Denab, yeah?”
Geedee responded to him with a series of beeps that were translated on his screen.
“I know those were Glorian fighters and not TIEs. Still not much of a difference.”
Geedee politely informed him that it made a lot of difference.
“Yeah, well, what do you know?” An explosion behind him told him that his wingman had dealt with the TIE fighter that had been chasing him. “Thanks for the save, Two,” he said into his comm.
“Any time, Lead,” replied Lensi. “Still a lot more where that came from.”
“Don’t I know it,” Tyreez muttered. Opening his channel to all fighters, he said, “Rogues, form up. Time to execute the Mynock maneuver.”
“Aw, yeah!” said Rogue Five. “Time to show these guys who—”
A fireball lit up in the corner of Tyreez’s eye and the comm went dead. The boy couldn’t have been older than nineteen; what pained Tyreez even more was that he couldn’t even remember the kid’s name. He usually only knew people by their call signs unless he had known them for several months or years, and the kid had only been recruited a few weeks ago. What kind of squadron leader couldn’t remember the names of the men and women under his command? A lousy one, Tyreez realized. A very lousy one.
“Lead?” Rogue Seven’s voice broke through his train of thoughts. He was struggling to think of what her name was. “Are we still executing the Mynock maneuver?”
“Uh, yeah.” Tyreez used one of his four hands to rub his face. How did he even end up in this position? For nearly all his career in the Starfighter Corps, he had just been another wing in whatever squadron they had assigned him to. At Coruscant, he had been Gray Four. At Denab, he had been Scimitar Seven. Why High Command had decided to make him commander of Rogue Squadron, one of the most elite units in the Corps, he still struggled to understand. He couldn’t even remember his teammates’ names, for stars’ sake!
“Lead, on your left!” Rogue Nine cried but the warning came to late. A strafing run from a lone TIE fighter clipped his wing and he went spiraling out of control. Geedee’s screeches came through as scrambled aurebesh on his screen, though he at least got the gist of what the astromech was trying to say.
As he struggled to regain control of his fighter, Tyreez saw the hull of a First Order cruiser rapidly coming into view. No amount of praying or last-minute miracles was going to get him out of this one. Those only happened to ace legends like Wedge Antilles or Tycho Celchu. Not standard pilots like him.
He could only hope that people would remember his name after he was gone.
* * *
From the safety of his own X-wing, Poe Dameron saw Rogue Leader’s fighter go up in flames as it crashed into the side of a First Order cruiser, leaving little more than a dent in its wake. He sighed to himself as he forced himself to focus on the battle at hand as he pulled his fighter back into the action.
While he, Snap, and Jessika joined the remaining Rogues in picking off TIE fighters, Tallie Lintra and her squadron of A-wings paved a path for Aftab Ackbar and his squadron of Y-wings and B-wings to begin their bombing run on one of the five Star Destroyers. The Dawn of Tranquility only had enough bombers to take out one of the Star Destroyer’s shields and, if they survived that run, take that Destroyer out. It probably wouldn’t do much to turn the tide… but it would be a start at least, hopefully buying them enough time for reinforcements to arrive from Coruscant.
If reinforcements arrived….
“More TIEs coming in hot,” Jessika said over his comm. “There just isn’t any end to them.”
“They’ll have to run out of them eventually,” Poe replied. “Just stay on my wing and we’ll get through this.”
“Copy that, Black One.”
“Black One, this is Gold Leader,” came Aftab Ackbar’s voice. “We’re beginning our attack run.”
“Copy, Gold Leader,” Poe said, steering his fighter towards an oncoming swarm of TIE fighter. “Tallie, do what you can to hold off any fighters that come their way.”
He did not wait for anyone to respond as he accelerated his fighter towards the incoming swarm of TIEs and unleashed hell upon them.
* * *
Lysa Dunter wasn’t sure if she liked their odds of victory.
While the First Order had five Star Destroyers at their disposal, the Alliance only had the Dawn of Tranquility and two other cruisers in operational order, with the others either under construction or still in their docks at the shipyards for repairs. She doubted the latter would be ready in time to defend Mon Cala by the time the Star Destroyers inevitably overwhelmed them. There was also no way for them to jump to hyperspace and the comms were being blocked by the enemy, preventing them from sending additional calls for help to Coruscant. Luckily, Captain Tarpfen had managed to get a message out in time, though stars knew if anyone had heard it.
Vice Admiral Holdo was sitting in her command chair, observing the battle. Captain Tarpfen was barking out orders. Admiral Niathal was on a comm call with Admiral Bwua’tu, who was commanding the Star Destroyer Welmo Darb. As per Bwua’tu’s preference for utilizing smaller cruisers rather than massive warships as command ships, the Welmo Darb provided little relief for the Dawn of Tranquility as it went up against five Star Destroyers. The last of the three functional cruisers defending Mon Cala — Niathal’s flagship, the Galactic Voyage — was also doing little to inspire confidence. As it stood, the Battle of Mon Cala was looking to be a short-lived one.
As she continued to man her station, Lysa once again found herself rubbing the diamond ring on her finger. She wondered if she was ever going to see Tiom again; to hear his laugh, to feel his arms around her. She also wondered if she was ever going to see her family again. They had not exactly parted on the best of terms; the few conversations she had had with her mother and sister had been brief and blunt, and she couldn’t even remember the last time she spoke to her father. It was his disapproval over her engagement to Tiom that had led her to turn her back on being Syal Antilles and becoming Lysa Dunter instead. No one on the bridge of the Dawn of Tranquility even knew that she was the daughter of Wedge Antilles, save for those who had access to her official records.
She swallowed hard, tears threatening to escape her eyes. It was only now, with Death’s door rapidly approaching, that she was starting to regret the things she had said. If she could turn back the clock and take those things back, she would do it in a heartbeat.
All she could do now was to focus on the present and pray that she would live long enough to correct the future.
* * *
Toah Jarsan watched the battle from a viewport in a room aboard the Dawn of Tranquility. Although, he, Rey, and Mara Jade had experience in flying ships, Admiral Holdo had turned down their offer to join Poe and his fellow pilots in the battle and ordered them to remain on the ship. Seeing no point in defying Holdo’s command on her own ship, the Jedi — along with Chek Urhed — had decided to watch the raging battle from afar. Finn had also joined them in the room, shifting uncomfortably in the seat he had chosen.
“We really ought to be out there,” he said, not for the first time.
“I agree,” said Mara. “But I’m not sure how much help we would be. We’re vastly outnumbered here.”
Toah frowned as he watched the chaos unfold. A squadron of bombers — mainly Y-wings and B-wings — had managed to take out one of the Star Destroyer’s shields but had been forced to pull out after its turbolasers took out a quarter of their fighters. X-wings and A-wings were all scattered in disarray as they tried to avoid certain death from their TIE fighter foes, which were moving faster and deadlier than Toah had ever seen from a standard Imperial fighter. Clearly the First Order had made some upgrades to their wares since taking over what had remained of the Imperial Remnant.
“Can’t we… I mean, can’t you guys use the Force to turn the tide or something?” Finn asked.
“Battle meditation is a Force technique that few Jedi have been gifted with,” Nira Maren explained. “I don’t believe any of us here is capable of it.”
Toah could tell that Finn was asking something else, but the ex-stormtrooper’s words became muffled as Toah felt himself falling into a haze. An icy chill wracked his body and his breathing became quicker, heavier. His thoughts became a black swirl, with the only thing breaking them being two pinpricks of red light, resembling eyes.
His throat became dry and scratchy; it was almost impossible to swallow. He opened his mouth to speak or scream, but no sound came out. Shadows began to envelop his vision as he lost his footing and fell backward into the abyss. He could barely hear the others calling his name as he slipped into unconsciousness, dark laughter ringing like a bell in his mind.
* * *
After what had felt like an eternity, the storm on Damosus had started to subside, albeit only slightly. The pressure on Kylo Ren’s chest finally lifted and he shot up to his feet, reaching for his lightsaber only to find it nowhere nearby. As he scanned the field for his weapon, his eyes fell on the small boy that had attacked him, his frightened parents cowering nearby. The boy’s dark eyes were stung with red and the area around them had a sunken look to them, discolored with purple. When the boy spoke, it was not with a voice that Kylo would have expected from such a young child but rather the voice of someone that sounded as old as the stars themselves.
“So,” the mouth of Kalon Sendor moved as it spoke the words. “This is the heir apparent of Darth Vader. How disappointing.”
The voice itself was enough to give Kylo Ren paused, despite how comical it may have been for it to come from a young boy. It sounded powerful and strong, reminding him of Snoke if not someone even greater than the Supreme Leader.
“You are Snoke’s student, are you not?” the boy went on. “I must say, his teaching leaves much to be desired.”
Kylo Ren tilted his head. “You know the Supreme Leader?”
“I am familiar with him,” the voice answered vaguely. “I understand that he was involved in an attempt to bring me back to life, though I am uncertain as to whether or not he was also responsible for the thwarting of that attempt.”
Kylo’s eyes went wide behind his mask. “Impossible,” he murmured. “It can’t be….”
The voice chuckled. “Evidently, it is very much possible.” The boy spread his arms. “Darth Vorath, in the flesh. Or rather, the flesh of my grandson. I had hoped to use my son’s body as a vessel, but he proved to be too weak. This will do for now.”
“But… how? The Mindspear containing your consciousness was destroyed.”
The boy sneered at him. “Are you too blind to sense it? There has been an awakening; a vergence in the Force. And through that vergence, I was able to crawl out from the depths of Chaos and return to the realm of the living!”
Kylo Ren looked again and finally spotted his lightsaber laying nearby. He reached out with the Force to summon it only to be pushed down once more by an invisible hand.
“Oh, I don’t think so,” Darth Vorath chuckled. “As amusing as it would be to watch you attack and be summarily beaten by a child, I have better things to do with my time.”
The boy he possessed raised his hands to the sky and the storm started anew, fresh lightning raining down upon Damosus.
“I have an empire to rebuild. And no one — certainly no spawn of Skywalker — is going to stop me.”
A wicked grin split across the boy’s face, revealing stained yellow teeth.
“I hope your Supreme Leader is taking notes, boy. This is how you conquer a galaxy.”
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