Into the Chaos Ch. 06

Into the Chaos Ch. 06

Into the Chaos -- Author's note.

Welcome to the third chapter of my story 'Into the Chaos'. A Sci-fi story that just happens to take place in the Unknown Regions of the Star Wars universe just after the Great Galactic War, almost 4000 years before the events of the movies.

As I said, this is the sixth chapter and if you haven't read the previous ones, I recommend that you do that first.

Disclaimer: I do not own or hold any rights to any Star Wars licenses, including the star ships used in this story.

Some warnings:

This is an erotic sci-fi adventure, meaning that there will be both sex and violence, but I don't mix the two.

P.S. The series is self-edited, so any mistakes are mine, though I now have a proofreader, that can catch missing words ect. Thanks to Jessejames932006 for doing that.

P.P.S. While you're here anyway, please rate the chapter and leave a comment :)

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Chapter 6 -- Following the plan

Dreadnought Majestic, Snare system, the Labyrinth nebula

"Your men depend on you to carefully analyse every tactical situation,

"to maximize the resources at your disposal, to think under pressure,

"and then to lead them by personal example."

From the Holy Book of War

Going green - month 3

Two months after we started the education, I held an evaluation meeting with Jander San, XO Betty Nagos and Administrator Atare. As usual Resa was also present as she had become my personal assistant, eliminating the need to write anything down.

Despite the initial problems I've had with Administrator Atare, he seemed to have finally understood, or at least had explained to him, the seriousness of the situation we were in and now and actually worked with us instead of against us.

For the most part, everybody was satisfied with how things were progressing. The majority of the damage to the Imperial ships had been repaired and the education was right on track.

There was one exception: There were still people that really didn't had the talent for any of the jobs we were trying to educate people into.

"It's not that they don't want to work, sir." Explained Administrator Atare. "They're just extremely bad at being spacers. At Jander San's suggestion, we made some of them into a team and tasked them to come up with some interior improvements to the ship and they have come up with a few suggestions that we all think have merit."

"Go on."

"First of all, they suggested that we change the lightning on the ship." Atare said. "The reddish hue reminds too many people of the Sith ships they either served on or were captured by."

I nodded and looked at Resa. "Are the colours of the lights computer controlled or must they be changed manually?"

The Blue LED on her temple blinked a few times and then she said. "Computer controlled, sir. What colour do you want, and do you want me to change it now?"

"It can wait until the next sleep period, but otherwise a nice white golden light like the one on Duchess would be fine."

"I can do that whenever you like."

"Thank you."

Jander San took over. "Most of the people here are former slaves and to be honest, they don't have that much." He held up a hand. "I know that they have all the necessities provided for them, but they have suggested that we use a portion of the loot from the Chariot to create shops on the capital ships, where people can buy things, using credits they get from working." He scratched an ear as he thought. "I know it also requires that we make a system for it, but that shouldn't take long."

"That is doable." I said slowly. It sounded a lot like the system in the Chiss Ascendancy and that had worked well for many years. "But the difference between lowest and highest number of credits given have to be small. The spacehands and techs work just as hard as the higher-level officers, if not harder."

He nodded with a smile. "I like that."

"Then have them write up a suggestion for a system and when we have confirmed that, we can set it into motion." I decided. "What's the next suggestion?"

Betty Nagos tapped the datapad. "A cantina or other social hub on the capital ships, where the off-duty people can meet, play holochess or other games, listen to music and get together. Perhaps even get a little something to eat."

Again, it was an excellent suggestion, especially with a crew as mixed as the one we had.

"Two things." I said after having thought about it. "No alcohol or other intoxicating substances and most ordinary things must be free of charge. It should be a place of relaxation and not a place where they will have to think about if they have the credits to get another cup of tea."

"Agreed." Said Betty Nagos with a smile. "And that brings us to the next suggestion, which is entertainment... or rather, lack there off. Especially holovid shows."

"Yes?"

"Have you seen any of the shows that are available on the computer?"

"No, I haven't had time for that."

"Lucky you." Mumbled Jandar San. It was obviously louder than he had intended it to be because it was followed by a "Sorry, sir, but they're really bad. With the exception of those imported from the Duchess and the other civilian craft, it's all Imperial propaganda disguised as something else."

"So, what is the suggestion?"

"A couple of the techs have asked permission to produce their own show, using 3D animations." Explained the XO and tapped her datapad. "Take a look at this."

One of the screens flickered to life, showing the interior of Mantis D5 as we raced to catch Lord Mahaw in the Alphe Viga system. I listened to the conversation, which sounded a lot like the real conversation we had during that encounter, while the view shifted to the outside showing the Mantis, as it launched a flight of capital ship missiles against Lord Mahaw's cruiser.

The scene went on for a while, intensity increasing as the combat started in earnest with the ships flinging turbo laser fire towards each other. They had even included a dramatic moment, where the missile pod was hit by a turbo laser and had been ripped off the Mantis.

"This looks fantastic. Did they make it with scanner data from the various ships?"

"Yes... or rather, it's based on that with some clever animation to boost it." Answered Resa. "But the scanner data was limited since we left the Mantis in the Epsilon Eta system. They swear they can do a much better job with the scan data from the other engagements. That's why they need your permission since it involves taking data from as many ships as possible."

Jandar San nodded. "They're among the freed slaves from Nodia Prime and started this because they were curious about what had happened before you guys rescued us." He smiled. "Personally, I think it's a fantastic idea, as it's not only entertaining, but also tells the story to the people that don't know it."

I thought about it for a moment. "They have my permission on a few conditions. First of all, it needs to be approved by the people in it. Secondly, they need to be reasonably accurate. I know that there have to be some artistic freedoms, but by and large, it must show what actually happened. Third, we need someone to look through the finished material and give the final approval before it's released."

Betty Nagos nodded. "I'll find someone to do that."

"Good."

"Now for the last suggestion," said Administrator Atare. "And this one is a little far out as it combines several of the suggestions we have already been through, aside from the entertainment part."

"That sounds intriguing." I said with a chuckle. "Do continue."

"We have an entire bay meant for Imperial walkers, but we don't have any onboard and to be honest I think it's a design flaw, as getting a transport ship large enough to transport Walkers into the hangar is going to be problematic to say the least."

That sentence proved that he hadn't had time to go over the ships and see what they could do, or that he simply didn't understand how warships functioned.

"It's not a design flaw, Administrator Atare." I gently corrected him and called up the plan of the ship. "The walker hangar is placed there to ease loading and unloading them along with the troops. The Dragon-class Dreadnought can make landfall, as can every ship in this fleet."

"Really?!" He said with surprise on his face. "Well, it can when you say so, it's just unusual for a military ship this large to be able to do that."

"Oh, I agree, but they can." I pointed at the plan of the ship. "This wall can be lowered, allowing the walkers to go into the main hangar, from where they can be transported to the ground."

"Good to know, Commodore... and it just makes the suggestion even better." His smile became larger, as he called up a drawing on his datapad and showed it to me.

It took me a moment to understand what I was seeing. As a hangar intended for the almost eight metres tall and twenty metres long Manka Class Armored Transport, the room was ten metres from floor to the ceiling and the designer had made use of that, by adding grow-towers that looked like trees, as plants grew on them.

In between the clusters of grow-towers, there were vertical gardens that looked like giant hedges, except for the fact that there were openings in them, enabling people to see through them. The only exception to that was at the walls, where the vertical gardens went all the way up as a wall of green plants.

Between the towers and vertical gardens, a cosy looking walkway snaked in between the towers and the 'hedges'. There were many smaller areas with places to sit, cantinas, shops and even a stage for plays or music.

"I take it that this matches the size of the unused hangar?"

Jander San nodded. "Yes, it does."

"Can it be done?" I asked, studying the drawing. "And why should we do it?"

"According to the mechanics and the agricultural techs, it's fairly simple and will add a lot of oxygen and food. All the plants are edible and are grown in the towers or the vertical gardens which are designed to be used in zero gravity." He glanced at his notes. "According to the engineers, this park area equals at least seven hundred thousand square metres of intensively farmed land. Along with the rest of the plants on the ship, that alone is enough to supply us with oxygen and together with all the other plants on the ship..." He gestured in the direction of the four encased plants that stood by one wall, the transparent casing adding light to the room. "... it will give enough produce to supply the crew with fresh food every day, even if we get a full crew at some point."

I thought for a moment. Not about the project, because without any walkers onboard, that was really a no-brainer, but about the amount of inventiveness that had come from my simple order of making an organic carbon scrubber.

Now we not only had such a one, but with the vertical hydroponic gardens in one cargo hold, plants all over the ship and now this 'park area', it was turning out to be one of the most unusual warships I had ever been on or even heard about.

Getting an idea, I called up the specs for the cruisers on my datapad and studied that for a moment. Unlike the two Dreadnoughts, the cruisers did have some Manka-class armored transport onboard, but only half of what they could carry. That left enough hangar space for this project to happen on the cruisers as well.

"All right, people. I'm going to run with this in a big way. The empty Manka-hangars on both dreadnoughts are yours and so are hangar C2 on the cruisers." I called up the different ships in the battlegroup on the datapad. "The Drake-class Frigates are too small for what you suggest but find some free space on the Delta-class carrier and the Gage-Class, when Keller is done repairing it. I doubt that the Kraken have any free space you can have, but please ask Keller anyway."

Jander San's eyes widened. "Do we even have enough materials for that?"

"I don't know, but if not, we have the biggest junkyard in this part of the galaxy right outside and we can get what we need from the other ships here."

He nodded slowly. "Good point, sir."

"Get this project up and running on all the major ships. The more food we can produce ourselves, the better." I looked at Betty Nagos. "XO, you organize this. The more people we can get to help on this, the faster it will be done... oh, and when we get more time, have a team of people search the civilian transporters and freighters out there for anything useful. We have a lot of free cargo space and we might as well use it."

"Yes, sir."

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After the meeting, I discovered that it was time for training, so I took a bag with some extra clothes and a towel and ventured down to the training facilities to spar with Tristana, Elanore, and Anna. As I had suspected, the three Echani had been trained since childhood and they were a lot better with a vibro-rapier than me.

At first it seemed like they didn't really believe that I was serious about it, but after I had explained the connection between the vibro-rapier and the lightfoil to them, they understood why I wanted to learn more. After a few training sessions where I had asked them to press me as much as they thought would help, they even grudgingly accepted that I was serious and from that point on, our three weekly training sessions had become exactly the learning experience I had hoped for.

Admittedly, the training was harder than anything I had ever experienced before, being even more intense and physically demanding than the fencing training at the academy or as a Praetorian, but on the bright side I could feel my skills increasing, so I kept coming back for more.

This time, however, it was only Tristana standing there, but the fire in her eyes warned me that she intended to put me to the test.

I wasn't wrong about that. For almost an hour, she drove me through every move, attack, and parry, as well as any combination of the three that the three sisters had taught me during the last two months, correcting any small mistake I made.

Then it became even harder as we moved to sparring. Normally, I would have the advantage of being taller and thus having a greater reach, but Tristana was an Echani and blindingly fast, so I had to spend most of my time on the defence, parrying or dodging her attacks, while trying to find her weak points.

It took me a while and my arms were getting tired, before I realised that as long as I let her do most of the attacking, Tristana didn't really have any weak points. Her style was close to perfect for the vibro-rapier, and I would become tired a long time before she did. At least when using the same style.

It simply suited her better and she even looked extremely good executing it, dressed in shorts that were easy to move in and showed off both the feminine swell of her hips and her long well-shaped legs, while the tight-fitting tank-top not only kept her breasts in place, but also left no doubt that they were as big, well-shaped and tempting as Shakka's or Iska's.

The training sword darted towards me and without thinking, I parried and when she shifted her weight to the front leg for a follow-up strike, I parried that attack as well and, using a move from Pretorian close-combat, swept the leg away from under her.

She went down, but the moment she hit the mats covering the floor, she lashed out with her legs and swept me off my feet as well and, despite my efforts to avoid it, caused me to land on top of her, pinning her to the floor.

For a moment, my red eyes locked with her silver ones and it was like a spark passed between us as I suddenly became aware of her body under me. The womanly curves, the swell of her chest as it pressed against mine and her warm breath on my face.

Then the world moved as she used the ground to roll us over so she was on top of me, but to my surprise, she didn't try to finish the combat. Instead, she kept eye contact as she leaned closer to me and whispered. "Commander Yaki says that it's forbidden for a superior officer to make the first move, so I have to ask if you have anything against kissing me?"

Speechless, I managed to shake my head and a moment later her soft lips met mine in a kiss. Our tongues tentatively touched between lips, then explored deeper as we went further. My hands circled her waist as the first few testing moments passed and then we were kissing in earnest.

With a groan, she pressed her body against mine and I could feel myself getting hard and pressing against her. She clearly felt it as well, because she moved her hips slightly, grinding her crotch against my hard dick, which also made her breasts press pleasantly against my chest. In return, I slid my hands from her waist to her well-shaped ass, fondling the firm, yet soft, cheek.

Still kissing me, she managed to get out of the top of her training clothes, allowing me to catch a glimpse of a dark red bra that looked shockingly colourful against her pale skin.

As soon as she had dropped the training top on the floor, I took a firmer grip on her ass and rolled over, so I was on top of her. In that position, her weight wasn't on me, giving me room to take off my own training shirt.

Just as I had done that, Tristana flashed me a smile and dragged me down for a kiss. I complied, but after we had kissed a little, she rolled us both over once more and took off her bra without a hint of hesitation, freeing her breasts.

They were just as well-shaped and pale as the rest of her body, the pale skin making the red areolas with the even darker nipples look shockingly colourful in comparison, somehow reminding me of fresh berries on top of a mound of ice cream. Berries that just begged to be stroked, kissed, licked and sucked on.

Using my hands on her magnificent ass for leverage, I pulled myself closer and gave one of those tempting berries a lick and a kiss, causing her to moan softly and wrap her arms around my head, pressing my mouth against her breast. Sucking the hard nipple into my mouth, I flicked the tip of my tongue over it, feeling shivers running through her.

The position was a little awkward for my neck, so I rolled us over again, so I could be on top with plenty of room to enjoy her fabulous breasts. Her moaning became more intense as I continued to caress her tits, licking and kissing them all over, while paying special attention to her hard nipples.

Fun as it was, I wanted more and moved down her body, kissing the soft skin of her flat belly, my tongue making small swirls with every kiss.

The downward movement had landed me on my knees and I took advantage of that by removing the weight of my body from her, hooked my fingers on the edge of her training shorts and pulled gently. Tristana understood my intention immediately and lifted her butt from the training mats, so I could pull the shorts down along with her panties. When they were on the middle of her thighs, she lowered her butt to the mat once again and lifted her legs, enabling me to take her shorts off completely before lowering her legs again, placing one leg on each side of me.

That gave me an unobstructed view of her pussy and it was a work of art, with swollen lips shining pink against the pale white skin, surrounded by a sparse bush of soft silvery hair.

Instead of going directly for her pussy, I placed my hands on her soft, firm thighs gently caressing them, the blue of my hands creating a striking contrast against her white skin. She shivered as I teased her by running my nails over her skin, my hand moving slightly higher up her thigh. Her breathing had become heavier, more ragged as I went, showing her excitement.

Then she gasped, as my lips and tongue followed my hands, sliding along her thighs until they reached the silvery hair between them, discovering they were just as soft as they looked like.

My mouth followed, starting with a long lick from bottom to the top, making Tristana moan. She tasted spicy, fresh and slightly acidic, but just as delicious as any non-Chiss pussy I had experienced so far. Reaching the clitoris, I sucked on the little nub of pleasure for a moment, before I put my tongue into action, drawing circles around it.

"Ohhh... yes! So good!" She exclaimed, her hands reached down, fingers gently, but firmly, taking hold of my head to press it lightly against her pussy.

Getting the not-so-subtle hint, I made my tongue hard and rubbed it over her clitoris with increasing pressure, enjoying the groans and moans, as I let my fingers play with her wet lips before pressing two fingers into her. With Tristana being extremely wet by now and my fingers being slick from playing with her, they went into her without much resistance. As it was meant as a tease, I stopped just inside the opening and massaged the opening, while continuing to rub her clitoris with my tongue.

"Oh.. this is FANTASTIC!" Tristana growled, throwing her long, well-shaped legs around me, hooking her ankles behind my back.

The change in position made her hips angle up and I took advantage of this by changing places, digging my tongue into her pussy, while snaking an arm around her leg to circle two fingers over her clitoris.

Extending my tongue, I twirled it in her pussy, savouring every fold and drop of juice, as I delved my tongue deeper and deeper into her, feeling her shake and the muscles twitching, as I licked the inner walls of her pussy.

"Fuck!" Cried Tristana. "How long is that tongue?!"

With my mouth on her pussy and my tongue exploring the inside of her pussy, there was no way I could answer that. Instead, I continued to draw circles on her clitoris, while focussed on licking the delicious pussy in front of me, alternating between going as far inside her as I could, licking the insides of her pussy, to letting my tongue dance over and between the folds of her pussy.

Her shivers were coming faster now and I could feel the muscles in her legs twist every time my fingers hit the head of her clitoris. Feeling fairly certain that she was on the edge of an orgasm, I focussed my tongue on her G-spot, licking it as hard as I could, while being grateful that the humanoids I've had sex with so far were similar enough that their pleasure points were situated the same way in their bodies.

Tristana yelped when she felt my tongue on her G-spot and it didn't take long before her hands on my head pressed harder, forcing my head into her pussy. Then her muscles began to spasm around my fingers, her body shuddering and shivering, and a moment later a jolt ran through her body, powerful and hard. The sudden impact of it caused her to cry out with a pleasurable howl, her body jerking as the orgasm raged within her, her thighs squeezing my head as she came hard.

My mouth was able to keep up with the plentiful flow of juices from her pussy, but the way she squeezed my head tighter and tighter, her body bucking wildly with the power of her orgasm, there was a very good chance she might choke me out, which would be the craziest way to win what had started out as a sparring match.

Fortunately, her body relaxed before it came that far and the legs stopped squeezing me, as she let them drop to the soft training mats. Then she just laid on the mats, breathing heavily.

Laying down beside her, I let a hand slide over her body, leisurely caressing the soft skin, and the perky firm breasts.

It took a while before she had caught her breath, but eventually she turned her head to look at me with a satisfied smile, saying. "That was insanely good.... There's nothing like a good orgasm to clear the thoughts of the gravity of the situation we're in."

I opened my mouth to answer, but nothing came out as the word Gravity echoed in my head, causing ideas and thoughts to form at random. Gravity could pull a ship out of hyperspace or prevent them from entering hyperspace. That was why the old Interdictor-class cruiser was equipped with a gravity well projector, effectively preventing enemies from escaping a losing battle by going into hyperspace or pulling ships out of hyperspace if you knew their route. Just like if a planet or a large asteroid had been in their way.

"Got it!" I said loudly, causing the naked women to blink in surprise.

"Got what?" asked Tristana.

"A possible way out of here." I said as I stood and dressed hurriedly. "Could you call Chief Engineer Keller and Master Engineer Gacith for me?"

"Now?"

"Yes, right now." I ordered as I finished putting on my training pants. Something in my voice must have told her that it was serious because she just said, "Yes, sir." and ordered the computer to make the call, without bothering putting on clothes, and then walked out of view of the camera.

Still on the last piece of clothing, I walked over to stand in front of the camera and had just finished drying my face from her juices when the screen lit up in a split image of both engineers.

Keller raised his eyebrows over seeing me. "What's wrong, sir?"

"Nothing, except I think I found a way out of here."

That statement caused both to look at me wide-eyed, but before they had a chance to ask questions, I started the explanation. "Listen, we're in a box-system, with the flux preventing us from getting out and no planets to create holes in that flux." They nodded somewhat impatiently, so I kept talking. "However, out there are loads of Interdictor-cruisers. The only type of ship I know off, that has a gravity well projector and the only thing that can make a hole in the electromagnetic flux of a box-system is gravity."

"Of course." Mumbled Keller and I could see on his face that he was starting to get it.

"Exactly, Chief Engineer." I said with a smile. "We repair as many of the Interdictor-class cruisers as it will take to make a hole in the flux and then we get out of here, using the real-space engines until we're on the other side of the flux where we can enter hyperspace."

A smile spread on Engineer Gacith's face. "That is brilliant, sir!"

Actually, it was a solution I privately thought I should have thought of a month ago, but better late than never, and there was no guarantee that any of the ships put there still worked.

"Hold the praise, until we know if it will work." I said dryly. "Not to mention how long it will take."

"It will work." Said Keller with certainty in his voice. "The question is more how many Interdictors it will take, but we'll talk it over with Master Mechanic Waydar, and get back to you with an estimate on the numbers." He looked thoughtfully into the air for a moment. "My guess is at least five months and that's provided that we can find a cruiser in relatively good shape. It's old tech, mixed with unknown technology and that is going to take a while."

"Which is a lot better than never." Added Engineer Gacith with a smile.

"Exactly." I agreed. "Go talk it over and do the calculation. Then we'll talk about it later, when we have some hard facts and not just a theory."

"Yes, sir."

"Good. How long will it take to do the calculations?"

"I'm not entirely sure, but at least half an hour, sir."

"Talk with you later then."

"Yes, sir."

The screen went blank and I looked over at Tristana, who had used the conversation to put her clothes back on. When she noticed me looking at her, she smiled. "I'm sorry, but can we continue this later today when you have gotten the result? The thought of getting out of here has chased away the mood.. for now."

I chuckled and nodded. "I know what you mean. Let's pack up and get out of here, then we can meet later."

"Your cabin?" She asked. "I share a cabin with my sisters and that might be awkward."

"Sounds like a plan."

Tristana walked over to me and gave me a heated kiss with lots of passion behind it. "See you later then."

"Yes. See you later."

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Chief Engineer Keller, Senior Mechanic Waydar and Master Engineer Gacith were all smiles when they got back to me a few hours later, while I was eating dinner with Betty Nagos and Jandar San. Both the XO and Jander San had been briefed earlier and they looked at the wall-screen showing the technicians in muted anticipation.

"The preliminary calculations say that if we place an Interdictor-class eight light-minutes away from the pulsar, the gravity field will create a hole in the flux large enough to get the fleet through." Said Keller.

"Yes!" exclaimed Jander San.

With a smile Master Engineer Gacith added. "The Chief Engineer and I are not in total agreement here. The Dreadnoughts are large, and I think two would be better."

Keller shrugged, still smiling. "An Interdictor has four gravity-well projectors that can be placed individually. It is enough, but I agree with Master Engineer Gacith that two will give us a better safety margin."

"Two it is then." I said with a nod. There was no reason to risk the lives of the crew while we were finally getting out of here. "How long will it take to repair two cruisers?"

"As that depends on the amount of damage they have taken, there's really no way to say that for certain, but as I said earlier, my guess is at least five months." Chief Engineer Keller said, making the two others nod in agreement. "However, since we're repairing two and only have one repair ship, I'll like to suggest that we convert one of the cargo ships out there to a repair ship. That will cut down the final time by months."

That made me lift my eyebrows. "How long will that take? In conversion I mean."

"Less than a month, sir. You basically take a long cargo ship and add some heavy manipulator arms and cranes, along with plasma welders and some other equipment, and you have a ship that can work as a repair ship. It'll not be nearly as good as the Kraken, but it's a lot better than nothing, and it will enable us to work on both ships at the same time." He shrugged. "Alternatively, we could scan the ships out there and see if there's a real repair ship out there."

I accepted that with a nod. "Do it, but if you find one that we're going to take out of here, make sure you find a ship with a working Rank 2 or 3 hyperdrive. When we get out, I don't want to waste time waiting for a ship with a rank 4 or 5 hyperdrive."

Keller smiled and nodded. "Got it, sir."

"We also talked about the state of the Interdictors." Senior Mechanic Waydar added, "We can use tractor-beams to move the cruisers to where we need them. That way, we don't have to repair their drives in case they're damaged, which will save time."

"Good. Scan the Interdictor-class cruisers and find the four best ones. Then give me the locations, so I can check them out before you go over there and look at them personally." I paused and then added. "But keep as far away as possible from the three Interdictors I have marked as dangerous."

"Yes, sir." They replied in unison.

"And before I forget it, excellent work by the three of you."

"Thank you. Sir."

"Now, I'm becoming slightly optimistic." Declared Jander San, as the screen went blank. "We're not out of it yet, but things look much better than they did an hour ago."

Betty Nagos nodded, a wide smile showing on her face.

"Yes, they do." I agreed. "But we need to plan the repair of the two Interdictor-class on top of all the rest we need to do. I want our ships to be done at the same time as the basic education, so we can do fleet training, while the engineers finish with the Interdictors."

Jander San looked at me. "Why all the training, sir? We just need to free the people at Sharron the Red's base, which should be a breeze with the ships we have, and then transport them to a place where they can live in peace."

I nodded slowly, as I realised that they didn't have access to the information I had. "One moment, I'll send you all something to read. I'll share it with all the officers later."

Taking my datapad, I sent them the notes from the data I had found about Darth Malgus and other Sith Lords retreating into this area of the galaxy, and then I waited patiently, as they read it. At first, they looked somewhat indifferent, but as they came further down the document, they started to look worried.

Betty Nagos finished first and put the datapad down with a sigh. "Three Imperial Forces in the Chaos, each led by a Darth, and one is in this area. That's not good."

Jander San nodded in agreement. "There isn't a force in the Chaos that can stand against them. On the other hand, the nature of the Chaos itself will slow them down a lot. Not even the Empire is crazy enough to do large-scale fleet manoeuvres in the Chaos."

"You have a point." I said, adding. "And before you ask: No, I don't plan on fighting any Imperial force unless they happen to corner us. According to these files, Darth Malgus has at least fifteen Harrowers, twenty S-Class Cruisers, sixty Terminus-class destroyers and an unknown number of transports and carriers. Taking them on would be suicide." I paused for a moment to let the numbers sink in and then continued. "Fortunately, according to this, Darth Malgus is at the galactic north, which is a long way from here. However, please remember that the source of this information could be wrong about all of this as it's mostly second-hand information. Not to mention that this information is so old, that it's most likely obsolete by now. It's Darth Arkol that worries me, as he's supposed to be around here somewhere."

"Do we know anything about what ships he has?" Asked Betty Nagos.

I shook my head. "No, there wasn't any data on his forces, besides that it's considerably smaller than Darth Malgus' fleet."

"Well, that certainly explains your decision to use droids as gunners." Betty Nagos said with a sigh.

It had taken some time to install the droid control units, while Resa and several other techs reprogrammed the Sentinel Droids, but once the system was up and running, there was an immediate improvement in the overall shooting and by now most people were used to the thought.

I nodded to her. "Yes, if we by some stroke of bad luck encounter an Imperial force, I want to have as many functional guns as possible, with gunners that can hit a target, so we have a reasonable chance of running away without getting caught."

"I think most of our people will appreciate that." Said Betty Nagos with a slight smile.

"So will I." I said drily. "Most of you will be made into slaves or drafted into the fleet, but as the commanding officer of a group that has stolen no less than a small fleet from them, the Sith will kill me in the most unpleasant way they can think of, just to make an example."

"Not a happy thought." Said the XO.

"No, so let's avoid that."

-----------------------------

After that we got into more details about the planning and it was somewhat later before I was able to get to my cabin, plans, schedules and assignments still whirling in my head.

The sight of Tristana sitting on my couch, reading something on her datapad made those thoughts disappear like ice in sunlight. Not because she was reading, but because she was doing it totally naked, her fabulous white body looking like a work of art against the darker colour of the couch.

She looked up with a smile as I entered. "Hello there. I hope you don't mind me waiting in here."

That made me chuckle. "Not under any circumstances, but especially not naked."

Her smile widened a bit. "Thank you... Not to pry, but how did it go?"

I quickly relayed what the engineers had told us, "But please keep that to yourself, until I have had the chance to tell the rest of the people here."

"No worries, sir." She said as she placed the datapad on the table and stood, her eyes shining with lust and need. "And with that out of the way, can we get back to where we were before the interruption?"

"I would love to." I answered and got out of my uniform in record time, while Tristana walked over to me. She had it timed perfectly, reaching me just as I had taken off the last piece of the uniform, and put her arms around me, as she kissed me. I kissed her back and within seconds we began to make out, slowly at first, but more and more intense as our passion rose, our tongues exploring each other's mouths as our hands caressed each other's bodies.

Without saying a word, Tristana broke our kiss and sank to her knees to take my cock into her mouth. I groaned with pleasure as her lips glided over the sensitive head, tongue making swirls around it, sending shivers down my spine. A gentle hand closed around the shaft to stroke it as her mouth did its magic, adding to the pleasure.

She continued for a while before taking a break with her mouth and looked up at me. "Sorry for cutting this short, but I really want you inside me. Can we take this to the bed?"

"Oh yeah."

Tristana wasted no time, but stood and walked to the bed, where she crawled onto it and then suddenly stopped, her well-shaped and tempting ass on full display to me, the wet pussy glistening like a guiding light.

I wasted no time but positioned myself right behind her, lining my cock up with the entrance of her pussy. My cock was still wet from her oral treatment, but just to be on the safe side, I rubbed the head up and down between her wet lips to spread more of her juice on it, loving the anticipatory moan she made.

Pressing forward with my hips, I made the head of my dick slide into her hot pussy and then stopped as she gasped and instinctively clamped down on my dick, making it difficult to go any further. Moving my hands to her back, I caressed it for a while until I felt her relax and then took hold of her hips.

"Yesss!" She hissed. "I want it all the way inside!"

"As you wish." I said simply and slowly pressed on. She was tight but as wet as she was, I had no trouble penetrating her until I couldn't get any further.

"Fuuuuuuuuck...." She groaned, shivering all over. "Start up slowly, please. Its been more than a year since last time and I'm out of training."

"Well, we better get you back into shape then." I said with a grin and slowly withdrew from her, while running my hands over the soft white skin of her back, squeezing her ass when I got to it. That coincided with me being almost completely out of her, so I moved my hands to her hips again and grabbed them as I went back inside her a lot faster than I pulled out.

Tristana gave off a short cry of pleasure and reached down between her legs with one hand. I had expected her to play with her clitoris, but instead I felt her fingers on my balls, caressing them lightly. Along with the feeling of being deep inside her, it felt heavenly.

Leaning forward I reached around her and grasped her swaying breasts, fondling and caressing them as I slowly picked up the speed, going in and out of her in an ever-increasing tempo, her pussy squeezing my cock from time to time.

"Faster!" She groaned. "Harder!"

"Raise your upper body." I commanded and when she did, I used my hands on her breasts to get a bit more momentum into my strokes, slamming into her firm ass with every thrust.

In that position, she couldn't reach my balls, so instead she placed her hand on her clitoris, working it feverishly.

"I'm coming." She suddenly stammered, and then cried out in an intense orgasm, her ass quaking against my hips as her pussy clamped down on my cock.

I considered it a minor miracle that I didn't come right then and there, but instead I lost my balance and tilted sideways, ending up on the bed on my side with my cock still buried in the orgasming woman, and the hand of the arm not trapped under her fondling her breasts.

With a groan, Tristana leaned against me, while raising her leg and from the way she wriggled her hips and ass against me, I had no doubt that she wanted me to continue... So I did.

Still fondling her breast with one hand, I started to fuck her again. Driving my cock in and out of her, but at a much slower pace than before, fully enjoying the feel of her pussy around my cock as it slid in and out of her.

"This is so fucking good." Tristana moaned with a satisfied sigh and gasped as I chose that moment to slam my dick into her.

"Yes it is." I agreed.

Since it sounded like she was ready for more, I picked up the speed again, making her breasts bounce and her beautiful face contort into a mask of pure pleasure. One of her hands found my thrusting hips and caressed my skin lightly, as her breathing quickly got heavier and her groans louder.

To my surprise, she came again, tossing her head back and crying out loudly as her pussy tightened around me and a gush of her juices hit our joined sexes before leaking down on the bedspread. I tried to keep moving inside her through the orgasm, but she straightened her legs, pushing my dick out of her, and just lay there, looking totally relaxed.

I took the opportunity to do the same and just lay there, admiring her. The big, firm breasts rising and falling with each breath, her powerful body glistening with the faintest sheen of sweat from her orgasms. My eyes drifted up to her beautiful face only to discover that she was looking at me with a warm smile on her face. "That... was... incredible!"

"So are you." I said with a smile.

"Oh, you haven't seen anything yet." She replied with a cocky smile, that sent shivers down my spine. Then her eyes dropped to my still hard cock. "You haven't come yet?"

"No, I was too busy looking at you."

"I'll have to do something about that." She said with a wide smile as she rolled over to me, giving me a passionate kiss before she continued her movement, ending on top of me. Sitting a little more upright, she grabbed my cock with a hand and guided it in between the lips of her pussy, before slowly taking it inside her as she sat down.

Seeing her like that, sitting right up, breasts swaying gently while she impaled her gorgeous body on my cock, biting her lip in pleasure, silvery eyes staring lustful at me, was a sight that sent shivers down the spine, going right into my balls.

She sighed in satisfaction as she reached the end and then began riding me. A slow and deliberate ride that made us both groan in pleasure.

I pulled her down towards me, so I could reach her tempting breasts with my mouth, flicking the hard nipples with my tongue and making her moan. In response, she picked up the speed, rocking her hips harder as she bounced up and down on my cock.

"--- BEEP --- "

The sound of the intercom, followed by the computer saying. "Chief Engineer Keller wants to speak with you, sir." made Tristana come to a halt with a groan. "You got to be kidding me!"

"I know the feeling, but I have to take this. Keep on moving but do it slowly and silently." I said and accepted the call, using audio only. "Good evening, Chief Engineer. What can I do for you?"

"Good evening to you too, sir... I was just wondering... We need building materials for the park, and we might as well get them from the Pius Dea ships, while the Interdictors are being dragged into place and the new repair-ship is being constructed." He paused for a moment, but as he started speaking again, Tristana lifted herself up while squeezing my cock, creating a wonderful sensation as the Chief Engineer said. "Most of their hull materials would be too old to be of any use, but there has to be something useful over there." He chuckled as he added. "And to be honest, I'm dying of curiosity to see how ships that old were engineered."

Tristana sank down on me again, wriggling her hips as she did so, forcing me to concentrate to be able to reply to the Engineer in a professional manner. Though I had to admit to myself, that answering a call while a white, silvery-haired and well-shaped beauty with huge breasts was riding my hard cock was not the most professional thing to do, and there was no way I would make any final decisions like this.

"Excellent idea." I told him. "Please give me until tomorrow to think it over. In any event, you're not taking the Kraken there alone. If I agree to this, you'll have to give me a day or two to assign people to the various ships and then I'll send a protective force with you. It'll be a good exercise for the crews and less of a risk for both you and the Kraken."

"Thank you, sir."

"Very good, Chief Engineer. Have a pleasant evening."

"Likewise, sir." He said and ended the call.

"That sounded interesting." Said Tristana, moving slowly on top of me. "Can you tell what assignment I'm going to get, or would you rather wait?"

As she was ranked as one of the best captains, it was obvious to everyone, including herself, that she was going to get a ship at some point, but the situation was so surreal that it made me chuckle. "I plan on giving you a cruiser. You'll be a brilliant cruiser captain."

That made her sit still. "Really?"

"Yes. Not only do you have the skills for it, but you have the right aggressiveness for that type of warship... Oh, and since your efficiency rating is ten percent higher when working with Lieutenants Elanore and Anna, I'm going to assign them to your ship." I paused and added, "Unless I need them for another assignment. They scored almost as well as you did in the tests."

She leaned down and gave me a soft kiss, her breasts pressing against my chest. "Thank you."

I returned the kiss. "Don't thank me, thank yourself. If your evaluation hadn't been as good as it was, I would have given you one of the Delta class carriers or even the Kraken, no matter how good or willing you are in bed."

That made her laugh. "Yes, I thought that much. You're not the type to let your lust override your judgement." She kissed me again. "Which is one of the reasons why you're so damn sexy." Another kiss. "And now I'm going to finish what I set out to do, which was making both of us come."

"Not quite." I said as I wrapped my arms around her and rolled us over so I was on top. Tristana looked up on me, looking like she was going to object, but when I started to fuck her in the same slow, deliberate pace she had used with me, she smiled and closed her eyes in pleasure.

I leaned down to kiss her and she responded eagerly, as I drove into her with long slow strokes, enjoying the feel of her body against me as much as the feel of her pussy around my cock. Tristana rocked her hips against me, showing that she liked the slow pace as much as I did and for the longest time we kept it like that, while the pleasure slowly built in both of us.

Breaking the kiss, I groaned. "I'm going to come soon."

"Me too.... In a few minutes." She said with a responding moan. "Sooner, if you speed up."

"Not going to happen." I stated and kissed her again, while adjusting the angle of my hips to make sure my pubic bone hit her clitoris every time I went into her.

Kissing me back, she opened her eyes wide at the sensation and after a few more strokes, her hips started to work faster, grinding against me, while the walls of her pussy squeezed my cock, adding more friction and pleasure for the both of us. It felt so hot, so good, that I wanted it to last for a long time, but I also knew that we would reach the end soon.

Suddenly, she broke the kiss to cry "Now! I'm coming!" and a second later she trashed her arms as the orgasm tore through her, causing her pussy to tighten around my cock.

The sensation made me come as well, grunting in pleasure as I emptied myself in her pulsating pussy, sending stream after stream into her.

For a long moment we just lay there, our energy spent, but then Tristana lowered her legs to the bed and opened her eyes to look at me, saying. "That was so good!"

"It was." I agreed and retracted my dick from her pussy, so I could lay down on the bed beside her.

"Any chance that we can do it again some time?"

I chuckled and turned my head to look at her. "Unless duty comes in the way or one of us fall in love with someone else, I would happily agree to that."

"Good." She said as she stretched. "Ahhh... a bath would be good right now."

Getting the hint, I stood from the bed. "Come on then... let's go take a bath."

She followed me with a smile.

--------------------------------

The next day, Resa and I walked into the room where the future captains were being educated, immediately causing everybody to fall silent. As usual, about half of them were missing, as they were busy teaching the new pilots along with Flight Lieutenant Kierian, but the ones I had asked for were here.

Nodding to Iska and Meistrin, who were the ones teaching, I walked to a spot where everybody in the room could see me without turning their heads too much, while it was Resa's job to transmit to the rest of the fleet.

"Hello everybody... Yesterday, we finally figured out a possible way to get out of here." I started, causing a few jaws to drop, and explained the plan with the Interdictors and gravity wells.

They were completely silent while I talked, stressing that we couldn't be completely sure that it would work, but when I finished talking, somebody started to clap. Others followed and within seconds, the whole room was clapping and cheering.

I let it go on for a while, but when Resa gave me a nod to indicate that she had finished the transmission, I signalled them to be silent as I continued. "Over the last three months there's been a lot of speculation about which ships to take and who was going to captain those ships." I looked around and most of them nodded. "We're going to take as many of them as we can possibly crew. Some of them with a skeleton crew, while others will have just enough crew to make them functional warships."

There was silence in the room for a few seconds, but then Lieutenant Zwul asked, "Why so many, sir?", curiosity written in his face.

"Because Sharon the Red still has more than seven thousand people we need to free and unless the Imperials have placed a battlegroup there, we're going to rescue the people at Nodia Prime as well."

The former slaves looked at me with a mixture of hope and disbelief on their faces, but as some of them started to smile, I could feel the atmosphere in the room change. Until now, most of them had been motivated by self-preservation and the camaraderie with their fellow former slaves, but as they realized what I was saying, they were suddenly part of a fleet with a purpose that went beyond themselves. A purpose they could be proud of and that might even reunite them with their lost friends and relatives.

For some it went faster than others and I let the pause draw out, giving it time to sink in and saw realization dawning on their faces, but also some smiles from several people.

"I see that some have guessed what I'm going to say now and yes, that you're in here right now means that I'm going to assign you to captain a capital ship."

Those who had smiled, started to grin, while the rest looked surprised.

Ignoring it, I continued. "This also means that as Captains of a capital vessel, all of you without a former military rank are Junior Lieutenants from this moment. The Junior Lieutenants and Ensigns become full Lieutenants, and the former Lieutenants are now Commanders." I held up a hand. "As long as we're together, that is an education that is going to continue. Officer's school is there for a reason and there are things you need to learn and know, as captains of a military vessel. It won't be easy, but you'll need that knowledge."

I could see the military educated people nod at that.

"As a note of caution, I need to add that these ranks are for the Dragon Defence Force alone."

They nodded again and I continued.

"Before I continue with the assignments, there's one thing I need to do." I looked over at Captain Bobba, who had done terribly in the tactics course, but otherwise had done an excellent job during our time here, despite his sometimes overly pessimistic attitude. "Captain Bobba, as you know, the engineers couldn't repair the life support systems on the Last Chance. More to the point, while trying to repair it, they found so many other flaws in the ship that they deemed it unsafe for space. However, we're all in this together and you have done an outstanding job keeping people alive."

Several of the people who had been on his ship nodded at that.

"That's why I'm going to give you the Barracuda as a replacement vessel for Last Chance. If nothing else, it will prove that the Heraklon-class wasn't the Last Chance for you and your crew. When I say give, I mean exactly that. The Wanderer-class freighter is yours to keep."

That was a significant upgrade and Captain Bobba looked at me open-mouthed, but those who had nodded before started to clap and before he had the chance to say anything, the rest of the table joined in.

That gave him time to gather himself and when the applause had died out, he smiled. "Thank you, sir. I have to say that this is the most positive experience I've ever had with any Navy."

Being in the Chaos, that wasn't much of a compliment, but it did cause people to chuckle.

"Now for the assignments." I said after a few moments. "Please remember, that the postings I'm going to assign are based on the result of the many scenarios we have been through in the last two months as well as my own judgement and your wishes, so there will only be a few surprises. I will also split the group into two squadrons, with Majestic as the head of one squadron and Glorious as the head of the other."

Glorious was the name people had agreed upon for the other Dragon-class Dreadnought.

"Even more important is the fact that as long as we are trapped in this box these assignments are not permanent. Some ships might break down and we may find other ships worth salvaging, so any of you might find yourselves commanding other ships than the ones I'm going to assign here today."

They nodded, clearly just waiting for me to get to the point.

I turned towards Iska. "Commander Iska, I would like you to be the captain of the Majestic."

The Twi'Lek looked at me in disbelief, but then a huge smile appeared on her face. "Thank you!"

"No need to thank me, you've worked for it and earned it." Smiling, I turned towards Commander Meistrin, who looked a little disappointed. "Commander Meistrin, I need you to know that it was a close call, but in the end your tactical and strategic understanding won out."

She started to nod but stopped in the middle of it, looking surprised. "Excuse me, sir?"

"I'm giving you Glorious and the leadership of the other squadron, if you accept it."

Meistrin blinked a few times, but then got hold of herself. As she slowly started to smile. "Thank you, sir. I accept it."

I nodded and looked around the table. "You've all seen the results of the tactical course so it shouldn't be a surprise who gets the Wyvern-class cruisers: Tlath, you'll captain the Eagle. Tristana, you get the Hawk."

Turning towards the trio of human pilots that had done exceptionally well in the tactics course, I continued. "Bucbro, you get Falcon and Barlee, you get the Vulture." They both looked at me in surprise, but then lit up in smiles. "Thank you, sir."

"You're welcome." Looking at Trine Karnos, I said. "Karnos, you have expressed a wish to learn more before taking command. Therefore, I'll give you the choice of serving on either the Majestic or the Glorious as a tactical officer. If you have changed your mind, say so now and I'll happily give you a ship."

She blinked in surprise a few times, but then said. "I would like to serve onboard the Majestic, sir."

"Good. I'll look forward to that." Turning towards Fama Sul, I said. "Commander Fama, your crew and ship-handling skills are among the very best. For that reason, I'm going to give you the Kraken... The Epsilon-class repair ship should be safe in your hands."

She gave me a wide smile. "Thank you, sir."

I smiled back. Giving Fama Sul the repair-ship had been Doctor Shakka's suggestion, as Fama Sul and Keller got along really well, which was critical as he was the co-captain of the same vessel.

"That brings me to Stingray, the Delta-Class carrier. Lieutenant Bul." The grey-skinned Duros looked up. "I'm giving it to you. Lieutenant Swur, you'll be the Wing Commander."

I don't know what they had expected, but it clearly wasn't to be the Captain and Wing Commander on one of the most valuable ships in the battlegroup, because both looked at me in silence for a few seconds, before the Sullustan grinned "Thank you, sir." Then he proved that he was better at reading Duros then I was, by offering Lieutenant Bul a fist-bump that was immediately accepted.

"You're welcome." I said and meant it. A stellar ship handler, Lieutenant Bul wasn't good at tactics, but as carrier captain he wouldn't see much direct action anyway, and Lieutenant Swur was excellent at starfighter tactics, though his overall strategic sense was lacking. As they worked well together, they made for a good pair of commanders on a carrier, and both were excellent leaders.

"Lieutenant Georgina Witt." The human looked at me in surprise, that turned into a smile, when I continued with "You got Orca, the Gage PA-class transporter."

"Yes!" She hissed and then sent me a smile. "Thank you, sir."

"You're welcome. At a later date, we're going to need a captain for Beluga, the other Cage-Class transport, but the engineers aren't finished with that one, so that can wait."

People around the table nodded and I continued. "Next are the Drake-class Frigates. Lieutenant John Larstin got Hunter. Lieutenant Mivito, you got Chaser. Commander Zwul got Stalker." I looked at them. "In case you guys operate independently, Commander Zwul is the group leader." Turning towards the last three, I continued. "Lieutenant Siman got Predator. Lieutenant Novur got Raider and Commander Crapen got Striker. Again, if you operate independently, Commander Crapen is the group leader."

That made Commander Crapen raise an eyebrow in surprise. I guessed it was because the two others were Chiss and she had expected me to pick one of them as the group leader, but being a former Imperial Officer, she was simply the most experienced commander, which was why I had made her the leader.

"That's it from me." I said, making everybody look surprised. "Yes, I know, that the smaller crafts need captains or at least pilots, but per tradition, the captains of the support ships are picked and assigned by the Dreadnought captain and not the Group commander, so I'll leave that to Captain Iska and Captain Meistrin." I looked over at Iska and Meistrin who nodded back smilingly.

Next to them stood a smiling Elise Samko, and I realized that I had forgot to mention her to the rest. "If any of you wonder why Lieutenant Samko hasn't been assigned to a ship, there's two reasons for that. First, she has declined command of a warship, preferring civilian vessels. Secondly, she's hands down the best teacher in capital ship piloting and operations we have, and for that reason she's going to be promoted to Commander and put in charge of teaching the bridge crews and the general assignment of crews."

That brought smiles on the faces of the others and a lot of them nodded. Despite being a decent tactician, Elise Samko didn't have the killer instinct it took to become a good warship captain, but as I had said, she was a gifted teacher.

"Now, comes the next part of the job." I continued. "First, we need to assign people to the ships and let me be clear about this from the start: We seriously lack crew, so don't expect miracles. Things will not go smoothly from the start." I paused and let that sink in before I continued. "Despite that, we need to forge the new spacers into the collective whole called crews. When that is done, we'll need to forge the individual ships into a fleet. To that effect, I will invite six of you over for dinner twice a week for the next many weeks, so we can get to know each other better."

"Yes, sir!" They said in chorus and several of them even seemed like they were looking forward to it. I had come to know many of them very well over the last few months, but a little more was always better.

"Good. When we're done here, Commander Samko will take over and together you have three days to assign a crew and get them moving to their new ships. After that, Captain Meistrin will take off along with a group of frigates, heading towards the Pius Dea ships along with the Kraken, since Chief Engineer Keller wants to examine them and get some of the materials that we need. While they do that, the rest of us will drag the four Interceptor-class cruisers the engineers have chosen to a spot where they can work on them. The two most promising will be repaired, using spare parts from the other two."

"Excuse me, sir." Said Commander Bul. "But do you have any plans for the rest of the new Imperial Battlegroup? I mean the damaged Delta-class carrier, the Terminus-class Destroyers and the two cruisers?"

"Yes, I plan on looting them for anything we find useful." I said with a slight chuckle. "At least, we need their starfighters and droids, spare parts, food and, perhaps most important, Tibanna gas and fuel."

Tibanna gas was essential for keeping the Turbolasers functioning. Despite their name, Turbolasers weren't true lasers, as they didn't fire off beams of coherent light at a target since that was easily defeated by shields. They were more like plasma throwers, using lasers to energize Tibanna gas, creating a bolt of plasma that was shot towards a target.

This also meant that the effective range of Turbolasers was a lot shorter than the theoretical unlimited range of a real laser, as the energy could only keep the plasma together for so long. In general, the larger the weapon, the longer the range, since the larger weapons could add more energy to the plasma bolt, making it stick together longer.

Tibanna gas produced four times its normal energy output when cohesive light passed through it, making it the perfect ammunition for Turbolasers and something no fleet commander ever wanted to run out of, myself included.

The Mega Masers of the Chiss Ascendency worked almost the same way, just with microwaves instead of lasers, and the importance of having sufficient ammunition had been drilled into me from day one of the Naval academy.

It was especially important for this battlegroup, since we didn't have a convenient base we could return to for resupplying.

Fortunately, there was no shortage of the gas on the many warship wrecks out there and as it was normally encased in carbonite for easy storage and handling, it was fairly easy to move from one ship to another.

"Thank you, sir." Said the Sullustan. "I just want to hear that we're taking the starfighters, transports and scouts from the other Delta-class carrier."

"Oh, we do. No reason to let them go to waste." I looked around, but it didn't seem like anybody had questions, so I said. "Captains, we have a lot to do, so let's get to it."

"Yes, sir!"

----------------------------------

Wrecks, ships and starfighters

"A wise leader makes a point of foraging on the enemy.

One ton of the enemy's provisions is equivalent to twenty of one's own,

and likewise a single ship of his fleet is equivalent to five from one's own shipyard."

From the Holy Book of War

When I entered the bridge again a couple of hours later, Tavune signalled me to come over, so I headed over to the scanner section where Tavune was sitting today.

Normally he was on the comm, but as the Master Engineer on Alpha Viga had said, the young man was a wizard with electronics, and he was one of the best scan techs we had. It was for that reason that he was among those selected to scan the Interdictors and find those that were least broken.

"Hello, sir." He greeted me cheerfully, telling me that whatever he had found wasn't something bad. "Please, take a look at this."

He activated the 3D holoprojector and a moment later, an Interdictor-class cruiser showed up, turning slowly in the air. "This is the Interdictor-class cruiser from the database. It has five medium turbolaser batteries, six point-defence batteries, three tractor beams and the infamous four gravity well projectors."

"Yes, I have read the statistics on them."

Tavune smiled slightly, as he touched the controls again. Another Interdictor-class cruiser showed up on the holoscreen. Then he turned his attention towards me. "This, sir, may appear to be a typical Interdictor-Class cruiser but look at the weapon load."

I did as he said and got a surprise. This Interdictor had four medium dual-turbolaser batteries, two Ion cannon batteries and no less than twenty dual laser batteries.

"A command ship of some kind?" I guessed as I studied the stats. "With this weapon load, it simply has to have a bigger reactor than the others."

"It's not just this one, sir." Tavune said and as he spoke, the system map returned, and about a dozen Interdictors lit up. "According to the scans, fourteen of the Interdictors have this configuration, while the rest are of the other variant.

"It looks like an anti-starfighter ship." I said slowly, thinking as I talked. "But if it's not in the database, there's only one person I know of that might know something about three hundred years old Sith ships."

"Chief Engineer Keller." Stated Tavune with a smile.

"Yes. Get him on the comm for me, please."

"Yes, sir."

After Iska and Meistrin had selected the captains they wanted for the screening force, and four Interdictor-class cruisers had been picked out for repairs, I had divided the fleet into two squadrons, called First and Second Squadrons, each consisting of a dreadnought, two cruisers, and three frigates. That made it easier and more flexible to work with.

Then I had sent the Kraken off to study the Pius Dea ships under the command of Captain Meistrin in Glorious, supported by the three frigates from Second Squadron. The four cruisers got the job of using their tractor beams to drag the chosen Interdictor-class cruisers to their assigned spots.

While that sounded like a straightforward job, it wasn't. The Interdictors were placed in four different locations and other wrecks had to be moved out of the way, before there was room enough to move the targets.

That didn't require the Majestic to be around, so while they did that, I had taken Majestic along with three frigates and flown to the Republic Battlegroup Keller had detected a while ago in the hope of finding something useful.

It also gave me an excellent chance to evaluate some of the people and see if their training translated into real skills.

I shook my head slightly, while Tavune got hold of Keller. The Chief Engineer had proven to be one of the best assets in the entire fleet, with both his technical skills and extensive knowledge of outdated Imperial ships.

"Yes, sir?" said Keller's voice and a moment later he showed up on the hologram, with the bridge of Kraken in the background.

"Mister Tavune has discovered some baffling scan data on the Interdictors. Some of them have fifteen medium dual-turbolasers batteries, and eighteen quad light laser cannon batteries, while others have just the six point-defence laser batteries. Do you know why that is so?"

He blinked in surprise, and I could almost see his brain starting to switch gear, as he said. "The Interdictor-class was originally built by Republic Sienar Systems, using the shipyards at Corellia. It was cutting edge technology at the time, and they did have problems with the gravity well projectors. Only one of them, named the Leviathan, left the dock in what can be called 'space worthy condition'. Unfortunately for the republic, Leviathan belonged to Admiral Saul Karath, who later defected to the Sith."

I grimaced. That couldn't have been well received at the Republic Admiralty at the time.

"Exactly, sir." Said Keller as he saw my facial expression. "The important part is that one of the descriptions of the Leviathan mentions that it was 'armed to the teeth', which fit a lot better with the type you found than the ones in the database."

"So, you're saying that the Imperials copied the Interdictor from the Republic?"

"That is well documented, sir." Said Keller and added. "It also fits with the theory of this battlegroup escaping the Battle of Rakata Prime, because that was where they were made according to the Imperial records." He looked thoughtful for a moment and then said. "Sir, if we find one in reasonable condition, we ought to repair it and take it along with us. It could be the key to survival if we run into another box system."

"Not unless you can install automated systems." I said dryly. "The crew requirement of a skeleton crew is about five hundred and even if cutting corners, making it a functional warship takes at least four thousand people which is simply too large."

"Yes, sir." He said with a nod. "On the positive side, with that many weapons, the reactor has to be bigger on the original Interdictor-class, than those built later, so please make the original class a priority when scanning for ships to repair."

It would require that we pick some new ships instead of the four we had already marked as good ones, but his suggestion made sense, so I just nodded. "Will do, Chief Engineer."

He closed the connection and I nodded to Tavune. "Good job, Mister Tavune."

"Thank you, sir!"

"Now put somebody on doing a deep scan of the suitable Levitan-type Interdictors, so we can pick four new ones, and send that information to the cruisers." I looked at the screen with the scanner out and then at the young man again. "Tavune, I'm tired of getting surprised, so I have a job for you and the rest of the techs. Unless you have other jobs, use the scanners on every ship you can point them at, starting with the nearest ones and work your way outwards. Get Trine Karnos to help you with that here and tell the scan-techs on the other ships to do the same. I want to know what's out there."

That made him smile. "Yes, sir. I'll put people on it right away."

It didn't take long before the scanner screen started to show various ships, along with whatever statistics that database contained about them. I knew some of the warships from the lessons at the Naval Academy, but a lot of the ships were freighters I had never even heard about. Some of the freighters were locally made, but most were old ships from outside the chaos even before they ended up here.

One of the warships out there, an Inexpugnable-class tactical command ship, made me hit pause, giving me time to study it. I remember having read about it, but there was a far cry from reading about something to actually seeing it on the screen, knowing that it was out there.

Shaped somewhat like a saucer, the massive ship had a diameter of 3000 metres, making it the largest ship I had ever seen and so big that I initially had thought it was a space station and not a giant battlecruiser.

Glancing at the statistics, I sighed for myself. Slow and under-armed for its size, the only positive thing about it was that it had room for at least 12 fighter wings in its huge hangar. Otherwise, the ship wasn't what I would call an efficient design and according to the database only a little more than a handful had ever been made.

It had also taken a beating since arriving here and something, I guessed a meteor, had ripped the thrusters completely off the hull.

"Tell me you're not considering that one, sir." Observed Iska with a little chuckle.

"I'm not." I answered. "Even if we managed to repair it, the only task that ship can be used for is functioning as a space station and that's not something we need. However, that ship was made to coordinate fleet attacks and its presence here means that there's a good chance that we can find Hammerhead-class cruisers and Thranta-class corvettes out here as well."

"Those are solid ships." She remarked. "Though we don't have a crew for them. At least not yet."

That made me chuckle. "I know, but it's fascinating to find no less than two Republic battlegroups out here and according to the database, the Inexpugnable-class was never sent out alone, so I think there's another, smaller, battlegroup out here as well."

"Sir." Said Resa from her station. "There's an abnormality on the side of the Inexpugnable." She highlighted a section of the top. "According to the scanners, it's a ship and it's built from a Nyix-alloy and not durasteel like the other ships."

That made it highly likely that the ship was a locally made ship, perhaps even a Chiss ship, since most of our warships were constructed using Nyix-alloy, giving them their typical silvery-blue appearance. Not that we were the only ones using the alloy for warships, but most of the others were far away from here.

"Do a closer scan, Commander." I ordered. "And give me a visual."

A moment later, a strange sight showed up on the view screen. A small capital ship had rammed the larger cruiser, embedding itself halfway into it. The strange part was that the smaller ship had hit the command vessel backwards, going in with the engines first. A clear sign that it wasn't under power or control when the collision happened.

On the positive side, that the front was relatively unharmed made it a lot easier to identify the ship and there was no way I didn't recognize the front end of a Chiss Warlock-class patrol ship, as I had spent a year commanding one when I was a Lieutenant.

"Excuse me, sir." said the Chiss pilot, a female by the name of Tes'atomi'eorge (Satomie). Her name meant 'hometown beauty' and in this case it was true, as she was a good-looking woman. More importantly, she was a former Talon Interceptor pilot, that had proven to be just as good with capital ships as she had been with starfighters, which was the reason that Iska had chosen her as one of the pilots on the Majestic.

Looking over at her, I said. "Yes, Pilot Satomie?"

"There's a chance that it's the Swooping Hawk." She said in a low voice. "It disappeared without a trace eight years ago."

I didn't ask if we had tried to find it as that was standard procedure. Though rare, it did happen that warships disappeared without trace. However, a specific disappearance wasn't something that the navy made public knowledge, which meant that she most likely has had family aboard the ship.

"I'm sorry to hear that," I said and used the controls to mark the ship as a point of interest. "We will investigate the ship later."

She nodded her acceptance of my condolences and I looked at the viewscreen again.

"Excuse me, sir." Said Tavune from the scanner section. "But I think I just found yet another battlegroup and unless the database is wrong, this one is a Mandalorian Battlegroup. Look at this."

The image on the screen shifted and a group of ships showed up, consisting of one large ship and fourteen smaller ones. The design was very different from the Republic ships, but most of them were so damaged that I had to look at the picture under the statistics to see how they would have looked like before.

According to the computer, the largest one was a 1360 metres long Kandosii-Type Dreadnaught, while the next in line were two 752 metres long Kyramud-type battleships. Last of the known ship types were six Jehavey'ir-type assault ships, measuring just under 200 metres in length. Normally, the smaller ships would have been used to screen the larger ships, but since they were Mandalorian, I guessed they were yet another type of attacker.

It was the last six ships that had me slightly baffled. Mostly because their arrow-shaped hull looked so much like the typical Imperial designs, that they wouldn't be out of place in a regular Imperial fleet, but they didn't show in the Imperial database or in any other database for that matter. Not even the list of Mandalorian ships.

"Yes, Chief Engineer Keller did say that he had detected some Mandalorian ships out here when he did a scan after we had just arrived, but I had totally forgotten it in everything that has happened since then." I said slowly. "However, those six ships don't fit anything I know about Mandalorian ships. Are we sure they belong in the same group?"

"There's no way to be completely sure in this mess, sir." Said Tavune honestly. "But judging from their position and angle and speed of drift, I would say that they arrived at the same time."

I nodded slowly. "Send the pictures and scanner data to the Master Engineer, and let's hear what he has to say."

"Yes, sir."

I spent half an hour looking at the other ships in the junk belt and there was just about anything I could imagine, from old Republic Quartermaster-Class Supply Carriers to locally made warships and freighters of various designs. Most of the local ships were made from a Nyix-alloy, though none of them were of Chiss manufacture.

However, most of them were in a lot worse shape than 'our' battlegroup and getting just a few of them repaired would take a lot longer than we had or wanted.

"Incoming call from Master Engineer Keller, sir."

"Put him through."

A moment later a smiling hologram of the Master Engineer appeared in front of me. "Hello, sir. I see you have found some interesting ships." He paused for a moment. "From the scans I received, it looks like you have found some MX5s. Those are a part of a line of ships given to the Mandalorians by the Empire during the Mandalorian wars some 300 years ago. I guess you can call them a kind of prototype for the later types of ships."

Suspecting that Keller was about to dump a lot of information as he usually did when it came to ships, I simply asked. "Can you give me an example or two?"

"In a moment, sir. The MX-series consisted of four different variants: The MX3, the MX5, the MX7 and the MX9. The numbers refer to their length in hundreds of metres. So, the MX3 was a three hundred metres long forerunner for the Drake-class, while the MX5 was the forerunner for the Terminus-class destroyers."

"And the MX7 was 700 metres long and the MX9 was 900 metres long."

"Exactly, sir, and while those don't have any direct descendants so to speak, at least some of the knowledge gained from those ships was used in the design of the Dragon and Wyvern classes."

That made me smile. "Which led you to study the ships."

"Yes, sir. It seemed reasonable to study what had come previously before making something new."

"Good point." I said, "do you have any stats on them?"

"Yes, sir, but I'm going by memory here, so there might be a few errors."

"As long as it reflects the general capability of the ship, I'm fine with that."

Keller nodded and a moment later, a list of statistics showed on the screen and they were quite impressive. Like most warships from that period, the ship had a Rank 2 Hyperdrive, but it was also extremely fast in real-space, making it a good pursuer and raider craft. Like most ships used by the Mandalorian it was also extremely well-armed, having twenty-six Quadruple Turbolasers Batteries, a similar number of Quad Laser Turret Batteries, eight Ion Cannons, five Concussion Missiles Launchers, two Proton Torpedo tubes and two Tractor Beam Projectors. To augment that, it had a starship complement of 60 Fighters, 36 scouts, 24 bombers along with various support craft, like shuttles and loaders.

"Why are they not in the Imperial database?" Asked Iska curiosity written on her face. "I mean they were built by the Empire, right?"

"They were built for the Mandalorian at the time, when the Republic didn't know that the Empire existed." Explained Keller patiently. "A policy of secrecy was put in place and since nobody ever bothered to change that policy, it's still in effect. It's not in most Republic databases, because as far as I remember from what I've read, the Mandalorians didn't like the ships, so they were only produced in limited numbers, and the only battle I know they had been part of, was the Battle of... hmm... Derroco, I think it was?"

It took me a moment to dig up the right memory. "You mean the Battle of Serroco? Where the Mandalorians nuked the planet and turned most of the cities into glass?"

Keller nodded. "Yes, that one. Freaking maniacs. Much like the Sith."

I nodded slowly in agreement. Like the Empire, the Mandalorians were merciless when on the warpath and Serroco was just one of the planets they had devastated. It was also a lesson at the Chiss Naval Academy on what could happen if you misjudged your opponent, which was why I could remember the name.

"Do you know why the Mandalorians didn't like the ships?" asked Iska. "The MX5 looks fine to me."

"I'm not sure, Captain, but if I have to make an educated guess, there are several factors at play here. First of all, it's an Imperial ship and they would have to rely on the Empire for spare parts, if they accepted more. At least until they could make their own. Secondly, they carried a lot less troopers than a similar sized Mandalorian or Imperial ship. The MX5 only has space for 500 troops while most Mandalorian ships of the same size carried at least five times as much. Third, the Mandalorians at the time usually had larger missiles, while the missile-tubes on the MX-series used the standard Imperial missiles." He shrugged slightly. "Anyway, do you have any plans for those ships that I need to know?"

I shook my head. "Not at the moment. I don't know what condition they're in and we simply don't have crews for them."

"Well, sir, from the scans, I can say that three of them are so heavily damaged that we're never going to be able to repair them out here. The other three look like they have been shielded from damage by the larger ship types, so there's a chance that they're in good shape. I'll take a look at them when I return."

"Thank you, Master Engineer."

"You're welcome." He said with a salute and the hologram disappeared.

I turned towards Captain Iska. "Alright, let's take a closer look at the Republic Battlegroup."

"Yes, sir."

-------------------------

"Well, sir. I'm glad we don't have to repair those ships." Said Captain Iska as we studied the battlegroup from the Galactic Republic on the hologram on the bridge.

I nodded in agreement. "And I'm grateful that we don't have to rely on finding a working null quantum field generator out there."

The Republic battlegroup was just as dead as the other ships and had taken its share of meteors, loose ship parts and later arriving ships. Consequently, most of the ships were wrecks with gaping holes, missing parts, and crushed hulls. "This is a mess, but on the other hand, now we know where most of the newer ships have arrived."

"You might be right, sir." Said Captain Iska and pointed at a ship that had smashed into a Hammerhead-class cruiser with enough force to almost break it in half. "That's a Bulk Hauler of some kind and from the looks of it, it was fully loaded with ore when it rammed that cruiser."

A moment later the stats on the Bulk Hauler showed up on the viewscreen, proving that Tavune was following the conversation.

I glanced at the screen. "Yeah. One hundred thousand metric tons of cargo will do that."

Iska nodded and activated the comm. "Alright people. Capital ships stay in the current position and scan those ships carefully. Launch the Sharks and the Super Sting scouts and let them do close scans but watch out for debris."

It was a wise choice to use the Sharks and the Super Stings. Not only did they have the best scanners, but they were also equipped with good shields in case they were hit by debris.

"While the Sharks and Super Stings do their thing," Iska said, looking at me. "let's get a couple of search parties to the Inexpugnable-class to check out both ships."

"I agree."

I had been prepared to go along on the search party, but as commander of the Space Marines, Yaki forbade Iska and I to go.

"Commanding officers never go on away-parties unless there are no other options." She sternly informed us. "That's my job and that of the marines. If you really need to see it for yourself, the two of you can see it only when we have secured the area and deemed it safe."

As much as I wanted to go, I accepted it and settled down to wait, while the Marines left in two dropships. One going for the command vessel and the other for the frigate.

That left me with some time on my hands and I used it to look over the stats on the Republic ships as they looked three hundred years ago, before I leaned back in the throne-like seat and thought it over.

There were so many legends regarding the Battle of Rakata Prime, that it was almost impossible to know what really had happened there, but most agreed that the Sith had an important shipyard or military base there. Whatever it was, it was important enough for both the Empire and the Republic to risk most of their fleets in a single giant battle.

What I didn't understand was how the Republic had won.

According to almost every story, the Empire had the superior numbers in regard to capital ships and to make matters worse for the Republic, they had the inferior main capital ship, as the Interdictor-class was slightly better than the Republic Hammerhead-class. Especially if a fifth of them were the original version.

I was sure that both sides had Force-users, which cancelled out each other to some degree, and the same could be said about the quality of the officers. Since it was basically a civil war, more than half the Imperial officers had started out as officers in the Republic Navy, so the skill level had to be almost equal.

That left the starfighters and while the Aurek Tactical Starfighter was a good strike fighter, I didn't know exactly how it compared to a Sith Interceptor, which had been the Sith starfighter in that era.

Calling up the statistics of the Sith Interceptor, I placed it side by side with the Aurek on the viewscreen and got a surprise.

Except for manoeuvrability, where the Sith Interceptor was a bit nimbler, the Aurek was the best fighter by far. Even when used as a space superiority fighter. It was faster and had better shields, armor, and weapons. It also had a hyperdrive, enabling them to hyper into the combat zone, instead of being launched from the capital ships.

The more I looked at the statistics, the more familiar they looked and finally I understood why: The Aurek had almost the same stats as the S-13a Super Sting, which was quite impressive considering that the Aurek was about three hundred years older. Naturally, the newer fighter had better electronics and more advanced weapons, but these could be upgraded, bringing the Aureks to the level of the Super Sting, but as a strikefighter and not a scout.

I turned towards the viewscreen again, mind racing. As an experimental battlegroup, most of the ships only had half the fighter complement they were meant to carry and if we ever meet an Imperial Force, we could use all the starfighters we could possibly get.

On the other hand, there were forty Hammerhead cruisers with room for twelve Aureks each. That summed up to four hundred and eighty starfighters. Enough to bring the Dreadnoughts and the remaining carrier up to their full capacity of starfighters.

Not that I believed that all the Aureks had survived, but even if just a quarter of them were intact, that was still a little over a hundred starfighters. And that was assuming that the Hammerheads only had twelve fighters each. I had seen the hangar on the Hammerhead cruiser we had fought at Alpha Viga and that one had plenty of room for more fighters if they removed the shuttles.

There was no reason to think that the Republic Admirals didn't know that their strongest weapon was the fighters and if I were them, I would have made sure to bring as many Aureks as possible to the battle, giving me the best chance of winning.

All in all, there was a good chance that they had equipped the Hammerheads with as many fighters as possible. Fighters that we could use instead of the MK VI.

The Inexpugnable-class command ship we had found only made it better, as it was designed to hold 12 wings or 144 Aureks in its hangars, and while it was unlikely that they all still worked, it would add to the total of available fighters.

However, if we were to use them, we needed to be able to have them onboard the various types of ships and some of those ships weren't geared towards anything else than Imperial type fighters.

"Commander Resa," I finally said. "How much will it take to install the Aureks on our ships?"

That made her smile. "That is a question best asked to Chief Engineer Keller, sir." She thought for a moment. "But I suppose you could use the bomber hangar on both the dreadnoughts and the carrier, since they only got half the bombers they're supposed to have. The regular hangars have top mounted racks for the MK-series fighters and that doesn't fit the Aureks."

I waited patiently for her to answer the question. From time to time, Resa got caught up in the design and details, but from experience, I knew that she would eventually get to the point.

"Anyway," She continued. "It won't take much to install them, if the spare parts are present, sir. As I said, the Aureks are easy to work on and it wouldn't take that long to reconfigure the hangars to the Aurek."

"I was thinking about the Wyvern-class cruisers, but those will work as well." I said, getting an idea as I was talking. "Resa, one of the Manka hangars on the cruisers has been transformed into a park, but what's in the other one?"

The LED on her temple blinked a few times. "Half filled with Manka's, sir."

Calling the schematics of the Wyvern-class cruiser up on the viewscreen, I studied it for a moment. Like the Manka hangar on Majestic, two of the walls could be opened, with one of them leading directly to the ramp, while the other exit gave the walkers access to the main hangar.

Making a decision, I looked at Tavune. "Comm, give me Commander Yaki."

"Yes, sir."

"What can I do for you, Commodore?" Yaki said a moment later.

"Lieutenant, while you're inside the command ship anyway, please take a quick look inside the hangar. I need to know how many intact Aurek Starfighters it has."

"Yes, sir." She replied and hesitated for a moment. "Is this part of a larger plan, sir? Because if so, I might as well send out more away parties to the Hammerhead cruisers right away."

"It is." I confirmed, amused at her guess.

"They'll be on their way soon, sir." She promised and then asked. "What about the Warhawk? It's a total wreck and we'll have to blow it up at some point, but at least we found the name-plate and it is the Swooping Hawk. My people have collected the bodies and are bringing them back along with side arms, armor and some personal items. The fighter wing is mostly destroyed, except for one Talon Interceptor that looked like it was in the repair bay at the time of the collision. Shall I have it transported to the Majestic?"

I shook my head. There was a standing order about not letting Chiss warships be examined by non-Chiss and if we had it transported to the Majestic, the engineers would be all over it. "No, take vid for evidence. Then we can use the Warhawk for shooting practice when we're done here."

"Yes, sir. I'll send the footage in a moment." Yaki said and closed the connection again.

There was a soft chuckle from Resa. "May I ask what you are planning, sir?"

"Yes. If we construct a wall here." I marked a place on the diagram. "That would allow the Mankas to enter and exit their hangar by the ramps, and still leave about half the hangar left, right?"

She nodded. "Yes. Why do you ask?"

"Because, if we lower the wall by the main hangar and build a platform strong enough to hold a wing of Aureks on top of it, we can use the space below for another wing. That will potentially give us an additional twenty-four Aureks on each cruiser."

Captain Iska tilted her head a bit, as she looked at me. "Do you think we will find that many, sir?"

"Yes, I do."

"I have to disagree, sir," she said. "Those ships look really battered."

Leaning back in the seat, I sent her a smile. "We'll see, Captain. We'll see."

---------------------------

Several hours later, I was sitting in the office when Captain Iska came in, followed by Trine Karnos. "Hello, sir."

"Captain." I greeted and nodded to Karnos. "Lieutenant. What can I do for you?"

Iska smiled wryly as she walked over to the desk. "You can explain to me how you knew that there would be more than twelve fighters in each cruiser, sir."

"I assume that you have heard from Commander Yaki."

The beautiful purple Twi'Lek nodded. "Yes, sir. She and her crews have gone through ten cruisers... all of which had between twenty-four and thirty-six starfighters on board. According to the latest count, they've found two hundred and nine Aurek Starfighters in what look to be working conditions. They also found about a hundred in the Inexpugnable-Class, though that is less surprising." She smiled a bit. "Which brings me back to the first question: How did you know?"

"I didn't know, I suspected it." I said and looked at Trine Karnos. "What do you think?"

The human female looked scared for a second but caught herself. "I didn't think of it at the time, sir, but I guess the Aureks were their key to winning at Rakata Prime."

"Why?"

She hesitated for a moment, and then said, "I don't know, sir."

"Relax, Karnos. It's not a test, just think about it." I said with a smile and explained the thought process I had gone through when looking at the ships.

They both nodded, and Karnos said. "When you put it that way, it makes sense, sir."

"Well, it's still just a guess and the difference in quality of starfighters cannot explain the Republic victory alone, but it's the only one I can quantify with the current knowledge." I paused for a moment and then continued. "Now please go study the ships out there. You might see something we do not."

With a salute, she turned around and walked back to the bridge.

"I wish that I could say that she would learn it." Said Captain Iska with a sigh, "but more often than not, I can't follow your thinking myself."

I laughed softly. "It's more a matter of asking the right questions. As 'why did they win?" or 'why did they lose?' than anything else."

The beautiful Twi'Lek nodded, and then smiled. "Have I mentioned how much hearing you analyse things turn me on?

"No, I don't think you have."

"Well, it does. Majestic, lock the doors." She ordered and walked towards me, one hand opening her uniform top. "I hope you have time for some relaxing sex."

I stood from the chair, enjoying the sight of her. "I think I can find time. After all we're just waiting right now."

A moment later, she was in my arms, soft lips kissing me passionately.

----------------------------------

Holocron

"There are few sets of skills that match only one specific job.

More often they are adaptable to many different professions.

Sometimes, one can plan such a change.

Other times, the change appears without warning."

From the Holy Book of War

Later that evening, I was reading education reports, when Yaki entered my office carrying a box. "The Black Dragons found something on a Hammerhead that I think you better take a look at, sir."

"That sounds intriguing. What do you have?"

Smiling, she placed the box on the table. "You tell me, 'coz I'm not sure, sir. At least not on all of it."

Curious, I stood up and opened the box. The first item that caught my eye was a pair of Lightfoils. With the short, curved hilts, they almost couldn't be anything else. Beside the pair was a pillow made from some soft material and on that lay a glowing cube of crystalline material. I could see the Force swirling around inside it and for a moment my heart stopped beating. It was a Jedi Holocron. An ancient information storing device, that was used as a teacher for young Jedi's if there were no Jedi Knights around to do the teaching themselves. Exactly as a Sith Holocron.

I looked up at Yaki. "Where did they find this?"

"In the commander's office at Hammerhead 31." Said Yaki. "There was a dead body in there as well and a heavy armor in the closet. I guess she was sleeping when they hit the gravity ripple, because it looked like she had been thrown into the wall, resulting in a broken neck." She pointed at a little crystal laying beside the Holocron. "She had this on her, so I put it in the box."

With a nod, I carefully took out one of the lightfoils from the box. The craftsmanship was exquisite and as far as I could see, it was constructed from Electrum, inlaid with dark wood to give a better grip.

The powerpack was drained, but the connectors were still the same, so I just took a spare and plugged it in instead of the original.

Then I ignited it. A bright blue beam rose from the hilt, strong and vibrant. At least for a few seconds, but then the blade started to flicker and give off a strange keening sound. Hurriedly, I switched the lightfoil off again.

"That sounded weird. What's wrong?" Asked Yaki worried.

"I don't know yet... but I guess that something inside has taken damage from the pulsar, the passage through the flux or both." A thought hit me, and I drew my lightfoil, igniting it. As usual the blade appeared, but as with the sabre from the Hammerhead, it started to flicker and give off a keening sound a few seconds later and I quickly switched it off, mumbling a heartfelt. "Shit!"

Yaki looked at me with wide eyes, but before she could say anything, I reached out with the force, examining the kyber crystal within the lightfoil. To my surprise, it felt exactly as it usually did, meaning that there was something else wrong with the weapon.

"Well, it's not the crystals." I said out loud. "But it's still not good."

"Is it possible to repair it, sir?" asked Yaki, sounding worried.

I considered it for a moment. Everything in a lightfoil or a lightsaber for that matter, had to fit together perfectly for it to work and as my lightfoil had been built with Chiss components, using a crystal from the Chiss Ascendency, chances were that the part I needed to repair it, like the energy modulation circuit or the cycling field energizers, had the wrong modulation.

I explained to Yaki, finishing with, "so I need to find parts that fit the modulation of the kyber crystal."

"Can't you just use another gem, sir?"

"Well, then I might as well build a new one. It would be faster than finding a gem that fits whatever new parts I put into it." I pondered that for a moment. "That requires a new pair of gems and I don't really know where to get..."

My voice trailed off as I realized that we still had the gems from Mahaw's Raiders and with just a little bit of luck, some of them would function as kyber crystals.

Yaki looked at me with a slight smile on her face. "Yes, sir, I don't think that anyone would object to you finding a few crystals among the loot from Mahaw Raider's."

"You may have a point." I admitted. "But building a new lightfoil takes at least a couple of weeks, so it will have to wait until we're done here."

"Alright, sir." She nodded. "I'll head off to bed. It's been a long day and tomorrow is going to be even longer."

"Sleep well."

"Thank you, sir."

When she had walked out of the door, I turned to look at the Holocron. As with so many other Jedi and Sith things, I had heard a lot about them, but never seen them in real life.

A Holocron was an old storage device that was used to hold information on Force techniques, instruction manuals by Force users, and historical information about the universe. They could also contain now forgotten Astro-navigational data, blueprints of starships, or just about anything else the user wanted to preserve.

According to Master Brin, holocrons were regarded as highly valuable and much sought after by both the Sith and the Jedi.

I was tempted to see what it could tell me, but there was something I needed to do first. It was a long time since I had meditated and with all the fighting and deaths I had experienced during the last months it was long overdue.

Meditation was at the core of both the Pretorian and Je'daii codes for a good reason: It allowed a force user like me to study my actions, reflecting on them in the harsh light of hindsight. Had I been too hard? Was there another and more peaceful way to solve the problems? Had I been too prideful when taking command, or had I been tempted too easily by the many beautiful females around me?

I pondered these questions for a while, going through my actions from the day we landed on Alpha Viga to the present, but however I looked at it, I couldn't have done it more peacefully. It was one of the times where the Naval Doctrine, Pretorian and the Je'daii code overlapped as solving a conflict with minimum losses was always the best way.

Nature was a balance of chaos and harmony, and violence and warfare were part of us, but so were mercy and peace.

It wasn't pride that had made me take on the Red Widow and the prison ships in the Epsilon Eta system but the simple fact that I wanted to save as many people as possible and had a plan that made it possible.

Going through everything took time, but I felt much better when I exited the meditation.

Reaching out with the Force, I examined the cube. It was clearly a Jedi Cube, but when and where it had been made was anyone's guess.

Without warning, one side of the cube suddenly opened, revealing a small six-sided hole.

I pondered the situation for a while, but then decided that it couldn't hurt to take a look. After all, it was a Jedi Holocron and those had to be reasonably safe.

Taking the small crystal from the case, I inserted it in the Holocron.

Suddenly, I found myself sitting on a sofa in a sunlit garden, looking at a middle-aged human male, dressed in a white and beige coloured outfit.

I guessed it was the 'Gatekeeper' I had heard about. When someone made a Holocron, the appearance and part of the way of thinking was mimicked by the hologram technology, creating a gatekeeper that would act as a search engine and guide to the information within the Holocron.

If need be, it could also restrict access to information and since using a Holocron required that you made a Force connection, the Gatekeeper would know how far you were in your learning and what type of information you shouldn't have access to. According to Master Brin, that was to prevent power hungry trainees from learning things they couldn't handle yet.

"Hello there!" greeted the man cheerfully. "I'm Trejar Melbate, your guide to this... " His voice trailed off. "Wait a minute! You're not a Padawan... or even a Jedi for that matter!" The cheerfulness disappeared from his voice. "Leave here immediately!"

Leaning back on the sofa, I regarded him calmly. There had been plenty of stories where Sith's had found and used a Jedi Holocron as well as the other way around, so unless this one was special, the gatekeeper didn't have the power to throw me out.

"Not going to happen." I informed him. "I want to know what kind of information this Holocron contains, so I ..."

"Don't care." Trejar Melbate interrupted. "Leave!"

Ignoring the interruption, I continued. "... can consider if it's worth learning."

His eyes widened. "Do you seriously think that there are Force powers not worth learning."

"Yes... or at least a question about when to learn them and for me, now is not the time." I stated calmly. "I'm trying to get a battlegroup out of a box system in a nebula. The lives of the four thousand people under my command take precedence over me learning some fancy Force power." I paused for a moment and then added. "Not to mention that those Force Powers will most likely only be useful if we encounter the Sith that roam this part of the galaxy... and if it by some strange happening comes down to a personal encounter and not a naval battle."

"B-but some of them are quite powerful!" Trejar Melbate protested, somewhat to my amusement.

"That might be, but I'm not looking for personal power. I'm looking for knowledge that might be helpful to the rest of the fleet at some point."

That left him silent for a moment, as he looked at me. "There's a darkness in you and yet you don't want personal power."

I shrugged slightly. "I'm a naval officer. It's part of my job to send people to their death for the greater good, and I have accepted that a long time ago. Otherwise, I wouldn't be much of an officer... as many of the Jedi of your time discovered."

"Explain your statement."

"I've read about what is called the Jedi Civil War and how it ended at the Battle of Rakata Prime. Details are few, but I know that it came directly after the Mandalorian Wars. As a civil war between Jedi, it can only mean that so many Jedi had been corrupted by the dark side during the Mandalorian wars, that they had become a force large enough to threaten the Republic." His eyes widened slightly at the statement, but he stayed silent, so I continued. "Ordinary, good-natured people are in general not suited for warfare and especially in a command role, unless they have been taught how to deal with the burden of command and accepted that their orders will get people killed. I doubt they got such training, judging from the fact that the Civil War did happen, causing many to be corrupted by the dark side."

"So, you're saying that to be a Force user and a Naval officer you have to accept the dark side?"

I thought about that question for a moment. According to Master Brin, the teaching of the Je'daii Code differed a lot from the Jedi code and there was a chance that Trejar Melbate would get extremely upset. Unfortunately, I was pretty sure that he would know if I didn't tell the truth. "No, because there is no dark side. There's the Force and corruption of the force. A corruption, which you call the dark side, and it's born from selfishness, while using the Force is accepting that you're working towards a goal greater than yourself, that you want the best for all life."

"Fascinating view, but it doesn't answer the question."

"I know, I just needed to clear up our differences in the View of the Force and what you call the Dark Side." That caused him to nod, and I continued. "As a Commanding officer, you must accept being responsible for the death of both allies and enemies or you risk frustration, anger and seeking out revenge on an enemy. An Enemy I might add, that in many cases are doing exactly the same as you, just on the other side. This demands a cool head, meaning that you need to keep your emotions under control and act from a place of reason and not passion... which is exactly the same you need to do as a Force User. If you let yourself be controlled by your feelings, people around you die, and as an officer you're responsible for the lives of those people."

I paused, causing him to ask. "So, how do you use the Force?"

With a light shrug, I said, "Well, as any personal experiences, it's hard to explain, but I think of what I want done, then I reach out to it and let it flow through me, trying not to interfere while The Force does the work." He looked like he was about to ask another question and I held up a hand to stop him, while I thought. "Now, you're most likely about to ask if I use the corruption from time to time and I'll respond with a story. Imagine that your home is invaded and the invaders are trying to kill both you and your family. You fight against the invaders, but there are many and the fight drags on until you're so exhausted that you're about to fall, when you stumble into the kitchen. On the table there's a pack of drugs left by the invaders. The kind of drugs that will not only revitalise you, but make you stronger and faster for a short time. However, on the shelves in the kitchen, you know there's some ordinary energy powder. The kind that needs to be dissolved in water and drunk, but then it'll revitalise you as well."

He slowly started to smile, as I continued. "If you just want to win the combat with no regard for the future, you might take the drug out of desperation to save your family. However, if you think it through rationally, you know that the drug will get you addicted to it, making you need more and more of it to the point where it'll kill you. On the other hand mixing and drinking the energy-booster comes with no side effects, but it does require you to keep a calm mind and take the time to mix it. Most rational people will, given the time to think about it, choose the energy-booster, but in the moment of desperation and frustration, some people will choose the drug to save their family and disregard the consequences. That's the choice we have as force-users. We either soil ourselves with corruption and get addicted to it or we control our emotions so we can stay rational and make the best choices. Now to answer the question, I've no wish to become addicted, so I haven't used what you call the dark side ever. Not only for my own sake, but also for the sake of the people around me."

That left him silent for a moment, but when he did speak, he sounded calmer than before. "Please leave. I need to think about this."

I accepted that with a nod and severed the connection, abruptly returning to my cabin.

I stretched and yawned. It had been a long day and I needed to sleep before I activated the Holocron again.

----------------------------------

Keller returns

"We train for years, yet whether we win or lose is decided in a single moment."

From the Holy Book of War

Despite my plans, I didn't get the opportunity to return to the Holocron right away. As soon as the four Interdictor cruisers had reached their assigned place, we were joined by the four Wyvern-class cruisers and the work with getting the Aureks out of the unpowered Hammerhead Cruisers and the Inexpugnable-class ship started. For safety reasons, the engineers didn't start up the Aureks engines in case one of them had taken enough damage to explode, so they had to be moved by other means.

The only exception to that rule was the first Aurek moved, as the engineers moved it away from the ships and started it up, just to see if it could be done. It took a few tries, but eventually they got it running, so it was time to move the rest.

Fortunately, like almost all warships with a hangar, the Hammerhead cruisers were equipped with specialized droids, designed to help with moving the starfighters without starting them and Master Engineer Gacith began with moving some of those droids to the Majestic, where they were charged and reprogrammed to work for us.

That done, the droids were tasked with getting the starfighters out of the Hammerheads, from where the frigates could grab the fighters with tractor beams and drag them to one of the larger ships, where a crew of pilots and engineers stood ready to receive them.

The crates with spare parts were packed into containers and moved to other ships, using the orbital lifters from the capital ships, which also gave some of our pilot trainees some much needed practical experience.

That was followed by all the fuel they could get their hands on. If our plan worked and we got out of here, we would be in the middle of nowhere, without a convenient place to refuel the ships, so we needed all the fuel we could find. Fortunately, the fleets in the junkyard had a lot of fuel and I watched in satisfaction, as years of hyperfuel was found and transported to our ship.

While they were investigating ships anyway, I had tasked Yaki and the marines with finding anything that could benefit our people or be sold in the shops on the major ships, and it didn't take long before crates started to arrive with anything from civilian clothes to wall decorations.

Since we had more than four thousand people to feed and very little information about the food situation on Sharon the Red's planetary base, I also ordered the crew to transfer as much food as possible from the Republic Battlegroup to our own ships. Just in case the thousands of slaves there needed it to survive.

The engineers had even found spare hyperdrive field guides and two null quantum field generators, enabling us to repair the Chariot. Not that it was really needed, as they had also found two completely undamaged Foray-class Blockade-runners and four functional Hammerhead-class cruisers. Even more importantly, these Hammerhead-class cruisers were newer versions than the ones from the second Republic Battlegroup, and unlike the pirate version we had encountered in the Alpha Viga system, these newer Hammerheads were equipped with twenty light and ten medium turbo lasers, ten laser cannons for close protection and eight tractor beam projectors.

Compared to the large warships we had found, the Foray-class Blockade-runners were old, small, and underpowered, but they were extremely fast at sublight speed, had a rank 2 hyperdrive and could hold 300 passengers as well as 2800 tons of cargo. Unfortunately, they were only armed with two twin turbolaser turrets and two anti-starfighter laser turrets, but as I intended to use them as freighters and not warships if we had enough people to crew them, that didn't matter much.

On the bright side, both the Hammerheads and the Forays started up on the first try, didn't need much repair, and could be flown by a skeleton crew of only fifteen for the Hammerheads and eight for the Forays, and there was no reason to leave functional ships behind if we could take them along.

The Imperial made Mandalorian MX5 was another unknown and if they could be repaired, I would prefer them over the Foray-class, as they were simply better, though they required a larger crew to function.

It all came down to manpower and until we were done educating people, there was no way of telling if we would have enough people to crew them.

---------------------

With everybody doing what they were supposed to be doing, I had time to continue my unfinished business with the Holocron and Trejar Melbate, so I sat down in my cabin, activated the Holocron again and I was suddenly sitting on a sofa in the same garden as last time.

Trejar Melbate was sitting this time, looking like he had been waiting for me, his hands resting on the arms of his chair.

"Hello again, Master Melbate." I greeted him. "Have you had enough time to think?"

The middle-aged man nodded. "Yes. You're not a Jedi or even a Padawan, but when you speak, you sound like a Jedi, and you use the force like one as well. So, I've decided to grant you access to some of the information here."

"Thank you."

He accepted that with a nod. "So, how can I help you?"

"I don't know." I said honestly. "As I said last time, I'm not looking for personal power, but for something that can help me get a fleet out of a box system or at least repair some of the ships."

That left him silent for a moment, but then he asked, "Would ship designs help?"

"I doubt it. The ship designs in here would be ancient compared to our ships, but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. Name a few."

"The Star Sabre Starfighter and the Praetorian-class Frigate." Trejar Melbate said proudly. "Some of the finest ships around."

I knew of the ship types from the lesson at the Naval Academy, and the Star Sabre had been in service for a long time, until the Aurek had become the main starfighter of the Republic, while the Praetorian-class Frigate was the predecessor to the Hammerhead-class cruiser.

It also told me that at least some of the knowledge in the Holocron was centuries old and in some instances too old to be of any use.

"I'm sorry, but those ships were outdated half a millennium ago." I told him. "Got something more recent?"

"The Aurek-class Strikefighter is one of the newest uploaded." He admitted with a sigh.

"It might be helpful." I said slowly. Blueprints were, at least to my limited knowledge, always useful when repairing complex machinery like starfighters. However, with the quality of the engineers and mechanics we had, I was sure they could do the repairs without the blueprints, so it was just a 'nice to have' and not a 'need to have'. "Do you have any designs on capital ships?"

"Well, I have the plans for both the Centurion-class and the Interdictor-ships, but with only four thousand under your command, I doubt they would help."

I sat still for a moment, trying to keep the elation I felt under control. I had no doubt that Keller could repair almost anything, but having the design plans for the Interdictor would certainly speed up the process a lot. I was tempted to ask why the Holocron had designs for Imperial ships, but then remembered that both the Centurion and the Interdictor had started out being Republic ships, before switching sides.

"I would like the plans for the Interdictor, as we're trying to repair some of them, so we can get out of here as soon as possible."

"Done, but I have to ask why you're in a rush."

"There're more people depending on our success." I told him and explained about the prisoners on Debra and Nodia Prime, as well as the presence of the Sith in this part of the galaxy.

He considered that for a moment and then said, "You say that you don't want personal power, but you're going to need exactly that in order to fulfil your mission."

"That might be, but I honestly don't know what I need to learn to defeat them."

Trejar Melbate and I debated back and forth about what to learn for what seemed to be a long time but in the end, he agreed to give me access to files about how to heal with the Force as well as a few other Force powers that would help me in case it came down to one-on-one combat.

He also asked me about lightsaber combat and was astonished when he discovered that I didn't know what style I used, since I only knew it as Praetorian Light-foil combat, but after I had explained some of the moves and stances to him, he decided that it sounded a lot like something called Makashi, combined with another style which he called Niman. I still had no idea what he was talking about, so in the end he gave me access to the parts about lightsaber combat and constructing, so I could study how other people used them. Something I was extremely thankful for.

The lack of experience with real one-to-one combat was one of my greatest weaknesses: With the extremely limited number of Praetorians in the Chiss Ascendency, I rarely had the chance to spar against other Praetorians and I had never fought directly against a Sith or another force-user for that matter. The Sith on the other hand not only fought the Jedi, but quite often also against each other, at least according to rumours, and that meant that every single one of them had more experience in real combat than I had.

Not that I expected to be face-to-face with a Sith anytime soon, but I believed in being prepared and Darth Malgus wasn't the only Sith around.

---------------------

Captain Meistrin and her group came back before we were even halfway finished and instead of just doing a debriefing, I invited Captain Meistrin, Captain Fama Sul and Chief Engineer Keller over to the Majestic for dinner, along with Captain Iska and Master Engineer Gacith.

"So, did you find anything useful?" I asked Keller.

"Both yes and no." He answered with a short nod. "On one hand, most of the materials and the technology in the ships are outdated to the point of being useless. I think a Drake-class could take down those battleships, despite it being one fifth of their size." He drank from the glass. "On the other hand, we searched four different ships and I have to say that the Pius Dea must have been very busy, because we found a fortune. Especially in the Naval Galleon."

"In what form?"

"Precious metals and gems." Said Fama Sul with a grimace. "I hate to think of the number of people they had killed to get those, but we have almost four hundred metric tons of gems in the cargo hold, along with sixteen thousand metric tons of gold, silver and platinum."

Keller nodded. "We even have a few tons of songsteel."

I had no idea how much that amount of gems and precious metal was worth, but I also didn't really care. For me, the wealth meant that once we were in a position to get the freed prisoners to a place where they could live in peace, I could supply them with money so they wouldn't have to start from nothing.

"Songsteel?" Said Iska astonished. "I didn't even know they had it back then."

"Nothing but the best for the high-ranking members of the order." Said Keller and placed a highly decorated dagger on the table. "We found such a dagger on every bridge crew and the higher-ranking Paladins... or whatever they were called... each had a slim sword made of songsteel." The Chief Engineer smiled a bit. "On the bright side, we brought back seven-hundred-and-eighty songsteel daggers and two-hundred-and-ninety-five songsteel swords."

Looking at the dagger, I noticed the religious carvings on the hilt. "Is it possible to remove the hilt or are they made as one piece?"

Keller grinned. "I already checked that, sir. Yes, the hilt can be removed, so we can fit them with new hilts without all the religious motifs."

Iska looked at me and stated, "You have an idea."

I nodded slowly. "Yes... with three Sith Lords and a part of the Sith Imperial Navy lingering somewhere in the Chaos, I want to be prepared if we ever encounter them. Equipping some of the troops with songsteel blades is a good start, but I would also like to have a squad on each ship equipped with the deck-sweepers and electro-net guns we have from Mahaw's Raiders."

Deck sweepers were nasty weapons, designed to be used against boarders. It was a slug-thrower that fired canisters containing hundreds of razor-sharp durasteel darts, which would spread out over a large area, killing, or severely wounding lightly armored pirates or crew-members, without damaging or penetrating the hull. It was also impossible to parry or deflect with a lightsaber.

The electro-netgun fired a paralyzing, electrically charged stun net in the form of five yellow energy balls, between which the webbing of the net formed and expanded as it approached its target. Normally used by slavers and pirates, the electric charge could paralyze or knock-out targets and like the deck sweeper, it was difficult to deflect with a lightsaber.

"I know that Force-users are just a tiny portion of the Imperial Navy," I continued. "But the rest we can counter with regular military tactics if we should ever encounter them."

Fama Sul nodded with a relieved look on her face. "I think that I speak for most of those that have encountered a Sith, when I say that having such a squad would make people feel more secure."

Iska nodded as well. "I agree. The weapons won't counter everything a Sith can do, but it's a good start."

"There's safety in numbers. Especially at a distance." Said Keller softly. "Most Force-users will have trouble against a squad of soldiers armed with those weapons."

"And I have no wish to be in melee combat with a Sith." I stated calmly. "All combat should be conducted and resolved with capital ship weapons as any civilized people would do."

That made the rest of the people at the table chuckle and Captain Meistrin asked. "If that is the case, why're you training close combat so much?"

"I might be civilized, but that doesn't mean that the enemy is." I answered and almost by itself a quote from the Holy Book of War popped into my head. "It is better to be well trained in peacetime, than untrained in a war."

That caused Captain Meistrin to smile. It might not be the official motto of the Naval academy, but the teachers and trainers used it so much that it might as well be.

"I'll drink to that." Declared Keller and lifted his glass.

"So, what have you been up to while we were away, sir?" asked Fama Sul when the toast was over.

I told them about the Aureks, causing the Chief Engineer to sigh with a smile. "I swear that I have never met anyone that's so good at finding extra work for the mechanics and engineers, sir." He thought for a moment. "How many in each ship?"

"Well, they're about half size of the bombers, so we should be able to pack quite a lot of them on the dreadnoughts and carriers, but they also need to be able to get out of the hangar within a reasonable timeframe and as you're the expert on ship design, I'll leave that to you." I thought for a moment. "Ideally, I would prefer to avoid using the death-trap the Empire has chosen to call the Supremacy-class. Unlike the Empire, we can't afford to lose pilots left and right and so far, we can avoid it since we have more Nightsingers than we have pilots, but that may change in the future."

I looked at him. "How many intact starfighters are in the damaged DeltaX-class Carrier?"

Keller shook his head. "Not as many as you think, sir. We looked inside them when we were looting spare parts and the main hangar on the Delta is gone." He shrugged. "That still leaves a lot of Super Stings in the side hangars, but the M7s are in shambles."

"On the bright side," Added Fama Sul. "The cargo holds seemed almost intact, so we should be able to get some spare parts there."

"Oh." Said Master Engineer Gacith with a smile. "That sounds promising. The more spare parts we have, the better."

Keller chuckled. "Well, you might want to have some fifty trainees to sort them. I bet the parts have been thrown around among each other." He suddenly looked like he remembered something and looked at me. "While we were away, I got a message from Mister Tavune, telling me that he had found an interesting ship."

I felt my eyebrows rise, since Tavune hadn't told me about it. On the other hand, I had been occupied by all the other stuff that was going on, and until they knew if the ship was operational or not, there really was no reason for him to tell me about it. "I haven't heard that. What is it?"

"A Colossal-class heavy carrier." Answered Keller. "Could you have the scan up on the screen?"

"Sure." I answered and ordered the computer to do so.

The screen flicked on, showing a picture on a large ship floating among several smashed Imperial Drake-class Frigates, but unlike the ships outside, the pulsar in the background was to the port side, meaning that the ship was a lot farther away than the Republic battlegroup.

Despite being wedge-shaped like most imperial ships, there was little of the sleek elegance and deadliness that characterised the Dragon-, Wyvern- or Drake-classes, as the wedge was a lot less prominent and the walls between the slanted upper- and under-sides was a lot taller, adding volume to the ship.

The statistics showed up next to the picture and I skimmed through them.

As Keller had told me, Imperial Carriers were not fighter carriers and the Colossal-class heavy carrier was no exception, reading more like a super-sized version of the Gage-class transporter. With a length of 860 metres, it was almost as large as the Majestic, but the taller side-walls and the less pronounced wedge-shape gave it larger interior volume than the dreadnought. Added to that, most of its interior consisted of cargo holds, enabling it to carry three hundred thousand tons of cargo and seven hundred passengers, as well as a squadron of fighters. It even had thick armor, good shields, and a decent point defence to go with its ten turbolasers.

Shaking my head, I looked at Keller again. "That's a huge transport."

The engineer nodded with a grin. "Yes, though technically, it's not a transport, but a fabricator ship. The Colossal-class heavy carrier is the primary vessel of the Imperial Engineering Division. This is the ship they use when they build fortresses, bases, ships, and everything else they make. Not only can it make landfall to ease operations, but it also has a lot of fabricators that can make almost everything from micro-circuits to turbolaser parts. Feed it with raw materials and the fabricator can build whatever it has the programming for."

"What's the crew requirement?" I asked more calmly than I felt.

"One hundred and forty for a full military crew, fifteen as a skeleton crew." The Chief engineer answered. "It's designed to carry five hundred engineers and mechanics, as well as the flight crew for the fighters, but really, it's an upscaled transporter and needs a lot less crew than real warships."

"And you want it." I stated.

Keller nodded. "If we can get the reactor up and running, yes, but since the Colossal-class heavy carrier class only started production just before the war, they can't have been here for long."

"Right." I thought it over for a moment, but like so many other things, it was really a no-brainer. The fabricators on the ship could make spare parts we didn't have access to, so bringing it along was common sense, even if it meant that we had to ditch at least one, perhaps even two, of the newly acquired Foray-class blockade runners to have enough people to crew it. "If you can get it started, see if you can find a log or something that explains what it's doing in this region of the galaxy."

"Yes, sir."

An idea hit me and with a smile I looked over at Gacith, who was studying the ship's data with interest. "See anything you like, Master Engineer Gacith?"

He nodded absently. "Yes, sir. I wish we had one of these when we made the production plant at Alpha Viga. It would have made our job so much easier."

"Good, because when we're done training people, that ship is going to be yours."

"What?" He looked at me with a shocked expression on his face.

"As Chief Engineer Keller said that ship is designed for engineers like you and as the senior engineer here, I'm going to make you co-captain of it, when the ship engineers are done repairing it." I explained. "Unless I'm mistaken, the people under your command are the only ones that can use the equipment in there anyway."

The shocked expression on his face slowly gave way to a large grin, as he looked at the screen. Then he surprised me by asking. "Can I name it Nautilus?"

I nodded with a chuckle. A Nautilus was a giant squid-like creature from the planet of Ool in the Chiss Ascendency. It resided on the bottom of the oceans and only rarely made it to the surface, which was fortunate, considering that it not only had ten long tentacles with a hook on the end, but also a tough shell that protected its softer parts. Another special thing about the Nautilus, was that it constructed shelters or nests for its young ones, which I had to admit fit perfectly with what I had learned about the ship so far. "Yes, but you might want to ask Yaki to paint a picture of one, so you can show it to the crew. Otherwise, they won't have a clue what you're talking about."

"Good point." He said, the smile still plastered on his face. "I'll do that."

"You could hang the picture in the corridor by the main airlock." Suggested Fama Sul. "That way people almost have to see it."

"Which might scare them away." I said dryly, causing some of the others to laugh.

Leaning back in the seat, I smiled to myself, as the chat continued. At least on a commander level, this was slowly turning into a fleet, or at least a Battlegroup.

-----------------

Having more people and more ships helped, but it still took four weeks of almost constant work before we were done. By then, we had no less than five-hundred-and-forty-four intact Aurek Tactical Strikefighters along with spare parts and an additional fifty damaged fighters, out of the almost nine hundred fighters we had found.

The last four hundred fighters were either too broken to be of any use or inside ships that were so damaged that the starfighters were impossible to get out without cutting the hull in two. If we really needed them, we could get them out, but so far it simply wasn't worth the time and effort.

As Keller had said, the damaged Delta-class carrier was mostly a wreck, but we did manage to get fifty M7 Nightsingers, eighteen Super Stings and five Agency-class shuttles out of it, along with a load of spare parts from both the storage holds and what could be taken from the damaged scouts and Interceptors.

We were also filled up on fuel, Tibanna gas, food as well as raw materials for the fabricators, and the stockrooms for the shops were filled with items that people might buy.

To Keller's delight, the scan techs had found a repairable support ship among the floating wrecks: A Rendili StarDrive Heavy Salvage Ship, which the engineers immediately had gone to work on, naming it Squid.

I didn't understand his delight, so I looked the ship up in the database and got a pleasant surprise. Extremely durable and reliable, the Heavy Salvage ship was designed to service space stations and could tow a capital-size navigational hazard, like a broken-down cargo hauler, and clear a space lane in no time. Since not every ship could be repaired, it was also equipped to break down those ships into spare parts and was thus equipped with everything a repair ship would need, like tractor beam projectors, manipulator arms with plasma cutters and more.

Since the ship needed to be able to get in position quickly so they could prevent collisions, it was fast and manoeuvrable despite being three hundred metres long and had a Rank 2 Hyperdrive that could take it to a nearby system in good time. Besides that, it had a hangar with four small salvage tugs, as well as six orbital lifters, and was able to carry two hundred and eighty thousand metric tons in its cargo holds.

Even the crew requirement of nine was more than reasonable and I remembered Elise Samko's surprise when she saw the crew requirement for warships. On the other hand, the crew requirement was without mechanics, engineers, gunners for the tractor beam projectors and flight crew for the tugs. Still, if we ditched yet another Foray-class blockade runner, we could bring it along and it was without a doubt extremely useful during repairs.

For some reason, I had expected such a ship to be a rarity, but according to the database on Majestic most larger space stations and spaceports had at least one of this type of ship servicing it, and since Rendili StarDrive produced one of the best, there were literally thousands of these ships in the galaxy. What it had been doing out here was a mystery, but I guessed that somewhere a space station missed a salvage ship that never reached its destination.

Thinking it over, I realized that I had seen similar ships around the various space stations in Chiss space, but since they were non-military ships, I haven't given them a second thought. An oversight that was corrected now.

In my opinion, the Heavy Salvage Ship only had three drawbacks. As a civilian ship, it was only armed with three lasers for self-defence, its armor was designed for collisions, not combat, and it was about as good-looking as a flying brick. Granted, it was an extremely practical work ship, but after having been looking at the streamlined Dragons, Wyverns and Drakes for months, the box-like and angular hull of the salvage ship was simply ugly.

None of that mattered right now and with the Kraken working on one of the Interdictors and the Squid on the other, the space around them was filled with tugs and orbital lifters from the whole fleet. As the Interdictors were emptied out, the Engineers had room to examine the damage they had suffered.

As for what ships we could take along with us when we eventually got out of the Snare system had to wait until we were further along in the training of the crews, we knew we would have to wait to determine how many people we could assign to the ships.

-------------------------

"What're you going to use all the old fighters for, sir?" Asked Resa, as we stood in Majestic's hangar, looking at a bunch of old Sith Interceptors and bombers that had been moved into the hangar from the Interdictor-class cruisers. Next to them stood some of the Mk. VI Supremacy-class from the other ships, waiting for the engineers to finish repairing the ships they came from.

"I don't know yet and that is why they're here." I admitted. "We don't have that much hangar space left, but they must be good for something."

"I might be able to help there, sir." Resa said with a smile. "I saw some of the video Commander Yaki sent and that clawship is a nice design. I would love to see if I can make something similar."

For a moment, I had no idea what she was talking about, but then remembered that she had both an engineer program package and a ship designer program and that ship designing was listed as one of the things she liked to do.

"Please don't copy that design. Resa... At least not with those lines." I said softly. "If we have to fight our way out of some encounter, having a Talon Interceptor-like ship will only make people blame the Chiss and if those people happen to be Sith, that could be very bad for my people."

She was silent for a moment and then nodded. "Good point, sir. I'll think of something else. Any other limitations?"

I thought it over. With both the Nightsinger and the Super Stings, as well as the Aureks, we had all the Strike Fighters we could wish for, but we needed space superiority fighters, and that wasn't the MK VI Supremacy-class. The Super Stings could be used as that, but if we were to use them against pirates it would be nice to have a fighter with Ion cannons as a secondary weapon.

"Make it the best space superiority fighter you can, Resa." I said and told her my thoughts. "But the only real limitation is that it must be one we can send people out to fight in, knowing that if they don't come back, it wasn't the equipment that let them down."

She nodded with a smile. "That I can do, sir."

"Thank you."

I nodded and turned to look at the fighters again and saw Senior Mechanic Waydar walking towards me. As always, his height, width and bald head make it look like he was in power armor, complete with a helmet, when in reality he was just clad in a one-piece suit for technicians.

"Hello, sir." He said in his deep, rumbling voice. "Can I have a minute of your time?"

"Always, Senior Mechanic. What can I do for you?"

"One of the marine squads that went to scan the Mandalorian MX5 brought back some interesting armor. Are you familiar with those?"

"Well, if you're talking about Mandalorian armor, I know about them but that's about it." I said thoughtfully. "I know that at least some of them are incredibly tough and able to resist blaster bolts and, according to several sources, lightfoils and lightsabers."

"Exactly!" He said with a wide smile. "I've tested the armor they brought back, and it resists blaster bolts like nothing I've ever seen before."

"And you want to use it?"

"Yes, sir!" He said with an enthusiastic nod.

"Can you reforge it?"

"No, but that Kandosii-Type Dreadnaught has room for thirty thousand troopers. I'm sure that we can find armor that will fit our people."

I nodded slightly. The suggestion made sense, but there was something about Mandalorians and their armor that I couldn't quite remember, except that it had been in a file about the Mandalorian Wars.

"Resa, what does the database say about Mandalorians and their armor?" I asked and looked at her.

The blue LED blinked a few times and then she answered. "According to the Resol'nare, as the code of the Mandalorians is called, it's the duty of every Mandalorian to wear armor. To do otherwise, would mean that you're Resol'nare, which means a person without a soul. On the other hand, wearing Mandalorian Armor without being a Mandalorian is considered a grave insult to the Mandalorian people and most Mandalorians will try to have the armor returned to the hands of the Mandalorians." She grimaced a little. "With or without the current wearer's consent."

Waydar sighed. "I guess that means a big no to using them."

I nodded to him. "You would be right. As much as I would love to have the marines in blaster resistant armor, it's not worth it in the long run. I know the Mandalorians are scattered over most of the outer rim after their defeat, but they're still a force to be reckoned with and I don't want us to become a target for one of their crusades." I thought for a moment. "However, have some hundred sets of armor brought to the ship just in case we liberate some Mandalorians along the way... hmm... You know the people from Nodia Prime better than I do. Are there any Mandalorians among them?"

"Not that I know off, but I'll ask around."

"Good and in the meantime, please do your best to discover everything there is to know about that armor... Aside from the metal they're made of, I mean." I told him. "Then we'll see how much of these features we can incorporate into our own armor."

Waydar's dark face spilt in a brilliant smile. "That I can do."

"Good, because I do want the Marines to have the best armor possible.... Using Mandalorian armor is just not an option, if we're to live in peace after we get out of here."

"Yes, sir." He said, sounding like he understood the reasons behind my answer.

"Excellent. I'll look forward to your report."

He saluted with a smile and walked off in the direction of the workshops.

I looked after him as he walked and noticed something I haven't seen before: A huge box-like structure that reached all the way to the top of the hangar. "Resa, what is that thing? I don't remember seeing it before."

"You haven't," said the female android with a chuckle. "It's Keller's solution to the problem of restarting the reactor if we have to go through the ionized field of the box."

"Oh," I said and looked at the box-like structure. Normally, there would be enough power in the system to restart a reactor that had been shut down by ion weapons, but the super-massive emission from a proton star was another matter, as proven by the many ships outside. In short, entering the field would entirely drain the power from the ships, leaving nothing left to use for restarting the reactor. "How does it work?"

"Well, it's a capacitor that stores energy, but what sets it aside is that it's totally isolated from the rest of the ship. There's not a single point of contact between the capacitor and the ship where power can run through."

"Well, that will prevent it from being drained, but how do you use it to restart the ships?"

Resa smiled a little. "Since there's no direct connection to the reactor, the power cables have to be plugged into the reactor manually, but then the reactor can be restarted."

I nodded slowly. The whole set-up made sense, and also explained why so few ships had them. Incidents like the one we had been through happened so rarely that it didn't make sense for most ships to have bulky counter measures against it.

"Does it work?"

"Keller hasn't had time to test it yet, which is why you haven't gotten a report about it yet, but to be honest, sir, I have yet to see a design from Keller that doesn't work as he intended."

"You got a point there." I agreed with a chuckle. "I guess, I'll just have to look forward to reading the report." I stretched. "What's next?"

"Training assignments." She said with a smile.

----------------------------------------

Building Lightfoils

"Hard training makes for an easy battle."

From the Holy Book of War

Since most people onboard were busy with either the Interdictor cruisers or the Aurek starfighters, I had rescheduled both my teaching and training, so that Meistrin, Iska and Tristana were the ones teaching the future captains for some weeks, leaving me with the time I needed to create a new lightfoil.

So, I asked Resa to join me for a tour of the Glorious' cargo hold in an attempt to find some new crystals. I could have used the ones from Mahaw's base, but since Glorious had returned from the Pius Dea ships with tons of gems, the chances of finding exactly the right crystal were better there.

Resa smiled slightly as we entered the cargo room with the jewels. "Here we are."

The cargo room was a large, well-lit area and there were more crates than I had imagined. I made my way down the line followed by Resa, moving slowly as I read the labels.

My old master had provided me with a list of usable gems but had also stated which ones were the best and since I had the opportunity to pick and choose, I might as well do that.

Most of the jewels were unknown to me, but as all kyber crystals resonated with the force, there was a good chance of finding some that worked. Even if the majority of them had spent thousands of years near a pulsar.

Closing my eyes, I reached into the force and let it guide me, as I walked past the boxes. Slowly, softly, something started to sing to me through the Force, gently pulling me to the right. I opened my eyes again and kept following the Force, until I stood in front of one of the ancient boxes from the Pius Dea ships.

It was sealed, but before I even had the chance to ask, Resa stepped up next to me and opened the seal.

"Thanks, Resa."

"You're welcome."

Inside the box was a multitude of smaller boxes, but with the force guiding me, I picked two boxes and placed them on top of the rest.

Then I took a deep breath and opened the first one.

The crystals were placed on a simple grey underlayer and they were breathtakingly beautiful. Finely cut and polished, they were a fiery dark orange changing to yellow inside, giving the illusion of being solidified flames.

"Oh, they are wonderful!" mumbled Resa and leaned in to take a closer look at them. "What kind of gems are they?"

"I have no idea." I admitted. "I'm going by feel and instinct here."

"In that case I can say that you've got a fantastic instinct, because that is one of the most beautiful sights I have ever seen."

"Yes, they're quite a sight." I said, carefully picking up two of the same size before I closed the lid and placed the box back where I took it from. I only needed one, but having a spare was always good when making something for the first time.

The next box looked a lot like the first, but when I opened it, there wasn't any colourful display.

The crystals were translucent to the point of being hard to see, but like the fiery ones, they had been finely cut and polished.

However, where the fiery gems almost pulsed with the Force, these were the exact opposite, as there was almost a tangible lack of Force around them, making them feel like small holes in the Force.

"No offence, but they look boring compared to the first ones." Said Resa calmly, tilting her head as she studied them. "Are you sure those are the right ones?"

"Well, according to the Force, they are, and I tend to trust that." I said, again picking up two and putting them into different pockets. "So yes, they're the right ones."

"That is good." She said with a small nod. "Do you need more?"

I shook my head. "No. One primary crystal and one focus crystal is enough. Now, I just need to figure out how to assemble the thing."

"You don't know?"

"My old teacher taught me how to make one, but it's customary that a guard doesn't make a lightfoil until the guard has been promoted to Knight, so I've never tried to build one myself. I think I'll check to see if the Holocron has something on it." I closed the box and put it back, closing the container. "But first I need to find the right parts in the workshop and find a design that I like. Then I need to attune to the gems, which will take some days of meditation. When that is done, I need to reassemble the foils with the new crystals and since that requires the utmost precision, it's usually done with the Force." I smiled a bit. "Then they're done."

"Good." She answered with a smile. "Let's get back to Majestic so you can start."

"Just a minute," I said and looked around. "I might need more crystals."

"For what?"

"Right now, Tristana is training me with a vibrorapier and while it's very good training, nothing beats training with real lightfoils, so I plan to build training foils we can use."

Resa frowned. "What's the difference between that and a real lightfoil? Except for the lethality, I mean."

I shrugged slightly. "Nothing, really. The whole point is that they behave exactly like real weapons but with a lot lower power level. The first light-foils I used even had a training setting, so the students could use the same weapon for both training and combat."

She hesitated for a moment, but then said, "Then I'll recommend you build exactly such a pair for Captain Tristana." She smiled a little. "I can't imagine them being satisfied with anything less than a real weapon."

"Excellent point." I said with a chuckle. "And as far as I know, you don't have to be a force-user to wield a lightfoil, so she could potentially use it in combat."

"I think she would like that." Said Resa, the smiling growing wider. "And you might want to make one for Captain Iska as well, so you'll be able to train while Captain Tristana is busy commanding her ship."

"Agreed, so I'll find some crystals for her before we leave."

Finding crystals for someone else than myself proved to be more difficult, but in the end, I found some crystals in different shade of yellow and pocketed them, before nodding to Resa. "That should be it."

"Good." She nodded. "Let's get back to Majestic, so you can start building the blades... oh just remember to build a training mode into your own foils, so you use them for training as well."

I chuckled as I closed the lid of the box I had taken the crystals from. "Thanks for reminding me. I will do that."

-----------------------

Despite Resa's optimistic outlook, designing a lightfoil was easier said than done.

I wanted to make the new lightsabre's hilt a bit more like the slightly curved hilt of both my vibrorapier and vibrodagger, but after having tried out the first mock-up, I realized that it would make parrying blaster bolts extremely difficult. Consequently, I tested out several other designs, until I found the right compromise between the ability to deflect blaster bolts and fencing, while ensuring that it was still comfortable in the hand.

The slightly curved hilt turned out to be problematic as it made aligning the crystals more complicated than in a straight lightfoil, and after having battled with the problem for a while, I simply asked Senior Mechanic Waydar for help. However, building lightfoils was a new thing for him, so in the end, I had to use a design from the Holocron, called a curved-hilt lightsaber. Having a blueprint helped a lot and eliminated the problem of having to invent things myself. The design added a bit more length to the hilt than I would have preferred, but to my surprise, it made for a better balance.

Senior Mechanic Waydar took a quick look at the power cell and other components I had planned to use, snorted, and asked if he could be allowed to make some upgrades. I agreed. Senior Mechanic Waydar had a lot more experience with building things than I had, and it would be foolish of me to reject his suggestions out of some misplaced pride.

While Waydar tinkered with the components, I used the Holocron to see if I could figure out what kind of crystals I had found. As it turned out, the fiery crystal was called a Qixoni crystal and when used in a light-weapon, it enhanced both the power of the blade and the user's Force abilities.

The last took me a bit by surprise. According to Master Brin, there wasn't much of a difference on the various crystals used in a lightfoil, but the Holocron stated several times that the use of specific crystals gave the light-weapon unique properties depending on the crystal used.

Unfortunately, there wasn't a convenient list that explained exactly what the various types of crystal did, so I guessed that I would just have to wait and see. Especially since I couldn't find any reference to the transparent crystal in the Holocron.

The yellow crystals I had found for the other blades turned out to be Topazium and Citrine Crystal, and according to the Holocron, Topazium gave a faster blade, while Citrine Crystal added to the impact of any blow dealt by the lightfoil.

With the knowledge of what most of the crystals did, the preliminary work was done, and it was time to attune to the crystals, starting with the ones that were going to be used in my own lightfoils, so I sat down to meditate with the four crystals to create a harmony between me, the crystals, and the Force.

During the months of training with Tristana, I had taken to using the rapier-and-dagger fencing style I had learned at the academy, simply to avoid getting hit by the lightning fast Echani, and instead of using two of the crystals and keeping the other two as spare, I had decided to use all four and build two light foils: One with a full-length blade to function as the rapier and one with a shorter blade, that would work as the dagger. A combination that would allow me to use the rapier-and-dagger style with the lightfoils and perhaps even combine it with the new fighting style from the Holocron.

Unfortunately, harmonizing the four, or two pairs, of crystals proved to be extremely difficult and I spent a great deal of time meditating over it, without getting it quite right.

"You seem frustrated." I heard Resa say, when I came out of the meditation with a sigh.

"Annoyed at myself might be a better expression." I said and I looked over at her. As usual, she was sitting in one of the chairs outside my field of vision so she wouldn't disturb me, but it was the first time she had done so without clothes on.

As I looked over, she stood and showed off her perfect body as she walked towards me, hips swaying seductively along with her breasts. It was an extremely erotic sight, and I enjoyed every millisecond of it as she walked closer. So did my body and I could feel my dick getting harder by the moment.

"I have a suggestion for what to do for make you more relaxed." She breathed.

"Sounds good."

The little smile broadened into what I could only describe as a lusty grin as she took the last few steps before reaching me. Since I was sitting on the floor and she was standing, I had to arch my neck to look up at her and when she stopped, her beautiful face was framed by her perky breasts, like a sun rising between two mountains.

That view was obscured a moment later, when Resa gently placed a hand on my head and took half a step more, placing her left leg on the ground next to my butt and then pressed my mouth against her pussy.

"Lick me." She said softly, with a tone of voice that made it sound more like a request than an order.

I happily obliged, letting my tongue dive in between her lips and then licked upwards, ending at the clitoris, where I ran the tongue in circles around it, as I grabbed her ass with my hands, fondling the soft buttocks firmly.

"Oh Yes. Just like that." Resa moaned and gasped as I sucked the clitoris into my mouth and gave the tip a solid lashing with my tongue.

Still fondling her ass, I sneaked a hand in between her buttocks and started caressing her pussy. That caused more moans and groans from her, so I opened my mouth, letting the clitoris escape, before I made my tongue hard and rubbed it over her clitoris with increasing pressure and speed.

Her legs started to shake a little from the pleasure, but instead of slowing it down, I moved my now completely wet fingers from her pussy and inserted two of the into her tight pussy, while the third went into her ass.

"Shit!" She exclaimed and used her hands to press my head harder against her pussy. "Faster!"

I finger fucked her hard and fast, while licking her clitoris in the same way, causing her to groan louder and louder, until she came with a small scream, the muscles spasming around my fingers as her body shuddered and shivered.

Normally, I would have stopped there, as most women get too sensitive to continue, but as Resa was an Android, that couldn't happen, so I just continued at the same speed, attacking her clitoris with my tongue, while the fingers went in and out of her holes as fast as I could manage.

One of the fascinating aspects with having sex with Resa was that, unlike organic women, I couldn't feel or sense when she was about to come, and I was slightly surprised when she came again less than a minute after the first orgasm, the artificial muscles of her pussy and ass clenching my fingers.

Resa took a few steps backwards and where a normal woman would have done that on wobbly legs, she had the same perfect balance as always. Sending me a smile, she said. "Enough. Now it's your turn. Take your clothes off and lay on the bed, please."

I nodded and did as she had suggested, though my hard-on made getting out of my pants somewhat difficult.

No sooner had I laid down, than Resa took my hard dick in her warm, moist mouth, her tongue soft and unbelievably life-like as she swirled it about the head of my cock.

"That feels fantastic!" I groaned and reached for her, but she shook the hand away and left my dick alone just long enough to say. "Not this time, sir. You need to relax and enjoy it."

"Yes, mam." I replied with a smile and then groaned, as she took my cock back into her mouth and let it go down her throat as she swallowed it to the root, before pumping up and down, tongue playing on the underside.

A hand disappeared between my legs and a moment later, I could feel her fingers teasing the sensitive skin of my balls. She stopped deep-throating me and grabbed the shaft with her other hand, while keeping the head in her mouth, stroking me with her hand and letting her tongue play on the head at the same time.

It felt fantastic and I was enjoying it when her fingers moved down to circle me at the base of my cock and started to tease me with her tongue, licking the head for a little while, before she smoothly took me into her mouth again, sliding all the way down. Her tongue flicked briefly at the very bottom, before she tightened her lips around my dick and slowly retracted, sucking hard and licking my cock at the same time.

My whole body tingled, and I moaned as she reached the top, the sound turning into a groan as Resa did it again and then once more, repeatedly taking my cock all the way down and then sucking as she went back up. Then she changed tactics again, holding the head in her mouth and letting her tongue play on it, while her hand stroked the shaft, and the other hand fondled my balls.

She stopped using her mouth long enough to ask. "Would you prefer to come in my mouth or inside my pussy." She licked the tip. "And no matter what the answer is, I'll be doing the work."

With the treatment she had given me, that was a tough choice, but after a few seconds, I managed to say. "Pussy... this time"

"As you wish." She said with a chuckle and moved. A moment later she had positioned herself on top of me with her back towards me. A hand guided my dick, so it lined up with her entrance and a moment later she slowly sank down on it, taking it into her wet pussy. Either the orgasm I had given her earlier had turned her on, or it was the blow job she had given me, but her pussy was warm, slick and wet as she impaled herself on me, making the tingles in me increase.

I had expected her to increase the pace once I was inside her, but as she lifted up, her pussy clenched around me, just like lips had done before and a moment later, I felt her hand returning to my balls, teasing them with her fingers. Then she slowly and deliberately sank down again, taking her sweet time to get all of me inside her before repeating the process.

It was slow, heavenly torture as she kept doing that, every up and down movement bringing me a fraction closer to an orgasm, her artificial muscles keeping the movement going, never speeding up and never tiring.

I have no idea how long I was in that heaven, but eventually, the tingles in my body added up and I could feel my dick grow inside her. Then my whole body spasmed as I came inside her. That set her off as well and she shook all over as an orgasm ran through her body.

I closed my eyes in pleasure and contentment, as my body began to relax. "Resa... that was amazing."

"Thank you." She answered as she dismounted me and lay down by my side. "You seem much more relaxed now."

I couldn't argue against that. Instead, I just lay there as the tension seemingly evaporated from my body, leaving me much calmer and more relaxed than before. So calm, that I simply fell asleep.

When I woke up again, it was with renewed energy and after a meal, I went back to business, though this time with a slightly different approach.

Up to this point, I had been treating the fiery crystals as the primary crystal and the translucent crystal as the focus, but just to test it, I changed it around, so that the translucent became the primary crystal, while the fiery became the focus.

After that, everything else went as smooth as I could wish for, and it only took a few days more before I felt that I was ready to assemble the weapon.

While I had been meditating, Senior Mechanic Waydar had finished the casings and when I was ready, I carefully placed all the components on the table and then used the force to slowly place them in exactly the right place.

As the final piece snapped into place, I released a breath I hadn't realized that I had been holding and stood up, taking the finished lightfoils in my hands for the very first time. It felt exactly right in that special way that is almost impossible to explain, as the curved hilt fit the palm of my hand perfectly, with the silvery knuckle-bow that protected the hand and fingers, adding a little more weight to it.

With a smile on my face, I ignited one of them.

The characteristic sound of a lightfoil being ignited filled the room as a slim blade extended to a little over a metre, glowing a fiery orange-red colour like the crystal I had used. However, as I was admiring it, I detected something strange: The slender orange-red blade that I had thought was the whole of the blade, was just the core. The real blade was wider, slightly longer, and so transparent that it was practically invisible.

Not only that, but after the blade had formed, the normal hum of a lightfoil or lightsabre faded away, leaving the weapon utterly silent.

That could only be a property of the transparent crystal and the Holocron had mentioned it as the only type of crystal that could make a silent lightfoil: A Ghostfire Crystal.

I ignited the other blade and created a twin to the first for a few seconds. Then I pressed the button to the blade-length control and the blade shrunk down to about one-third of its original length, creating the rapier-and-dagger style I had been looking for.

"Nice!" commented Resa from behind me. "Are you ready to go test them?"

"Oh yes!"

--------------------------

A few hours later, I was standing in cargo hold 12, bone tired and panting for breath, while sweat ran down my body, adding moisture to my already soaked clothes.

And it still couldn't wipe away the smile I had plastered on my face.

Making the curved-hilt lightsabers was simply the best I had ever done for myself. Ever.

Compared to my lightfoils, the fiery orange-red blades burned brighter, cut better and the width made parrying blaster bolts a lot easier, while the design fit perfectly with my combat style.

I didn't know if the curved-hilt lightsaber design was simply more powerful, if it was the stronger and more powerful parts Waydar had put into it, or if it was a result of the crystals I had used, but the new lightsabers were so much better than my old lightfoils, that it felt like the old one had just been a training weapon or, more correctly, a beginner's weapon.

"You made a mess." Observed Resa, as she looked around in the cargo hold. "Those sabers are really something."

"Yes, they are." I said and looked around as well.

When I had started, the cargo hold had been quite neat, with a series of metal rods in different materials, heights, and thicknesses, with and without some of the spare armor, so I could test the cutting power of the new lightsabers. Added to that, there had been training droids, melee dummies and a couple of floating security droids, with the power of their blasters turned to stun.

Now the cargo hold was filled with cut metal rods and there was bits and pieces of chopped up training droids all over the floor, along with the sad remains of the security droids.

As Resa had said, it was a mess.

"These..." I held up the hilts. "... are way more powerful than any lightfoils I have ever seen." I thought for a moment. "I think these are the equivalent to a Knight's lightfoil, where the old one was a Guard's lightfoil. Either that, or the curved-hilt lightsaber design is much much better than a lightfoil."

"Why the difference?" asked Resa with a frown. "Wouldn't it make sense to give a warrior the best weapon possible?"

"I can't be sure," I answered. "But with all the wars between the Jedi and the Sith, I think they didn't want to place too much power in the hands of Force-users, until those had proven themselves worthy of thrust." I shrugged, "That's just a guess, as I have no way of knowing for certain. There's a fair chance that the curved-hilt design from the holocron is newer and better than the lightfoild design. As far as I know, that design have remained the same for a long time, while both the Sith and Jedi have improved their designs during the wars they have been in."

"That's fair, I guess." She chuckled. "So, are you going to start on Captain Tristana's lightsabers now?"

I shook my head. "Not right away. I need food and sleep bad, but I'll start when I feel rested enough to do it."

--------------------------

Making more lightsabers was a lot easier than making the first set because I was able to use the same layout and parts, enabling me to go directly to harmonizing the crystals I was using, while Senior Mechanic Waydar produced the rest.

Unlike the crystals in my own weapon, the yellow crystals the force had guided me to use proved to be rather easy to harmonize. In fact, it went so smoothly that I used the Holocron to see if it could give me some clues about it, but without any luck.

I even talked it over with Trejar Melbate, but he couldn't give me an answer either. He also thought it was pointless to give non-force users a light weapon, as they could never reach the same level of skill with the weapon as a force user, but he did recognize that I needed someone to train with.

As a result of the ease of harmonizing the crystals, the handles were finished at the same time as I was finished with the crystals and assembling the foils was almost laughingly easy compared to the troubles I'd had with my own set.

Thus, when Tristana showed up a week later for our training, I was already in the training room, waiting patiently for her, which made her stop and study me for a moment. Then she smiled. "You have a surprise for me."

As it was a statement and not a guess, I chuckled as I nodded. "Yes, indeed. How did you know?"

She shrugged. "When you fight someone, you learn their body language and you're giving off the same vibe as someone about to give a gift."

"Fair." I said and nodded towards the locker that held the training rapiers we normally used. "The gift is in there."

She smiled and walked over to the locker, opening it. Then she stopped to look at the box holding the lightsabers for a moment before taking it out of the locker.

"Well, it can't be a set of vibrorapiers." She stated as she looked up at me. "The box is too small for that."

I just nodded at that, staying silent, while waiting for her to open the box.

She did and then stood still in what looked like utter surprise, staring at the two lightfoil hilts. Finally, she tore her gaze away from them to look at me. "Are those what I think they are?"

"Not if you think they're anything else than lightsabers." I said with a little smile. "I know that it's mostly a selfish gift, since it will enable us to train in lightfoil combat, but I thought you would appreciate the thought of having your own lightsabers."

Tristana placed the box back in the locker and took out the two hilts. Being careful not to point them in the direction of herself, she pressed the activation buttons and a moment later two golden-yellow blades rose from the handles. One long and one short, exactly like the vibrorapier sets we usually trained with.

An expression of awe showed on her face as she regarded the blades and waved them a few times, as if to test them. "Are they real weapons or training weapons?"

"Both." I told her. "Right now, they're in a training setting, but once you're skilled enough to use them without getting hurt, I'll show you how to switch them to the combat setting."

That made her lift her eyebrows and there was a changeling gleam in her silvery eyes, as she tore her eyes away from the blades and over to me before she asked. "You don't think I'm skilled enough now?"

"No." I said firmly. "You're used to weapons where the blade has weight and until you get used to that, I'll not risk losing one of my cruiser captains."

For a moment, she looked like she was going to protest, but she stopped herself, thought it over and nodded. "As much as I hate to admit it, I have to agree."

"Good." I said and ignited my own lightsabers, nodding to myself when I saw that the blades were redder and less like flames, while the part that was usually transparent looked a pale pink indicating that they weren't on full power. "Ready?"

"No." She said with a grin and walked onto the training mats. "But let's go."

It went slow at first, but as Tristana got used to the weightless blades the combat became faster and faster. Her extensive training in vibrorapier combat showed, but due to her unfamiliarity with the weapons, I had the advantage for once and I took advantage of it, scoring hits on her each time she made a mistake, exactly like she had done on me.

Finally, she stepped back, switched her blades off and bowed to me. "Thank you for the combat."

I switched off my own blades and returned the bow. "Likewise."

"Do you want some constructive criticism?"

"That's why we're training." I said with a nod. "To get better."

She nodded. "You're certainly better with lightfoils than you are with vibrorapiers. Your footwork is excellent, the defence is solid, and your counter attacks are quick and deadly." She smiled a bit. "However, due to the style you're using, you're too defensive. You keep waiting for me to make a mistake, instead of forcing me to make them." She thought for a moment. "There's also something missing. You stop yourself from time to time, like you were about to make an attack, but had second thoughts."

I nodded slightly. "The style I'm using is designed to incorporate force attacks, but I can't use them against you without risking hurting you."

She was silent for a moment, thinking it over before saying. "Then we need a few training dummies in here, so you can use your powers on them during training to hone your skills."

"Good idea. Hmmm... What did you mean about being too defensive?"

Tristana showed her teeth with a brilliant smile. "You're good with lightsabers. So good, that you could easily press me into making mistakes that you could exploit, but instead you wait for me to make them. When you learn to force mistakes, you'll be way better, not to mention deadlier." She thought for a moment. "It might be a result of your training at the Chiss Naval Academy. I've trained with Commander Yaki a few times and she does exactly the same."

I nodded slightly. Chiss were taught from a young age to rely on data and hard evidence, instead of emotion and intuition, so when we met an unknown enemy, we tended to use time to analyse our enemy before actually taking action. While that most often was a sound strategy, there were situations where delay of action gave the enemy the opportunity to carry out an attack they otherwise wouldn't have been able to.

A quote from the Holy Book of War popped into my head. 'The expert in battle moves the enemy and is not moved by him.' So, not only was Tristana right in her assessment, but the ancient battle masters of the Chiss had been aware of this weakness as well and had written it down to warn future generations of it. A warning I had overlooked until now.

I bowed slightly to her. "That is a sound analysis and I thank you for bringing it to my attention. It is something I need to work on."

She smiled briefly and placed the hilts back in the box, before walking over to me. "Do you have some extra time? I really want you."

Reaching out, I dragged her in for a kiss. "I think that can be arranged."

-------------- To be continued --------------------

Remember: If you like the story, please vote, comment, and add the chapter to favourites. Not only does it make me happy, but like most authors here, it's inspiring and the only reward we get for our efforts :)

In this Star Wars-inspired story, set in the Unknown Regions, the Chiss character Thalen approves of a suggestion to change the ship's lighting to a more welcoming white golden hue, similar to the Duchess. This change would be computer-controlled and could be implemented during the next sleep period.

During a meeting to discuss improvements for the ship and its crew, XO Betty Nagos proposes a cantina or social hub on the capital ships for off-duty personnel to relax and socialize. Thalen agrees, emphasizing that it should be alcohol-free and cost-free for the basic amenities, providing a place of relaxation rather than a financial burden.

The crew also wants to create an in-house entertainment system, using 3D animations based on scanner data and their experiences. Thalen gives his approval, setting some conditions for the production process, including the need for input from those appearing in the productions, maintaining accuracy, and waiting for a final approval before release.

In a brainstorming session regarding how to utilize an unused walker hangar, Administrator Atare suggests transforming it into a lush park filled with grow-towers, vertical gardens, and walkways. This idea is well-received, with Thalen seeing it as a way to improve the ship's food production and reduce reliance on external resources.

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