This story occurs immediately after the events of Dark Tide: Ruin. Because this contains many spoilers, do not read this unless you have already read the book. These characters and situations belong to Lucasfilm, Ltd. No money was made off of this, as it was created solely for entertainment purposes. Do not repost anywhere without the permission of the author!
Special thanks go to Davina Jeffrey, who helped me in writing the first lightsaber scene in this section (Your are awesome Nerf!!!)
Early the next morning on the Errant Venture, Corran Horn sauntered into the docking bay area in a deep green flight suit, carrying a helmet between his hip and right arm. He wandered over to a XJ class one-man fighter with green panels painted on it. The hatch was open and a ladder placed on the side of the ship, waiting for him to climb in.
Ah, back to the good old days, Corran thought to himself. He hadn't wanted to go in as a fighter, but considering the threat the Vong carried, he needed to go in at his best, and he could only be his best in an X-wing. Besides, impossible is what Rogues do best, he remembered, a smile tugging at the corners of his lips.
Sighing and pushing the memories aside, Corran climbed up the ladder to his X-wing and vaulted into the pilot's chair. He positioned the helmet on his head and adjusted the goggles to a comfortable position, then punched the release to lower the hatch. As Corran ran his hands across the controls, warming the fighter's engines up, he was welcomed by the familiar tootling of an R2 droid.
"Nice to see you again too, Whistler," Corran replied, grinning. "Think we can remember how to run this fighter?"
The droid blatted back harshly, the words "Speak for yourself" scrolling across the translator screen.
Corran laughed. "Let's see if Ganner is ready to go yet," he said, switching his inter-ship comm unit on. "Ganner, you with me yet?"
"I copy, Corran," came Ganner's formal reply. "I'm to your left, by the old beat up YT-1300."
Corran scanned the docking bay and spotted the other fighter. "I see you. Warmed up?"
"Just about. Give me another couple of minutes and I'll be ready to take off."
"Good. Ganner?"
"Yes, Corran?"
"This is going to sound odd, but I think we need to hold back on calling each other by name from ship to ship over the comm. I don't care about them knowing who I am, but this is standard comm frequency, and anyone could be listening."
"You're the boss. What do you suggest?"
"Well, I've been Rogue Nine, so I'll answer to Nine. What number do you want?"
"If you are going to be Nine," Ganner reasoned, "I'll be Ten."
"Sounds good," Corran stated.
"Okay, I'm ready to go," Ganner said at last.
"Good. Do you have the hyperspace route locked into your nav computer?"
"Yes, I'm all set."
"Then let's get to it," Corran said, firing up his converters and preparing to retract the landing gear of his fighter. In only a few minutes, Corran guided the fighter outside of the EV's docking bay with Ganner at his left. "Hyperspace on my mark," Corran said through the comm.
"Copy that Nine."
"Three, two, one, MARK," Corran said, pulling his hyperspace lever. The two fighters simultaneosly dissolved into lightspeed as Mirax and her father watched from the deck of the Impstar Deuce.
Booster looked over at Mirax, who was staring at the place where Corran's starfighter disappeared intently.
He smiled softly at her. "He'll be back," Booster told her. "Corsec never goes away," he added kiddingly.
Mirax looked over at him and managed a smile. "Thanks, Dad."
In the solitude of his fighter about forty-eight hours later, Corran woke up to the tune of Whistler's wake up call. Slowly, he floated back into conciousness while Whistler continued beeping and blurping at him. "I'm awake, I'm awake," he managed groggily.
Whistler bleeped what sounded like a statement at Corran. The pilot shook his head to clear the last of the drowsiness of sleep from his brain and read the translator. "Ten minutes till reversion?" Corran muttered at the droid. "Why'd you wake me up so soon?"
The R2 unit tootled at him indifferently. Corran chuckled softly. "I told you to wake me up in enough time to let me think, not in enough time to make me panic about the whole thing."
Whistler squawked rudely at Corran, clearly put out.
"Take it easy, Whistler, just log it in your memory for the next mission that five minutes is plenty of time for me to collect my thoughts. That is if there IS a next mission," he muttered to himself.
The droid bleeped again, this time more softly in a questioning manner. Corran bit his lower lip. "I don't know, Whistler. This mission is about as indefinite as it gets. I know the Force is with me. But that doesn't mean that everything will work out in the end."
The R2 tootled a bit more, and Corran read the translation. "No, I'm not going into this with a negative view. I just need to be down to earth with this…completely realistic and ready for all possibilities. That's the only way I'll succeed."
As Corran sat and thought over what he had just said, the one-minute reversion warning began to bleep. "Okay, Whistler. Here goes nothing."
As the counter clicked down to zero, Corran felt his mouth go dry. Why did he have such a bad feeling about this? Finally, starlines faded to stars and the picture became clear. Corran's heart sank into his stomach. "Ten, report in…" he said hesitantly.
"I'm here Nine. Please tell me I'm imagining that worldship out there."
"Negative Ten, unless I'm in your imagination," Corran said, gulping. As Corran stared at the Vong worldship, not knowing what to do or how to react, the Vong suddenly decided that for him. Without warning, the worldship opened on the underside and a squadron of coralskippers emerged, the "hatch" closing behind them.
"Escorts?" Ganner said hopefully.
"Either that or 12 to 2 odds. I'm not picking up any negative tremors in the Force. Then again they are Vong, so we really can't say what they are intending."
The lead corralskipper circled the two X-wings once, and his squadron members followed him. Corran and Ganner were surrounded. Corran tried to look at things positively. At least they hadn't been fired on. Yet.
Finally, the lead Vong skip positioned himself in front of the two X-wings and pointed what looked like the nose of his ship away from them, as though preparing to lead the two unfamiliar fighters to the surface of the planet below. Two of the remaining skips positioned themselves in a similar manner, only this time placing themselves directly in front of each X-wing.
Corran knew this set up well. "Ten, I believe we are to follow."
"Escorts," Ganner repeated.
"I've heard that somewhere before."
"True, Nine."
"But it's always nice to have all your bases covered. No use getting vaped for having huttpuss for brains," he observed, following the corralskippers, who were now moving forward.
"Niiiice Nine," Ganner replied sarcastically.
"Sorry Ten. Roque Squadron pilot personality is acting up."
Ganner chuckled. "I'm not surprised, Nine."
"They're taking us to atmosphere," Corran stated. "Better break up the comm chatter and keep our eyes and ears open. They haven't established contact so far, but they just might. I want to be ready for them if and when they do."
"I copy Nine. Ten out till we reach the surface."
The corralskippers lead Corran and Ganner to the surface, only the lead skip remaining after they broke into the atmosphere. The other coralskippers broke off and headed back to space, back to the worldship above the planet.
The coralskipper guided the two X-wings to the surface near a large building seemingly made out of mud, then he soared off to the skies once more as well. Corran shut down his engines upon landing on the planet ground, and surveyed the area.
Like many of the worlds the Yuuzhan Vong had invaded, this world seemed colorless, and devoid of the life that it should have known. The trees were an odd sickly shade of brown, as were their leaves. The ground was covered in green grass, but the texture of it seemed to be soft and mushy. Corran wondered what the Vong now invading the galaxy would do to its planets, if these "less warlike" Yuuzhan Vong could harm this planet in such a way.
"Nine?" Ganner called through the comm.
"I read you Ten," Corran responded through his thoughts.
"Air is breathable. Shall we proceed?"
Corran nodded. "Yes, we should. I'm preparing to open my hatch." "Got that, Nine. "I'm already out and on the surface, switching to Jedi garb."
"Garb indeed. I'll be there in one minute," Corran said, shaking the last of his thoughts away and switching the fighter's comm unit off. "Whistler, lock down the ship as soon as I get out. If I need to make a break for it, I'll let you know."
Whistler tootled what sounded like a war cry. Corran smiled. "Thanks for the vote of confidence."
Whistler bleeped a "your welcome." With that, Corran released the hatch of the X-wing and pushed it open, grabbing his travel satchel with the other hand. Once the hatch was ajar, Corran sat the satchel in his lap long enough to pull his helmet from his head. He sat the helmet in the place of the bag, and stood up, tossing the satchel over his right shoulder. He vaulted out of the X-wing, and hit the surface of the planet softly, barely feeling the pull of gravity on him. Whistler lowered the hatch of the ship behind him.
Corran sat the satchel on the ground and began to unzip his flight suit, revealing a civilian outfit beneath, the typical attire of a Jedi. He untangled himself the rest of the way from the flight suit, and folded it up, picking up the satchel and preparing to put it inside. As he unhooked the closure to the bag, someone came up behind him and touched him on the shoulder.
He turned around, nearly jumping, but avoiding the urge.
"Chill out, man, it's just me," Ganner's familiar voice explained.
"Oh. Sorry. I guess I'm more jumpy than I realized," Corran replied, eyeing the other man, who was now dressed in a tan civilian outfit of his own and a dark brown Jedi robe.
Corran put his flight suit in his satchel and pulled from it his weapons belt, with lightsaber and blaster already attached. He buckled that around his hips, then pulled his dark green robe from the satchel, closing the bag. Whistler opened the hatch of the X-wing again, long enough for Corran to leave his bag in the pilot's chair. Finally, Corran wrapped the green rob around his shoulders and turned to face his companion. "Let's go," Corran told him, feeling an odd but yet comforting calm wash over him. "It's time."
The two men, now acting as ambassadors rather than fighter pilots or warriors or even Jedi, proceeded to the strange mud building, entering the one and only entrance catiously. With Corran in the lead, they observed the inside "lobby" of the unfamiliar building. Corran felt a chill wash over him. Something seemed very odd about this place.
"Corran, there's another entrance, over there," Ganner said from behind him, pointing to a large wooden door to his left.
Corran nodded. "I see it now." With that, he stepped towards the entrance and forced himself to breath deeply, pushing the nagging flutter of his stomach to the back of his mind. Once he approached the door, he pulled it open and stepped inside, not noticing that Ganner had suddenly disappeared from behind him until he stepped into the room.
The door slammed behind him. He turned to tell Ganner to keep it down when he realized the other was no longer behind him. Puzzled, Corran reached for what looked like a door handle and tried to push the wieldy door open. To no avail. The door had been sealed behind him.
Corran turned around once again, at last surveying the room he had stepped into. This was no government room or conference area. A chill swept over him as he realized what was about to take place. The room before him was semicircular with seating of some sort along the edges…about ten rows of tiered stadium-style seating.
An arena, Corran thought, understanding exactly what his fate was to be.
Suddenly, the center of the arena area lit up, revealing a young Vong warrior who was lacking the scars common to the Vong.
"I am Tinkara Shai, son of Shedao Shai."
Corran's heart sank further in his stomach, but he forced himself to push away the panic and relax. He thought back to his discussions with Luke Skywalker when he had been at the Jedi Academy, when he had once been so sure of the light and darkside and where the line between them lay. He thought of how he had once been so sure of his place between them and remembered how firm his belief had been that he would not cross the line. Perhaps this certainty had been his weak point, and perhaps he had indeed crossed that line. But this was his chance for redemption, and the Vong warrior before him again represented the line between the Lightside and the Dark.
"I am Corran Horn, Jedi and Ambassador."
"I know who you are, jeedai," Tinkara spat angrily, tapping his amphistaff on the ground in annoyed gesture. "You have come to bargain with this Vong colony?"
"I come in peace, in hopes of settling this conflict between us," Corran explained evenly.
"Then you come in vain. This colony is no longer under its own control, but under the control of the Supreme Prefect. There will be no bargaining."
The young Vong placed his ampistaff in what appeared to Corran to be an attack stance. Adopting a rigid defensive stance himself, Corran took his lightsaber from his belt and activated it, its silvery hue highlighting the determination etched on his face. Surprisingly enough, though, Corran felt no fear, no anxiety over the battle that was now facing him. Instead he felt only peace. Then the realization hit him. That's always been my problem, hasn't it, always thinking of what I should be feeling? My thoughts of my friend clouded my judgement and my feelings before, when I should have let what I knew in my heart guide me. Corran relaxed his stance and opened himself to the Force, allowing his body and mind to become one.
Feeling the Force penetrate every facet of his being, Corran sensed Ganner, semiconcious but still in the near vicinity. He sent out a warning for Ganner to bust out if possible and warn the others of a major threat. Ganner seemed to hear him, and sent a silent acknowledgement of Corran's request through the Force.
Hearing Corran's order through the Force, Ganner forced himself to come completely back to conciousness. He hadn't a clue how the two of them became separated, but he had a feeling it would soon become clear. He determined he couldn't have been down for more than a minute, and observed that he was now belly-down on the ground, arms sprawled out before him. His danger sense tingling, he pulled his lighsaber from beneath his robe, activated it, and rolled around on his back, using his left arm to hold himself up off the floor.
His precaution proved to be a smart one. One Vong, who appeared to have been standing behind him, pounced on him with an ampistaff. Ganner deflected him with his lightsaber, and pushed him back, giving him time to get back on his feet. The Vong attacked once again, but this time Ganner was completely ready. The Vong charged him, ampistaff horizontal as if the warrior intended to run him through.
Ganner placed his saber at level with his waist and held it parallel to the floor. With once swift stroke, he swung the blade over to his left, and then back to his right. The Vong, who was so focused on his own move, never saw the swing of the lighsaber coming. The swing severed his ampistaff, and the weapon, at least for the moment, became useless.
Shocked, the warrior haulted long enough for Ganner to make his final move. Recentering his lightsaber, Ganner once again held the blade parallel to the floor, this time pushing it forward and stabbing the Vong's unprotected gut through with it.
The Vong rocked back and forth, his face contorting in pain. At last, he rocked back one final time and stumbled backward onto the floor, where he laid motionless. Not giving it another thought, Ganner closed down his saber and darted out the door of the building, heading for his X-wing. He notified his R5 unit by comm to warm the ship up and have the hatch open for him. The droid replied in the affirmative, and Ganner spotted the hatch of his X-wing, which was now in view, open. Still running as fast as he could, Ganner jumped up using the Force and vaulted into the ship. As he placed his helmet on his head and strapped in, he told his droid to talk to Whistler and have Corran's fighter ready for him. Ganner hated leaving him there, but orders were orders, and this time Ganner wasn't going to argue them or disobey them. At least not yet. As the ship finished warming up, Ganner prepared to take off.
Corran knew he had a fair chance. Even though little was known about the Vong, Corran's detecting skills from his Corsec days and what little knowledge they had of the Vong told him volumes. The Warrior before him was young and had a distinct lack of scars, which were normally worn by the Vong with pride. This lack of scars told Corran that this Vong was either not worthy or just inexperienced. Judging from the age of the Vong and his obvious anger at losing his father to a jeedai, Corran was banking on the latter, giving him an edge.
The first attack was swift however. The warrior positioned himself and made an upstrike to the right of him, which was aimed at taking Corran's face off. But Corran blocked down to the left. The Vong's move had been swift but had too much weight behind it, and the warrior had leaned in too far and was off balance. Corran's block further tipped the warrior's balance, and Corran stepped slightly to the right and raised his lightsaber at an angle connecting with the warrior's jaw, causing him to fall backwards.
As the Vong began to fall back, he brought the ampistaff across in a horizontal swing. Corran moved to dodge but still caught a glancing blow on his left knee. He staggered but managed to keep his balance, the lack of cracking sounds telling him it wasn't broken. Even so, Corran could tell there was enough damage to restrict movement.
Once the blow to Corran's leg had connected, the Vong warrior pushed his weight forward, using his ampistaff to balance himself and stop his descent, finally getting himself back to a standing position. For this split second, the warrior was leaning forward on his staff, and Corran saw the next move he needed to make clearly through the Force. Gritting his teeth through the pain of pivoting on his left leg, he brought himself to face the side of the Vong warrior. Corran stopped level, swinging his lightsaber and cutting through the unsuspecting warrior at his midsection. The two halves of the Vong warrior fell to the ground and Corran heard the hiss of his lightsaber powering down, although he was unaware of having done so.
Corran stood straight, surprised and uncertain because of the ease of his success. But the Force was with him, he was sure of that now. And he would know if and when another attack would ensue. He turned to go, hoping to find Ganner, but realizing that it would be almost impossible in an arena full of stadium seats to not find at least one other Vong warrior present. Ganner would have to wait and fend for himself. There was someone else here…Corran knew that, and it didn't take a danger sense in the Force to tell him that, common sense did.
He slowly turned, scanning the semicircular room's seats, but no one seemed to be present. This couldn't be. Even back on Ithor, Shedao Shai had another Vong at his side. Corran doubted this time would be any different. And then he spotted him…up in the west side of the room, squatting as if hoping not to be spotted just yet.
Knowing he had been seen, the Yuuzhan Vong warrior rose and descended the steps, carrying with him an ampistaff. The Vong reached the arena floor and stood before Corran, gazing at him measuringly. Corran returned the gaze, making sure he had the hilt of his lightsaber ready if he needed to activate the weapon.
This Yuuzhan Vong had many scars. The skin of his face seemed to droop as though if touched, it would slide right off the bones it covered. His nose appeared to have been broken countless times, and his jaw was somewhat offset. His body likewise was marred by many scars and contortions such as a missing finger on his left hand.
Corran knew this Yuuzhan Vong was a true warrior. And this Vong might be the real reason he was pushed into this arena to begin with. Corran wasn't certain of the circumstances, but he was certain of this…the battle wasn't over yet.
"Well, jeedai," the Vong said, adding extra emphasis to the word jeedai, "You have done what I was to do. You have defeated the enemy."
"You were the one intended to fight the honor duel?" Corran guessed.
"Yes. Shai's son arrived with the worldship a day before you arrived. The Prefect has taken over our planet, and brought it into his new order, an order that this colony would prefer to not be a part of. But Tinkara wanted to face you to avenge his father, and somehow he managed to trace you here. Now instead he has allowed you to kill a line of Yuuzhan Vong warriors. But that is not my concern. We left our galaxy and adapted this planet's terrain to avoid this galactic war, and because of you, we have now been forced into it regardless. You will answer to the gods because you have betrayed us to our people, jedaii."
The Vong, apparently angry, raised his ampistaff as if to stab Corran with it. But Corran was on his guard, and met the ampistaff with the silvery blade of his lightsaber. Momentarily surprised by Corran's quickness, the Vong stumbled back slightly, but regained his footing.
Again the Vong raised his ampistaff, this time swinging it down and parallel to the floor, as if to cut Corran through with it. Corran could not feel the intentions of the Vong, but he could ever so slightly see the pathways of the ampistaff. Because of this, he was able to side step the swing. The Vong swung again, this time to the other side, and this time with more force. Once again, Corran was able to avoid the swing by tracing the motion of the ampistaff.
Corran allowed the Force to flow, following each move of the ampistaff with it and no longer permitting himself and his mind to get in the way. With each swing of the staff, the warrior before Corran became more angered and more aggressive, much like the Darkside of the Force. Corran used this likeness to his advantage. In being quick and aggressive, the Vong lost out on strategy, and wouldn't see Corran's slow and methodical plan working its way into the picture.
As the Vong's strong attacks slowly began to tire him out, Corran pushed his lightsaber away from him and out more to block the ampistaff blows. In doing this, Corran forced his attacker to work in a larger circle in which he would have to establish more control of his weapon and his prey. The Vong was fairly successful at keeping control at first, keeping Corran in a small circle in the middle of the room and keeping his ampistaff fairly parallel to the floor and away from his middle. The ampistaff made brief contact with Corran's right hip, and he winced at the sudden shooting pain.
The warrior thought he'd won at last. He raised his ampistaff above his head and prepared to charge Corran, unprepared for the next move Corran knew he had to make. With one swift motion, Corran lowered his lightsaber to his waist and held it parallel to the ground. He eyed the Vong now coming at him full force, and gauged his speed, timing out when he would need to make his move. At last, he thrust the saber forward, pushing it through the midsection of his attacker.
Taken by complete surprise, the warrior released his ampistaff and allowed it to hit the arena floor. He stumbled back, and toppled on his back to the floor, life draining from him.
Corran knew the battle was finally over, the battle here and the battle within himself. He kept his lightsaber activated and walked over to the arena door, which appeared to still be tightly sealed. After only a minute, Corran was able to cut himself a hole large enough for him to squeeze through. Limping, he made his way to his X-wing.
Whistler, who had already spotted his master, opened the hatch. Corran used the Force to jump into the open hatch of the ship. He put his helmet on and lowered the hatch of the fighter as Whistler tootled something at him and the translation scrolled across the screen.
"Ganner got out," Corran acknowledged. "Good. Now let's get out of here too."
The droid whistled and affirmative. In minutes the fighter was off the surface and heading through atmosphere. "Is that worldship still out there?" Corran asked the droid as he guided the ship to space.
Whistler informed him that it was.
"Great. Leave it to the Vong to spoil a getaway."
As the atmosphere of the planet below morphed into space, Corran realized he was no longer alone. A large shuttle…a rather familiar shuttle, was firing on the worldship, attempting to hold it at bay.
"Sithspawn!!!" Corran gasped. "That's the Errant Venture!"
Corran's comm unit crackled. "Corsec, I believe you owe me something for this," Booster's voice boomed. "Get on the ship. We're busting out of here."
"I copy that, Booster. On my way."
After vaping a few persistent coralskippers, Corran maneuvered his X-wing into the docking bay of the Errant Venture.
"You in?" Booster asked over the comm.
"I'm in," Corran comfirmed.
Then hang on. We're going to hyperspace. And don't get any ideas, Corsec, this still isn't your personal yacht."
"I copy that," Corran said, smiling to himself. While waiting for the EV to go into hyperspace, Corran reflected on the events of the day, at last feeling a sense of closure to all of his concerns over the events of Ithor. In killing the Tinkara Shai and the Vong warrior Corran had felt no statisfaction. He had killed him not in anger because he wanted revenge, but because it was necessary. Corran smiled to himself, not because of the Yuuzhan Vongs' deaths, but because he had not strayed from the Lightside…he had become stronger in it.
"Okay, Corran, we're clear in hyperspace, you can get out of your fighter," Booster said over the comm, interrupting Corran's thoughts.
"Thanks Booster," Corran responded.
"You haven't begun to cover the thanks I deserve for that one, Corsec, but your welcome anyway."
With that, Corran unstrapped and cut the engines of his fighter off. He raised the hatch of the ship, and removed his helmet. After placing it behind the seat, he vaulted over the open hatch, hitting the floor of the shuttle. "Sithspit!" he grumbled to himself, feeling pains in his right hip and left leg.
As he sent some Force energy out to each wound, he didn't notice the figure approaching him. "Corran," a sweetly familiar voice called softly from in front of him.
"Mirax," he mumbled, looking up from his wounded left leg. She reached out with both arms. He did the same, and enfolded her in a long embrace.
"How did you get here?" Corran asked her at last. "I thought I told you to stay in Chiss space."
"You'll have to thank Ganner for that one later. He wanted you two to be able to make a quick break for it in a big ship if you needed to, and he proved to be correct."
"Good guy, that Ganner."
"Indeed. Anything good happen?"
"Well, I was attacked by a young angry Vong and a seasoned Vong warrior, but I got out alive. The worldship arrived yesterday and the invaders took over the Vong colony there. Those Vong don't want to be a part of this galactic invasion. Maybe someday we'll be able to use that. Right now it's hard to say."
"So you did face the Vong again?" Mirax asked cautiously.
Corran nodded.
"And?"
"I stood on the Good Side of the Force, and I succeeded. Ithor happened, and I have to let that be in the past. Questioning what transpired will not change what happened and will no longer help me. The wind has been calling my name, and I have been afraid to listen, but it is time for Corran Horn to return to himself at last."
