Starlight

In front of him sat his lightsaber. It lay in pieces, waiting to be assembled. With practiced focus and concentration he lifted it into the air and put it back together. Within seconds the double bladed saber lay before him, complete. His thoughts began to wander. The past couple nights he had the same reoccurring dream. It started with an empty room, half light and half dark. He stood under the light. The other side was dark. The only thing he could see was shapes. Lots of them. Then everything would speed up and he would be left facing only one figure in the darkness. The dream usually ended there. But last night it ha…

His arm beeped. He looked down to find his comlink buzzing. He pressed the answer key.

“Yes? What is it?”

An irritated voice sounded on the other end of the link.

“You’d better thing twice before you respond to me that way boy. I’m still your master so show respect and get up here. We’re approaching our next target.”

“Yes Harrar.”

“What was that? I didn’t quite catch it.”

“Yes, Master Durron.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought you said. Now get up here Night, we’ve got work to do.”

Night stood and began to put on his combat armor.  They had been doing this ‘job’ for almost two months now. The Jedi wanted the eradication of any and all Sith artifacts. They had been tracing shipments through the Outer Rim for years but hadn’t acted upon it. Now with rumors of the Empires return, the Jedi were holding nothing back to prevent it from happening.

Night grabbed his lightsaber and cloak and jogged down the hallway towards the bridge. Hopefully this would be the last target, and then they could go home. He couldn’t wait to see Tekli again. Before he left she said that she had to tell him something important.  He had no idea what it could be. They had been friends for the longest time and she was always trying to pull a fast one on him.

Night arrived at the bridge. One of the soldiers at the door shouted,

“Officer on deck!”

As the bridge crew rose to salute, Night waved them back down.

“We don’t perform formalities in combat, remember? It’s unnecessary, now sit down and get to work.”

From behind him a sarcastic laugh echoed from the captain’s chair.

“Your one to talk of work, boy. You don’t do a lick yourself.”

Night turned to face his master and smiled.

“Isn’t the captain’s chair for the captain, master? If so, then why are you sitting in it? You’re just the commander of this mission, not the ships captain.”

Master Durron was up in Night’s face in a flash.

“You watch your tone boy, or I’ll…”

“You’ll what? We both know that I’m the better of the two of us, so go ahead. Give me your best shot.”

The captain of the boarding squad pushed between the two of them. He stared them both hard in the eye.

“Enough, the both of you. You’re squabbling like a bunch of kids. Show some maturity.”

Master Durron smacked him away.

“Get off of me you inbred trash. I should have you court marshaled for this. You dirty piece of-”

Night’s blade flashed on. The tip was just under Master Durron’s throat. The bridge was silent.

“You say one more word and I will cut your tongue out, do you understand?”

The two just stared at each other for a moment.

“I SAID, DO YOU UNDERSTAND?”

An alarm siren broke the silence. A technician called from their station.

“We will be within firing range in two minutes captain.”

The bridge went back to its normal state. Night turned his saber off.

“I’m not finished with you.”

He and the squad captain turned to where the rest of the squad stood in a nervous silence. The captain leaned over to Night.

“Thanks for the help man but I didn’t need it.”

Night shook his head.

“Nobody talks to my friends like that. I don’t care who they are.”

John Drakthuul was in no way a helpless man. He was half human and half Tusken. Luckily his human side stood out more. Either way he was big and mean when he needed to be. He was one of Nights few and only friends.

Night leaned against the wall and sighed.

“I’m really hoping we can go home after this run. I’m tired of dealing with him.”

John grinned and said,

“Or you just really want to see your lady friend. Huh? Am I right?”

Night shoved him away.

“Tekli and I are just friends.”

John was laughing now.

“Oh yeah I’m sure. You’re just really good friends.”

Their laughter caused the rest of the squad to lighten up and relax until the technician shouted,

“Two minutes till boarding range!”

They straightened up and waited until the call sign said go. Then everything started going wrong.

The smuggler ship detonated, engulfing the blastboat in flame. The bridge shook about under the assault. Another alert siren rang off has dozens of other ships materialized around them. They opened up on the out-classed Jedi ship. The blastboat shook under each hit.

“Life support is at Fifty-two percent sir, our shields are gone. We can’t take another hit like that.”

Another shock rocked the bridge and the lights flickered. The technician looked at his keyboard again.

“And there goes the hyperdrive, we just lost our wheels.”

Master Durron stood from his chair.

“Try to comm. them; see if we can negotiate surrender.”

Night stalked up beside him.

“Belay that!”

Turning to Durron he said,

“You can’t possibly consider surrendering to the Sith? Those are their ships. We have to try and run.”

“On what? The hyperdrive is gone. We’re sitting ducks.”

Turning back to the technician Night asked,

“Is the drive still in one piece?”

“Yes sir, the power uplink was knocked loose and we lost the engineer who usually fix’s it.”

Night nodded

“Good, then I can get us out of here.”

He walked to the middle of the bridge and began to focus on the engine. Master Durron shouted at him.

“Do not do what I think you are going to try. If you even attempt it, I will personally shoot you into space myself! You could kill us all! I should have you…”

“John shut him up or we aren’t going to make it out!”

John walked over and promptly socked Master Durron in the jaw. He smiled at Night.

“That good?”

“Perfect.”

Night focused on the engine. He slowly fed it power through the Force and watched as the machine started to turn again. He felt blood running from his mouth and nose has he pushed it to go harder; faster and faster until… He felt the kick as they shot to lightspeed. He managed to stumble two steps before falling into darkness.