Jedi Princess

STAR WARS - ROTJ Infinities: Jedi Princess

By The Great Shaggy





Chapter Eight: Peculiar Plight





The wind was howling as it tore at the ankle-length jerba-hid trench coat that Leia had worn to protect herself from the stinging rain that was common on Sneave, which was nestled directly in the center of the Kastolar Sector between Chalacta and Bimmisaari just beyond a parsec out of Hutt Space that was now official under a special Imperial Decree of Martial Law. Grabbing the hawk-bat wing size collars of her coat, she gave them a quick jerk, causing her face to be assault by a spray of water droplets. She didn’t know why she even bothered. She was already soaked from head-to-toe after standing what seemed like eternity underneath the mandibles of the Cilpher Eagle. Wiping a strand of wet hair away from her eyes, she glanced back towards the aft section of the freighter by the main boarding ramp to see Talia and Groznik standing between the two hydraulic support arms.



Leia had joined up with the smuggling duo thirteen months ago after dropping off Mara at Silver Station. The first few months were a bit rocky, with her learning the ins and outs of smuggling and of the world of the black market dealings. It was so bad at one point that it came down to a point that Talia threatened to dump her on the next barren rock they set down if she kept screwing up. Leia stood up to that challenge, proving herself time and time again during runs through the Imperial blockades of Hutt Space, running weapons and supplies to the fighting clans that were still managing to hold out. Halfway through the year, she was soon regarded to be the third member of the Eagle. However the biggest lesson she learned so far was a simple one: you weren’t going to get rich anytime soon smuggling. Her percentage of the profits were twenty percent, which equal out to barely anything once expanses were taken out of her cut for repairs and fuel to the ship. It wasn’t that Talia and Groznik took the easy runs, far from it, it was just that most of the time the runs resulted in a quick escape from a pursuing Imperial Star Destroyer. Other times they had to jettison their cargo and make a break for it. She didn’t agree with it, but Talia always kept commenting on her motto in those cases: 'Runaway and live to make another run another day'. And with most of the high paying runs offered by the Hutts having dried up, they were always looking for that elusive big score now and more than willing to take risky chances.



Which had brought them to this forsaken world in the middle of a sector that both of the warring Imperial factions didn’t seem to be interested in at the moment. Of course the war was always in motion and things could always change within a nanosecond. Running another hand through her wet hair, she took a deep breath and let it out slowly as she glanced down at her chronometer. Talia had said that they would wait for their contact only two hours then they would haul jets out of there.



It had now been three hours!



Standing in her soaked clothes, Leia allowed her thoughts to drift as she stared out into the blanket of gray before her. She wondered if Mara was all right. Try as hard as she could, she still kept thinking about the feisty redhead woman even after all this time. She even found herself hoping on a few occasions that maybe someday their paths might again cross. Why she'd hoped for this she had no idea.



She was pulled from her thoughts by the whine of a distant speeder. Drawing her full attention to the curtain of gray, she could barely make out the faint illumination lights of a convoy of approaching landspeeders. Talia and Groz heard the same, for they left the safety comfort of the belly of the ship and stepped out into the whipping sheets of rain. Leia reached down to make sure her the retention strap on her holster was undone before she too stepped out into the rain. Two speeders, a cargo hauler and passenger, slowed and came to a halt ten meters from the Eagle. Nodding her head, Talia strolled over to the passenger speeder while Leia and Groz moved to the left and right, positioning themselves so as to provide covering fire should the deal suddenly go south.



A tall, yet overly obese, human male exited the speeder and shook Talia’s hand. Leia eyed the exchange warily, her eyes darting to the cargo hauler and then back to the passenger speeder. There was something not quite right about all this. She couldn’t explain it, but whenever something was out of the ordinary or amidst, she felt like there was a little voice warning her in the back of her head. The first time she had such feelings was over a year ago on Mirial. It'd disappeared for sometime after that, but only to resurface a few months later. But it had changed for now she could feel the danger before she saw it. Talia and Groznik first dismissed it as paranoia the first few times it had happen. However they started to take a different stance to Leia’s mysterious ‘sixth sense’ when it helped save their lives during an exchange that went south and on many occasions after that.



Cautiously, she took a few steps closer to the conversation that Talia was engaged in.



“The deal was half up now the other upon delivery.”



The pudgy man shrugged his shoulders. “What can I say, the Hutts are having a difficult time getting their funds to us these days. They’ve cleared out most of their other accounts outside their space that the Imps haven’t seized, yet.”



Talia shook her head. “How do I know you won’t stiff us?”



“Come, come. I’m a business man trying to make money here. Would it be bad for business if I sold out my clientele to the Imperials?”



“We’re the ones taking all the risk here. Not you nor the Hutts!”



“I think some of the Hutt clans would disagree with your opinion of them.”



“Think what they want. It's not they can do much these days with the Imps blockading their space, freezing their assets, and making life in general miserable for them.”



The man’s eyed narrowed. “You just better watch that snappy tongue of yours or you might find yourself in a predicament that you can’t weasel your way out of. Don’t forget that there are other Hutts with vast sums of credits still at large in the galaxy that aren’t confine to Hutt Space.”



Biting back the reply she wanted to give, she nodded towards the crates. “Fine. Just get them aboard and we’ll be out of here.”



“A pleasure doing business with yea, Talia.”



“Whatever, Kurger.”



The name was like a hot vibro-blade slashing through Leia’s stomach. She took a few more steps closer, her eyes straining at the man’s face. The Corellian’s hair had changed from its once jet back mane to a nice silvery tone with hints of its former glory. His weight and portion had drastically changed for the worse, but his facial features were still the same. No mistaking that this Kurger was the same that had visited her frequently while she was enslaved to Jabba at his Mos Eisley Townhouse.



Kurger glanced over to where Leia was standing and his eyes suddenly went wide, then a smile appeared on his face as he strolled over to her. Leia watched his smug approach and gripped the hilt of her blaster as that ‘sixth sense’ voice kicked in extra loud in her head.



“Well, I must say, you’re a cute one, too cute to be a smuggler.”



“Looks can be deceiving,” Leia replied back.



Kurger laughed as he crossed his arms over his tremendous bulk. “Feisty. I like that in a woman.”



“Instead of being meek and willing?”



Blinking his eyes, he stared hard at her. “Have we met before?”



“Another life time, perhaps.”



The tone in her caused a shiver to run down the Corellian’s spine. He snorted as he turned muttering “Whatever, bitch,” as he turned and hurried back to his speeder, calling out for his droids to load up the cargo into the freighter.



Talia took a step closer and rested her hand on her shoulder. “Another former clientele, I take it?”



“Very much so.”



“Let it go. Like you said, it was another life time ago.” She patted her shoulder to reassure her friend. “Come on, let's make sure those damn droids don’t break anything again loading up.”

**********



Upon entering the room, which fell silence, Grand Admiral Thrawn's glowing red eyes swept across the assembled fleet commanders of the Imperial Navy and Army. Many of the assembled commanders were old, familiar faces that had served under both of the Emperors during their long service careers to the Empire; Admiral Firmus Piett who had brightly lead his Death Fleet in clearing out the Loyalist forces in the Expansion Region worlds, Admiral Gilad Pellaeon whom had gain the Grand Admiral’s eye in his daring holding maneuver with a handful of the new Defender-class Destroyers during the Battle of Contruum, General Maximillian Veers who had personal led a commando mission to bring down the planetary shield on Tynna, and General Soontir Fel whose loyalty was waning to the Empire during the last months of Emperor Palpatine’s rule only to be reborn under Vader’s leadership of the Empire.



However speckled throughout all the familiar old faces were a few new ones, commanders who had distinguished themselves throughout the long campaigns to rise up the ranks. But out of this group there was one notable officer who stood out amongst the rest; Captain Lyra Mier, former executive officer to Admiral Pellaeon, who had become the first female officer to command a Fleet Squadron after taking command of the remaining ships of two fleets that had been devastated during the assault on Nal Hutta and lead a flanking maneuver that cut off the defending Hutt fleet from withdrawing when they became overwhelmed.



Stepping forward, a technician keyed for the overhead illumination panels to dim as the holographic situational display came to life in the middle of the amphitheater. “I must command all of you on the success of our campaign in Hutt Space. As of now, we control ninety-three percent of their territory and recently cut the Outer Rim in half from the Loyalist by taking the Barab and Aduha systems. Thus it has prepared us for our final campaign.”



He paused as his battle plan appeared, causing a trickling for mutters throughout the amphitheater in disbelief. “The plan consist of four phases, ladies and gentlemen. Phase One objectives is to effectively cut off the hyperspace routes between the Corellian Spine and Run. Battle Groups will then assault the Vivenda, Cadavine, and Seswenna sectors with our overall goal of taking the world of Eriadu thus severing the Hydian Way and Rimma Route. Once Eriadu has fallen, nine sectors will be isolated from one another and the Outer Rim will be cut in half.”



Thrawn continued to described the final three phases of his plan. Once completed, he called for all commanders to return to their assigned fleets and being the preparations for the jump off in a month’s time. Dismissing the assembled officers, he focused his attention back to the holographic representation of the galaxy and his battle plan.



After a few minutes, he cupped his hands behind his back and said, “You have something to inform me about?”



A man stepped out of the shadows from behind Thrawn. “Sometimes you got me thinking, Admiral, that you have eyes in the back of your head,” Sergeant Major Wrenga Jixton replied.



Once a trusted and loyal servant to Lord Vader who carried out a vary of missions from simple intelligence gathering to complex assassinations of political and military officials that had fallen into disfavor with the Dark Lord, it had been he who'd discovered the truth surrounding the death of the infamous rebel leader Luke Skywalker that initiated Vader’s wrath upon his former master and those loyal to him, including the Hutts that had a direct hand in Skywalker’s death.



When the civil war began, Vader turned Jix loose in eliminating enemies of Vader’s New Empire with precision, including those within the leadership ranks of The Council of the Palpatine. However he was soon transferred to a newly formed special operations branch of the Imperial military upon the request of General Veers. Known simply as Department 121, it only included a handful of the best SpecOps soldiers within the Empire, and they’re missions were deemed the most important and vital to the Empire’s war effort: Seek out and eliminate any threats to the new Emperor.



Walking over to the holoprojector, Jix inserted a data stick into the terminal and punch in his authorization code. The holo map of the galaxy dissolved and was replaced with a recording of a meeting. Thrawn watched as the gritty video zoomed in on the meeting, keying in on every key member of the group. He eyed as the computer displayed each individual's information minus one who was wearing an ankle-length jerba-hid trench coat. That one never seemed to turn in the direction of the probe droid so it could capture her facial features. Extremely interesting, he noted as he keyed in on her as the way she acted and seem to take great care in never to expose her frontal self which made him wonder if she somehow knew of the location of the droid. He froze the recording and zoomed in on her. She was shorter than the others, with short length brown hair and the way she stood look like she had a heavy, invisible burden on her shoulders.



"Who is this?" he asked finally.



Jix frowned and shook his head. "Unknown. She was the only one we weren't able to get a positive identification on. Of course we entered everything that we saw and calculated from the recording the rest and ran it across the databanks. Possible hit on forty-nine thousand, all under twenty percent confirmation. She is an enigma of the group for sure."



Thrawn nodded. There was something there, something about her that he couldn't place. Perhaps when he studied the recording in more private settings he might be able to deduce who she might be. Until then, there were more important matters to discuss on the recording. "So the Hutts are trying to move their wealth back into the meager areas they still control."



"Looks that way," answered Jix. "This freighter alone is carrying close up to twenty million credits worth of discs, vouchers, paintings, and antiques. Not to mention all the weapons and explosives as well. But it's that small datapad containing the clearance codes to travel through the blockades that warrants this ship being interdicted."



“Agreed. We can't allow the Hutts to use it or, more likely, to sell it to the Extremists. Do we know where they’re headed?” inquired Thrawn.



Jix nodded, handing the Grand Admiral another data stick.

**********



Crying out in anguish, Leia flung the thin sheet that covered her body from her. Breathing heavily, she laid still on the bunk in the crew quarters, beads of sweat tricking down her face as she listened in silence to the dull throbbing of the Eagle’s engines. Slowly, she lowered one hand down to her crotch and felt the material of her panties as a small sob escaped her lips. Just another dream, she told herself. Even although she kept telling herself that, she knew that wasn’t the truth. Since her earliest memories of her enslavement to Jabba the Hutt, she had kept having the same reoccurring dream. It started off as a few flashes of some distant memories, then partials, and now they’ve manifested into full sequences. However whatever the message that the dreams were attempting to convey to her continue to remain elusive.



Someday it might make all sense to me, she thought as she rose from the bunk and dressed herself. Strapping on her gun belt, she made her way to the cockpit and slumped into the pilot’s chair. Although not as good of a pilot as Talia and Groznik were, Leia was slowly starting to show her potential enough as a pilot that Talia had allowed her to fly the Eagle through some pretty harrowing situations. Glancing out the transparent durasteel viewports at the swirling masses of light that was hyperspace, Leia yawned as she laid her head onto her perched hand and closed her eyes.



Leia.



Her eyes suddenly snapped open. She couldn’t be asleep. No, she was awake, she knew she was awake.



Leia!



The voice was distant, haunting, yet warm and friendly. But she didn't want to hear it. She heard it enough already. She shut her eyes and squeezed her hands tightly against her ears hoping that it would bloat out the voice.



Leia!!!



"Stop it," she shouted. "Just stop it. Leave me alone already. Please."



Leia!!!!



She let out a scream and slammed her head down onto the console panel. Then she just broke down and wept. That was how Talia found her having been awaken to her screams. She stood unmoving in the rear of the cockpit, watching the younger Alderaani woman cry and for the first time since first laying her eyes upon her when she stepped out of that escape pod, she actually felt sorry for the young woman. Leia was just like her and Groznik; their lives had been destroyed by the Empire, they all had no family, and no homeworld to go back too. They had nothing except the Cilpher Eagle and each other. Only Leia was one up on them having survived a miserable existence as a slave to a Hutt. Maybe that was the reason that she never tossed her planetside when she threaten she would, that deep down inside of her she knew she couldn't do it even if she wanted too. She pity the young girl and for that reason she couldn't let her go.



Taking the last few steps to her, she gently placed her hand on her shoulders and gave them a gently squeeze. The act jolted Leia back upright, her head whirling around. Talia was surprised by her reaction and even more by the expression on her face. Was that fear she saw, she wondered. "Are you okay?"



For a second it look like she was going to say yes, but at the last moment Leia shook her head as she wipe the tears from her eyes. "No. I'm far from being okay."



"Bad dreams again?"



Even as close as she'd come to both Talia and Groznik, never had she utter a word about hearing voices in her head, always telling them it was the dream she kept having. "You can say that," she replied.



"Make anything out that you can remember?"



"No. Still can't." And she left it at that.



When Leia didn't go on, Talia let out a sigh as she slipped into the co-pilot's seat next to her. "Look, whatever is going on in that mind of yours is your business and not anyone else's. But as my husband kept telling me 'it's better to talk about it then to keep it bottle up inside of you'."



"You never said you were married," Leia said. Guess I'm not the only one keeping secrets around here, she thought and to her surprise she actually felt better knowing that.



"Long time ago, back on Cilpher I was," replied Talia. "Boren was always a man of conscious and honor. Maybe that's why his brother was able to talk him into joining that stupid rebellion. He said that once they freed the galaxy form the yoke of the Empire he would come back. But he never did." Talia let out a long sigh. "I don't even know if he's dead or alive. I knew if he was alive and free he would've come back for me by now."



"So that's why you became a smuggler?"



Talia laughed and shook her head. "I was already a smuggler to begin with. Just so happened that I fell head over heels for Boren when I came back to visit my friend Elscol, who had married Boren's brother already. He tried to get me to go with him saying the rebellion needed good pilots, but that wasn't for me. I've seen how good those Imperial pilots were and wanted no part in mixing it up with them in a starfighter. No, I stay with what I was good at and that was smuggling."



"Have you been back to Cilpher to see if he returned?"



"If he did he'd be a damn fool. A group of resistance fighters foolishly tried to wage a campaign to rid Cilpher of the Empire. After the big massive defeat by the biggest group of organized rebels at Endor, the Empire came down hard on all rebellious planets and Cilpher was no exception. My town was destroyed during the fighting and I lost my entire family."



"I'm sorry."



"Don't be. You're an Alderaani so you had it a lot worse than me, that's for sure. At least there is still a Cilpher left and not a floating debris field. Do you remember anything about it?"



Leia shook her head. "Not a thing. Guess if you really want to start your life from stretch, do a couple years worth of spice to destroy your mind and memories and then start anew."



"Guess you'd know that better than me," replied Talia. Then she asked, "What was it like?"



"What was what like?"



"Being a slave?"



She let a long breath and sat quietly for a few seconds, pondering the few memories she had of that time. Finally, she said, "Slaves didn't last long in Jabba's court, the ones that did usual manage to only do so by turning themselves into the thing that enslaved them. You didn't dare fight, that was a good way to an 'early retirement'. Although some saw it as the final act to truly being freed from that horrible existence that we lived. You were basically at the whim of whoever oversaw you and you did whatever they wanted."



"When you mean whatever, you mean, well you know."



The former slave girl nodded her head. "Yes, including giving your body over to whoever wanted it. I don't know how many times I willingly suck or fucked someone off or involved in massive orgies where every orifice on you was filled with a cock. I never thought about it really, I just did it with no conscious thought to it. It was my way of life and I accepted it. Now, looking back at it, I find myself repulsed by what I was and had become." She snorted as she shook her head sadly. "A willing sex-craze spice addict just doing whatever was ask of me for my next fix. What a pathetic thing I must've been."



"So was it only with males or did you do females as well?"



"Like I said, whatever was required of me to do I did it. I must've been very good at what I did for I was always reserved for Jabba's highest business associates or used to seal contract deals. I was never just given to the lower lackeys, always the top end and nothing less."



"To bad you can't remember what you were before you were a slave," said Talia.



"You know, maybe it's for the best." She looked at Talia as tears started to roll freely from her eyes again. "It would make me hate myself even more if I knew what I was before being turned into what I had became during my enslavement."



The words were barely out of her mouth before she was again openly weeping. Talia pulled her into her arms and held her close. Leia wrapped her arms around Talia and hug her tightly as she finally let go of everything; all the pain, all the sorrow, everything that she held in check was finally being released from her through those tears. With the tears still streaming down her cheeks, Leia glanced up to the face of Talia. Slowly she raised a hand to Talia face and brush a bank of red hair that dangled in front of her face. Talia smiled down at her as she moisten her lips as Leia drew up to meet her lips. The two women embraced, their tongues encircling one an others as they probed the moist interiors of each other’s orifices.



They both rose to their feet, their mouths a frenzy as Talia guided Leia back down the corridor to the ship's bunkroom. Entering the cramped compartment, Talia pushed Leia onto one mattress of one of the bunks. She grinned with anticipation as she pulled off Leia’s black boots and trousers, then helped the former slave girl out of her vest and shirt. Clad only in her bra and panties, Leia lay outspread on the mattress while Talia took off her own clothing then crawled on top of the sheets. The lithe smuggler stretched out next to Leia, then ran a finger over the beautiful woman’s soft lips. Leia licked the finger with her tongue, then began sucking lewdly on the digit. Talia giggled at the sensation, then leaned forward, kissing Leia passionately on the mouth. The two female’s mouths caressed each other again as their tongues entwined and slid together like horny serpents.



Talia straddled the prone Alderaani woman, then carefully unfastened her bra, tossing the lacy garment aside as she bent down to kiss and suck wantonly on the former slave girl’s breasts. Leia moaned loudly as she licked her own lips, then reached forward to fondle the smuggler’s round, soft tits. Talia bit her lower lip as Leia pinched her nipples, the knobs growing hard and erect as Leia caressed the sensitive pink dots. As Talia continued to suck Leia’s tits, she lowered her right arm, pressing her hand against the groaning woman’s crotch, then pushing her panties aside in order to rub her throbbing bare snatch.



“That feels good,” moaned Leia as she slid her hands over Talia’s warm breasts, then down the smuggler's flat stomach. While the naked girl sucked and licked Alderaani’s flesh, the prone woman pressed her hands over the girl’s buttocks, kneading the firm, smooth ass flesh, then sliding slim fingers into one of Talia’s wet cunts along her flank. Talia groaned with relish as Leia pushed two fingers into her slit, the digits plunging deep into her moist vagina.



Leia moved onto her hands and knees, inviting Talia to ravage her lovely ass. The redhead smuggler pushed her face into Leia’s buttocks, then lashed out with her tongue against one of the naked woman’s dripping pussies on her right side. Leia moaned with a deep ache, her body glistening with sweat as she pumped her slit against Talia’s beautiful face. Talia eagerly lapped at Leia’s cunt, sucking the tart juices gushing from the woman’s vagina before she thrust her tongue into a quivering, pink slit. Leia squeezed the sheets of the bunk with her hands, the fabric rough, yet smooth and slippery as her legs wobbled and her torso burned with ecstasy.



Leia’s orgasm rushed over her again and again, each wave snatching her breath and making her pussy spew another stream of sticky honey. Talia devoured her lover’s cunt unit her lips and chin were stained with musky jism. Leia collapsed onto her stomach, then rolled onto her back, allowing Talia to slide her own nude body atop her lover’s.



“Thank you,” Leia said, softly.



“For what?” asked Talia as her fingers entwined a bank of Leia’s hair.



Leia looked at Talia and kissed her gently on the lips as her hand cupped her crotch as a single digit slid into her moist tunnel. “For giving me a second chance on life.”



Talia breathing became heavy as her eyes fluttered close as her hips buck against Leia’s hand and probing digit. “I take it your more than ready for another go around?”



Leia smiled as she drew her lips closer to Talia’s again. “As I can tell you are.”



At that moment the Eagle jerked violently, pitching both Leia and Talia out of the bunk and onto the deck as alarms started to go off throughout the entire ship. The two women scrambled to pull clothes on their bodies, not mattering which article was whose before they were thrown to the deck yet again. Leia was the first to dress and bolted for the cockpit, throwing herself into the pilot’s acceleration chair as her hands darted across the control panel, turning off the auto-pilot and bringing up the deflector shields while charging the Eagle’s quad laser cannons and concussion missiles. As soon as that was accomplished she threw the freighter into a series of tight maneuvers as streaks of angry green turbolaser fire suddenly flash pass the cockpit canopy.



Talia was next into the cockpit, followed by Groz who sniffed the air and growled a question. "Never mind asking me what we were doing, you big horny furball," she yelled, battering up against the bulkheads as Leia whirled the Eagle violently. “What the blazes is going on. Did we come out in an uncharted asteroid field, some sub-space anomaly or-”



Leia didn’t dare take her eyes away from the cockpit, deciding to answer Talia’s question by bringing the Eagle around. Talia eyes widen and Groz let out a loud roar. Bearing down on them were two Imperial-class Mark II Star Destroyers and a Interdictor cruiser. More alarms from the sensors cried out for their attention.



Groz glance over the screen and announced that the Destroyers were launching fighters.



“When did we become so popular?” exclaimed Talia.



“How many fighters?” Leia asked.



Gazing down at the scope, Groz shook his massive head and let out a yelp.



“What do you mean there's too many for the computer to count?” exclaimed Talia when a klaxon cried out. “Their attempting to get a firing solution on us.”



“Tell me something I don’t already know,” shouted Leia.



“Switch out.”



Nodding, Leia heaved herself out of the pilot’s chair and Talia threw herself into it, grasping the flight yoke with both hands. “Bring up the navi-computer and find us a planet. The closer the better so we can get away from those rotten Imps quicker. I’ll be damn if I’m going to rot in an Imperial slag for the rest of my natural fracking life.”



The freighter lurched to the side as the lead flight of gaining TIE Defenders opened up on the fleeing starship. Talia pitched the ship in a upward and down corkscrew maneuver to avoid most of the incoming fire, but a few beams managed to connect.



“Get to the gun turrets,” cried out Talia. Leia felt the hull vibrating.



“What about that Interdictor? We can’t make the jump with a gravity well so close.”



“Just worry about those fighters. I’ll worry about the big ones.”



Nodding, Leia turned and ran for the gun turrets. Racing up the ladder, she settled herself into the swivel chair and strapped herself in as the target acquisition computer came to life. The board was almost pure red from so many enemy contacts. Bracketing the nearest TIE, she squeezed off a steady stream of red coherent energy at the pursuing fighter. She was rewarded as the beams slash through its invisible shields and boil through the transparent steel canopy of the cockpit, vaporizing the pilot a moment before the craft disintegrated into millions of tiny durasteel splinters.



Her victory was short lived as four fighters race in to assume the void. The heavens were full of them. She felt the hull vibrating as another barrage of fire struck the ship’s deflector shields. She paid it no mind as she swung her quad laser cannons on a approaching flight of TIEs. The lead fighter expanded into a ball of superheated gases and debris that caused his flight to break formation. Leia managed to pick off the trail fighter as it flew pass the Eagle’s sensor dish.



“There's too many of them, Talia. I can’t hold them off for-”



Her words trailed off as brilliant explosions erupted all around the Eagle.



The headset crackled with Talia’s voice, “Hold on!”



Pitching the freighter in a wild downward acceleration that dropped them below the galactic plain, Talia throttled the engines down, causing a squadron of fighters to overshoot, and then rammed the engines back to full power that it nearly broke them from their housing mounts. Leia’s quad cannons spoke, lacing out towards the twelve fighters causing direct hits on four of the passing fighters that erupted in fiery funeral pyres.



“How many are still with us?” asked Leia.



“I’m kindva busy up here,” replied Talia.



“Well I am too.”



The ship lurched again from a direct hit as another flight of TIEs shot overhead. Leia gave them a parting few shots but had to switch her attention to, yet, another incoming flight of fighters. We’re going to get pulverize if we stay here much longer, she thought to herself.

As the Eagle spiraled in an awkward dance, Leia got a good glimpse at their situation. The space around the freighter was alive with dozens of Tri-Solar panel Defenders, angry lances of green energy flashes of turbolaser battery fire, and the ever looming hulls of the approaching Star Destroyers. Her shoulder sagged and her grip relaxed on the quad cannon firing grips as the realization hit her



It was a hopeless situation.



Use the Force, Leia.



Leia sat up straight as the voice's words echoed in her head.



Let the Force guide your actions, Leia.



“What are you talking about? What force?” she asked out loud.



When no reply came, she cursed and grabbed the quad cannon firing grips. If this was going to be her last stand then she would take as many of the Imperials she could with her. Her finger mashed down hard on the firing studs, answering the fighters’ fire with her own. She screamed out in triumphant as fighter after fighter fell to her sudden unnatural aiming abilities. She felt her hands guiding the cannons controls without thought, as if they were anticipating the fighters’ exact next maneuver to line up her shot accordingly



In the cockpit, Groz bark in totally astonishment as Leia seemed to decimate a clear path for the Eagle through the clouds of fighters. Talia didn’t bother to comment as she shot the freighter through the opening that Leia had created. Angling the Eagle, Talia gasped as two TIEs flew into view for a strafing run on the cockpit only to disintegrate into an expanding balls of fiery gases and debris that the battered freighter shot through.



Talia shook her head in complete disbelief. “How is she doing that?”



Groz shrugged his shaggy shoulders and then pointed at the sensors.



Grinning, Talia keyed her headset. “We’re clear of the fighters, Leia. Come and give us a hand in the cockpit.” A minute or so later, Leia entered the cockpit and sat herself down into the navigator chair. Talia risk a moment to glance back towards the Alderaani to congratulate her on clearing them a path when she noticed that she was staring straight ahead and looked a bit disoriented. “You all right?”



“Yeah I guess so. How much longer on those coordinates?” she asked quietly.



“A few more minutes,” came Talia’s reply.



Leia blinked her eyes and look at Talia with dread and shook her head. “We don’t have a few more minutes.”



Groz roared and Talia nodded her head. “What are you talking about. A few more minutes and we’ll be out of that Interdictor’s gravity well generators then it's clear skies.”



“We don’t have a few more minutes,” Leia yelled again. Then she bolted from her chair, grab and yanked Talia from the pilot’s chair.



“Hey,” she screamed as Leia grabbed the controls. “What do you think you’re doing?”



The Alderaani didn’t responded as she yanked back on the yoke of the controls. The Eagle whined in protest as she brought the freighter around in a tight turn and then accelerated back towards the pursuing fighters and Star Destroyers.



“Are you crazy?” screamed Talia and Groz roared in agreement.



“Give me all power to the deflector shields now,” Leia shouted.



“What are you planning?”



“A head on pass.”



“A WHAT?!



But it was too late to argue the point any further for Eagle shot through the waves of pursuing enemy fighters and raced back towards the looming Destroyers. Talia dove for the control stick, but Leia’s hand came up and struck the Cilpherian woman across the temple, causing her to wheel back into the navigator chair. Groz roared angrily and was about to back hand Leia with his paw to stop her when the sensors screamed out as the entire interior of the cockpit suddenly became dark.



The two smugglers’ eyes widen in horror and surprise as the hull of a Star Destroyer whisked into existed above cockpit’s canopy. Lances of turbolaser fire erupted from its gun ports, but not at the fleeing Eagle, but at the pursuing Destroyers. The Eagle lurched violently as the other Destroyers opened up with full salvos from their forward turbolasers at the newly arrived triangular warships. Leia turned the ship hard to port and then dived down to evade a stream of ion bolts that slashed past her previous position.



“How long now?”



“A minute or so,” replied Talia just as she lurched to the side as their vessel took another hit from the three pursuing fighters, The others had turned their attention to engaged those flowing from the other Destroyers’ bays.



Leia struggled with the sub-light engines and tried to coax more speed from them as turbolaser and cannon fire illuminated the cockpit as she tried to formulate a plan of escaping this nightmare. "Give me more power to the engines," she yelled.



Getting an affirmative bark from Groznik, she then turned her attention to see the last of the hull of the Imperial Destroyer whipped past with only the Interdictor cruiser lying between the Eagle and open space. The young woman’s knuckles were pure white as she performed another evasive maneuver as ion bolts slashed over her cockpit window followed by blasts from the TIE Defenders.



The navi-computer beep, announcing that it had calculated a jump route. “Prepare a spread of torpedoes. Fire on my mark.”



Talia and Groz glanced at one another and then back to Leia. “Do you know what you’re doing?”



“Trust me.”



Keeping a tight grip on the control yoke, Leia took a deep breath and concentrated. Please let this work, she thought as more flashes of anti-starfighter flak began bursting all around the freighter. Targeting the starboard side gravity well generators, she dove the Eagle downward towards the nose of the cruiser. Ignoring the incoming fire, Leia waited until the last possible moment before launching the spread and pulling hard up on the control yoke. The Eagle whine in protest and buck hard as the torpedoes slammed into the capship’s deflector shields. Then the huge metallic dome in front of the Eagle erupted into a crimson ball of superheated gases and twisted debris. The crew was slammed hard into their acceleration chairs as the ship flew through the rolling ball of fiery gases. And then the freighter was clear, hurling into the depth of deep space and flickered out of existence as it jumped to lightspeed, leaving behind the Interdictor that rolled to the side as more internal explosions ripped apart its frame.

**********



"You didn't have to hit me so hard, you know?" stated Talia as she and Leia made their way back to the aft cargo holds. "A simple 'hey I got it' would've satisfies."



"Yeah about that, sorry guess I just got caught up in the moment," replied Leia.



It was an excuse really and Talia knew it. Something had changed in the Alderaani when she'd come down from the gun wells. "What happened in that gun well?"



"I don't know," answered Leia. "One second I'm trying to take out a flight out of TIEs and the next I'm sitting in the cockpit with you two."



"What, you just like blackout or something and single handily decimated nearly a entire wing of TIEs? That is the lamest story I've ever heard," Talia said as she ducked underneath some dangling cables. "Going to have to fix that after checking the holds."



Leia shrugged her shoulders. "Well if I knew you were going to be so cynical I would've deck you harder so you couldn't ask me all these annoying questions."



"You got lucky is all."



"Oh, lucky is it. And that is why Groznik was ready to bitch slap me when you went reeling?"



"What can I say, he's protective of me."



"And what else?"



"Oh don't even go there, girl," stated Talia with a laugh. "I don't think any girl can take what a Wookiee can give."



"What and you never gave it a try?"



"Who says I haven't?" That got another laugh from Talia from seeing Leia's stunned expression. "I swear that Wookiee is more horny than two Florn Lamproids in heat. Oh look at this mess."



Stepping into the aft portside hold, Leia realized that Talia's previous statement was extremely underrated. It wasn't just a mess, it was a catastrophe. Nearly all the cargo containers had broken free from their restraints and had crashed into the bulkheads and one another during the wild evasive maneuverings. Lids had snapped opened, slipping out their contents onto the ground which caused Leia to wrinkle her nose. Smells like five week old Bantha shit, thought Leia as she moved into the hold and help right the nearest container. She was about to move to the next one when a glimmer from the bottom of the plasicrate caught her eye. Glancing in she noticed that the 'bottom' of the container had been jeered loose and shifted enough to show there was something underneath it. Curiously, Leia reached in and tugged back the false bottom plate and stared wide eyed at what she saw.



"By the luckiest stars," she whispered as she pulled out a currency safety holder and flicked it open, her eyes growing even wider at seeing the amount of credit discs inside. Of the top of her head there could easily be ten thousand in her hands. A quick check told her there were nine more of the currency safety holders at the bottom.



Seeing what Leia was holding, Talia mouth dropped wide open and hustled over to her side. "There must be a hundred thousand credits here," she stated. Then she glanced at another container and began to wonder. A quick check of that one turned out the same amount of safety holders as in the previous plasicrate. "Why those two timing, slimy lard slugs. They've been holding out on us."



"Do you think there's more?" asked Leia.



Eyeing another container, Talia grinned mischievously. "Only one way to find out?"



For the next three hours they went through all the cargo plasicrates, each one taking a side of the ship. Then they came together in the main hold to discuss what they had found. The haul couldn't have been more impressive; nearly five million credits, various paintings and Old Republic antiques, and a whole slew of weapons and explosives. All and all it was indeed an impressive find and Talia didn't bother to hide her emotions as she let out a whistle at calculating the amount in her head.



"That's between twenty to twenty-five million worth of stuff we're carrying," she stated. "Have to give it to the Hutts, no wonder they were paying good to haul the crap they were passing off since they didn't want anyone finding out what they were really carrying back to them."



"So no one would haul jets with it," finished Leia.



Talia nodded. "Yeah so now comes the big question. What do we do now that we know?"



And that was a very good question. Stealing from the Hutts was basically a death warrant since they would put a price out so high that ever bounty hunter in the known galaxy, and a lot of wannabes, would come gunning for you. But this was different, the Hutts knew that some of the ships were bound not to make it; be it being intercepted by marauding pirates or either captured or destroyed running the Imperial blockades so they would probably have informants in place to notify them when that happen so as to take the appropriate action to either write off the shipment or to get it back. Judging from what they just survived it could be that they might decide that they were captured or destroyed by either side of the warring Imperial factions.



Regardless it made for a extremely tempting decision on their part.



"So what do you think?" asked Talia. "Should we continue with the run or take a chance that they'll write us off and keep it?"



"Well what do you think?" asked Leia.



She took a few minutes to ponder that question when she finally said, "I say we keep it. What about, Groz, keep it or run it?"



The Wookiee was faster to respond then Talia was and the way he acted Leia knew that he was agreeing with her. Which left her but she too had already made up her mind. Payback is a bitch, you slimy Hutts, she thought as she smiled and nodded her head towards her friends.

**********



Thrawn watched in silence as the holo showed a battered YT-1300 freighter diving towards the surface of the Readiness. He watched as two of the Interdictor’s giant gravity well generators exploded from a barrage of concentrated proton torpedoes from the freighter, which flew through the rapidly expanding ball of gases and disappeared into the flicker of hyperspace once clear. Standing respectfully silent behind him with his arms crossed over his chest stood Jix.

Shutting down the holo, Thrawn turned towards the Imperial agent. “Impressive skills the pilot of that ship has.”



“And gunnery skills. Nearly an entire wing was lost," add Jix. "That ship has been all over the grid in Hutt space. Apparently she has a knack of eluding capture, Admiral."



Interesting indeed, noted Thrawn. "What do we know about that ship?"



"Not much, I'm afraid. Modified Corellian Engineering Yards Transport Thriteen Hundred series boosting numerous modifications that we can tell, most probably illegal. Transponder is a forgery, no surprise there. Last traceable owner is deceased. All and all she's just like thousands of others out there operating in 'The Fringe'."



Not the answer that he wanted to hear but also not that surprising either as he fixated his attention back to the holo-recording. After several minutes he said, "Make sure the clearance codes are changed for all fleets operating in Hutt Space."



"The order has already gone out on a Priority Command transmission." Jix waited for a an acknowledgement from the blue-skinned Grand Admiral but when he didn't get one he decided to ask a question. "Forgive me for asking, but why are you worrying about this smuggling vessel?"



"To that I must learn the answer first before I can say. You're dismissed, Sergeant Major." After Jix took his leave, Thrawn dimmed the chamber's lighting as he ordered the recording to the main holographic display terminal as she keyed his chair's comlink. "Bridge, this is Thrawn. I'm not to be disturbed unless a Command Priority One transmission is received. This that understood?"



"Yes, Grand Admiral."



Getting the acknowledgement from the bridge's duty officer, Thrawn leaned back into his chair and gazed as the four times normal size holo-recording began playing again. And again. And again. Each time he noticed changes on how the smuggling vessel moved and reacted, how the gunnery was chaotic and random only to become extremely coordinated and precise, and how the ship was piloted with it first flight pattern looking desperate then almost planned. By the fifteenth time watching he concluded that whoever was conducting the precise gunnery had also taken over piloting duties since there was a slight lull between the masterful display of shooting to the precision in the vessel's flight handling.



Bringing up the Sneave recording, he paused it and magnified on the back of the enigmatic brown hair human female. Keeping one eye on the still picture, he watched the smuggling vessel incident recording again. Pausing it half way, he rewound the Probe Droid's recording, but kept it magnified on the brown hair woman, studying her every movement; from her stagger, to the way her hands gesture when talking, to how her arms moved. Her demeanor pointed to Core ward, but the way she articulated her hand gestures was a mix between Core and Outer Rim. It wasn't until much later that he noticed a stumble hint that finally told him of her origins. It was small, barely recognizable and he had missed it so many times and would've continue to miss it if it wasn't for his patience. The way she placed her hands on her hips as she stood was a common expressionless trait used to show annoyance towards a person on Alderaan. Thrawn silently nodded as he continue the watching the recordings, knowing that he was one step closure to pulling the enigma shroud away to reveal her true identity.





TO BE CONTINUED...