Star Wars_ The New Jedi Order 14_ Traitor - Matthew Woodring Stover [118]
Once upon a time, Han thought, TIE fighters on his tail would have been a bad thing.
“Commander Dorja,” Han said, “we’ve got some of your friends here.” Another two sections of clawcraft came roaring past, followed by three sections of New Republic E-wings. Directly in front of the Millennium Falcon the formation came apart in a starburst, one section of four heading for each of the remaining coralskippers while two others remained in reserve.
Han hit the TRANSMIT button. “Thanks, you guys,” he said, “but I was doing fine on my own.”
“Unknown freighter, stand clear.” The voice had a slightly pompous ring, and Han thought he recognized it. “We’ll handle it from here.”
“Whatever you say, sport,” Han replied, and then watched as four fighters ganged up on each of the coralskippers. The enemy craft couldn’t jump to hyperspace, and they couldn’t flee the fighters because they had been chasing the Millennium Falcon at near lightspeed and couldn’t alter course in time.
The newly arrived fighters took no chances, just professionally hunted down each of the coralskippers and blew it to smithereens, taking no casualties in return. Then the allied squadron turned on the dovin basal mine and very carefully destroyed it with a calculated barrage of torpedoes and laser bursts.
“Nice work, people,” Han congratulated them.
“Please stay off this channel, sir,” the fighter commander said, “unless you have an urgent message.”
Han grinned. “Not so urgent, Colonel Fel,” he said. “I’d just like to invite you to a meeting here aboard the Millennium Falcon, with Captain Solo, Princess Leia Organa Solo of the New Republic, and Commander Vana Dorja of the Imperial Navy.”
There was a long, lonely silence on the comm.
“Yes, Captain Solo,” Jagged Fel said. “We would be honored, I’m sure.”
“Come right aboard,” Han said. “We’ll extend the docking arm.”
And then, over the comlink, he called C-3PO and told the droid there would be guests for dinner.
THE OLD REPUBLIC
(5,000–33 YEARS BEFORE STAR WARS: A NEW HOPE)
Long—long—ago in a galaxy far, far away … some twenty-five thousand years before Luke Skywalker destroyed the first Death Star at the Battle of Yavin in Star Wars: A New Hope … a large number of star systems and species in the center of the galaxy came together to form the Galactic Republic, governed by a Chancellor and a Senate from the capital city-world of Coruscant. As the Republic expanded via the hyperspace lanes, it absorbed new member worlds from newly discovered star systems; it also expanded its military to deal with the hostile civilizations, slavers, pirates, and gangster-species such as the slug-like Hutts that were encountered in the outward exploration. But the most vital defenders of the Republic were the Jedi Knights. Originally a reclusive order dedicated to studying the mysteries of the life energy known as the Force, the Jedi became the Republic’s guardians, charged by the Senate with keeping the peace—with wise words if possible; with lightsabers if not.
But the Jedi weren’t the only Force-users in the galaxy. An ancient civil war had pitted those Jedi who used the Force selflessly against those who allowed themselves to be ruled by their ambitions—which the Jedi warned led to the dark side of the Force. Defeated in that long-ago war, the dark siders fled beyond the galactic frontier, where they built a civilization of their own: the Sith Empire.
The first great conflict between the Republic and the Sith Empire occurred when two hyperspace explorers stumbled on the Sith worlds, giving the Sith Lord Naga Sadow and his dark side warriors a direct invasion route into the Republic’s central worlds. This war resulted in the first destruction of the Sith Empire—but it was hardly the last. For the next four thousand years, skirmishes between the Republic and Sith grew into wars, with the scales always tilting toward one or the other, and peace never lasting. The galaxy was a place of almost constant strife: Sith armies against