Luna's Dark Knight...

by Praeco Nigrum

Last Stand: Ch 1

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The streaks of light coming from beyond the ship were mesmerizing to watch, beams of green and red laser fire streaked about as the men aboard an old Victory Class Star-Destroyer called "Deaths Blade" ran about trying to out maneuver a Galactic Alliance Fleet that had jumped in system. The 'Deaths Blade' was the flagship for around twenty other ships, ranging from Acclamator-class cruisers and Venator-class Star-Destroyers to Imperial Broadside cruisers and light fighter carriers. The fleet had started off at thirty strong, but were down to twenty some odd serviceable ships in many states of destruction.

They were facing up against several Imperial II Class Star-Destroyers and fifty or so smaller Galactic Alliance ships, ranging from Cruisers to Frigates and below. the odds were stacked against the motley collection of ships under the 'Deaths' Command... Though they did have a small contingent of Sith pilots in their midst. The gunners of "Death's Blade" tracked the incoming fighters.

"This is Darth Corpus to all Sith Star Pilots... Meet me at the following coordinates in five... That is all!" The Dark Lord leading the Sith armada Hissed over the comms, he was not very pleased about how the battle was going... Especially since he was not looking for the fight in the first place.


Perspective: Dark Lord Corpus

"I have had enough of these bumbling idiots!" I screamed, slamming my hands on the tactical console in front of me, "How did they even manage to find us out here! We're in the Kriffing Unknown regions for Banes sake!" I seethed, my men were of a similar mind as me as we tried to figure out how to bypass their defenses and get our ships our of here. Several years earlier we had abandoned our homes on Telos, Milial, and Ziost... we had a booming empire, one that had even given aid to the Rebels at one point or another... But upon the GA coming to power... Things changed. They found that ALL who obeyed the Sith teaching, even in name, were to be hunted down and exterminated... They saw us as nothing more than parasites and weeds that needed to be culled...

I led my empire through one of the largest exodus' that the galaxy has ever seen, getting us all on our empires largest ships so that we could make good our escape, leaving only those behind that volunteered to stall the GA's advance.

Over the past few years we had made our way through the unknown regions, gathering supplies and renewing our fuel when ever we found gas giants that had the right makeup. At one point we found an old Republic Venator star-destroyer... it had several fighters and several hundred tons of fuel in its holds. It was there that our luck had seemingly turned around, finding more weapons to defend ourselves with.

"Men.." I cut off my train of thought and came back to reality, "I am going to go and rendezvous with my men, I am leaving the command of this ship, and the battle, in your capable hands." I turned to my advisers, all of whom were some of my closest friends in this day and age...

"Mi-lord, we shall make sure that there is a place for you to return to by the end of this." One of them, a Devorian named Marik, nodded and saluted in turn, followed by the rest of my friends. I nodded my thanks before abruptly turning and making my way for the nearest turbolift. Once there I took it down to my personal quarters and donned my personal flight gear, which for combat reasons, was similar to a set of armor instead of a flight uniform. after I donned it I pulled on a large belt, said belt contained a number of lightsaber hilts, numbering around thirteen or so, as they rested on my waist.

Once I had donned my armor I made my way to the hanger bay, where my own star-fighter was awaiting me. It was a Delta 7 Jedi star-fighter we had picked up from a Venator Star Destroyer several months ago, in that time I had upgraded the shields, lasers, and the engines to be on par or even exceed the new XJ-15's the GA forces used to battle my men. I even installed a set of torpedo tubes on the Delta 7 capable of firing off the infamous Shadow bombs the Jedi use.

We had picked up several dozen of the Shadow bombs when we had made a stop at Bespin to barter for fuel, one of my men had several contacts in the black market that knew of a guy looking to sell, and he just so happened to be on Bespin.

The turbolit came to a stop several seconds later at the hanger, letting me step off and get to my fighter. I looked over and saw that G-R, my personal Astromech, friend, and constant companion for over two hundred years, was being outfitted for battle, an extra set of armor was being applied to his dome and painted the ships colors. When my eyes came to rest on the heavily modified Delta 7, they brimmed with joy, The midnight blue paint with white dots speckled all over it, making it harder to see with the naked eye. It had an advanced cloak package installed on it, hence the reason for the unusual paint job.

The canopy of my fighter popped open the instant I set my foot down on its hull. I deftly flung myself into the seat and started the pre-flight checks as thy lowered G-R into the astromech droid slot. Once everything hit a green light I handed control of the systems over to G-R and took the wheel, igniting the repulsers and sending my ship over the edge and into the void, where upon I shoved the leavers fore and felt my fighter lurch into the darkness. I used one of my atmospheric thrusters to shoot the nose around and aim us towards the aft section "Death's Blade", right on coarse to my rendezvous with Black squadron.


"This is Black Leader, Fall in!" I called over the comms.

"Black two falling in.."

"Black three falling in..."

"Bloke frour fawlling in..."

"Blake Foive Falling in..."

"Black ssssixsss falling in..."

"Black s'ven fallen in..."

"Blacks eight though fifteen falling in sir... your orders?"

Everyone had made it, we were now ready to break the enemy blockade and free our ships...

"Well it depends... How much do you value you life brother?" I asked my second, he was a stout being, a grey skinned Twilek, I had met the man on Coruscant in my youth, not seeing him till a great many years later on Korriban fighting off a pack of Tukata.

"I'd say about as much as you... But that would be and over estimation!" He laughed, knowing I would use myself as a shield if it meant that my people would live.

"Well, we're going to go pay our friends in the GA a little visit... and maybe hand out a few long deserved presents... anyone interested?" I chuckled out, earning many rounds of "Fuck yeah!" and "Damn right!"

"Very well then its settled, Blacks five four and nine will charge to the right and take out their designated destroyer... You have ten minutes to do this before moving on to your next target... Eight seven and thirteen will head left... both groups will have twelve, eleven, ten, and fourteen covering them, the rest of you will be following me to the middle... I want their Command structure down and out before they get any closer to our families, understood?!" I received green lights across the board as we all turned our fighters around and shot off towards our designated targets.


My team of five took off down range, doing corkscrews and sudden altitude changes to throw off the enemy gunnery officers. We were an unstoppable force as we all rushed towards the lead destroyer, knowing that it was not the one we needed, but would damage anyway. We reached it in seconds, all five of us flying over the top of it in a scattered formation, i gave a signal with my wings, we each let off two of the ten shadow bombs we each carried, knowing that these things would tear this ship apart. The first ones tore the shield right off the ship, damaging several of the decks directly beneath the blasts, while the second ones dropped through and decimated the rest of the ship, effectively blowing a large hole through the left hand side of the Star-Destroyer. We must have hit something important seeing as the ship started sinking down below us and headed right for the planet, it wasn't fast, but it was noticeable.

Once the ship started 'sinking' we sped up to the next one, only laying a single bomb from our fighters across its bow, somehow we got through its shielding and tore several large holes cross the bow, making it look similar to a moon after a meteor shower. Throughout the whole flight i could not remember a minute that had not gone by that our guns weren't being used... shooting down fighters, small frigates and even the occasional cruiser, creating hundreds of blind spots that the GA gunners had to spot us through. Flying under one of the Star-Destroyers I saw a large quantity of antenna sprouting from one of the destroyers... surprisingly it didn't show up on my sensors.. meaning that it most likely had a very unique cloak package installed in the ship, just from the amount of static my sensors were picking up from it confirmed this for me.

"Do you guys see that..." I asked Black three.

"Yep... Looks like a cloaked ship to me Corpus... Should we say hello?" Devon rasped out, he was one of the few humans in my squadron, he had had his lower jaw taken off in a fight years ago and was forced to use a synthesizer to talk, which gave hi a rather raspy voice.

"My intentions exactly..." I could feel my comrades elation at putting an end to this band of brigands and twisted countrymen. WE could feel their hate for us, their loathing just permeated the force... it almost made many of my people gag when these rat bastards had jumped into the system, THAT is how dark their souls are... My people are shinning rays of light, much compared to their hate filled auras...

"Alright... Devon, take Black six and hammer the engines, black two and three, take strafe the bow with your shadow bombs... I've got a few things in mind for the bridge... Copy?"

"We copy sir..." The replied simultaneously.

"On my mark... ... ...Mark!" And we shot off, our cannons blazing a rainbow of colors down on the Star-Destroyer, wreaking havoc with its shields and even taking out a few gun emplacements as we got closer for our shots to matter. Devon and Black Six shot down and under the ship, launching proton torpedoes and the occasional shadow bomb at the lightly defended underside. Black two and Three were already peppering the deck with explosions as I made a be line for the command bridge, Leveling out I depressed the launch buttons for the torpedo launchers, and hearing/feeling a satisfying thud go off in my ship I saw the two Shadow Bombs take off towards the T like shape of the bridge. I could feel their fear and shock permeate the force as they saw the two blue con-trails arch towards them, it was rather pleasing to feel.

"Alright guys, BUG OUT!" I yelled over all comms, it was our universal signal for 'fuck it it's gonna blow!', and much to my satisfaction we made it out of there in time as the whole thing started expelling its final breath into the void, busts of plasma and flame jetted out across the void-scape, painting the area in a red and blue haze.

"Has anyone heard anything from the 'Death's Blade'? I can't seem to raise them on the comms..." I asked of my fellows, seeing as it might have just been a slight malfunction with my comms-relay.

"Sir... We won't be able to raise them..." I raised a brow at my seconds statement.

"Why's that?"

"The ship... The whole FUCKING SHIP! IS GONE SIR!... EVERYONE IS GONE!" He screamed, I could hear him bashing on his consoles and cursing in about five different languages...

"What does he mean by gone sir?" Devon asked, I could hear the emptiness in his voice... he already knew what the twilek meant. I extended my senses to the edge of the system and what I found was... rather horrific...

"They're dead Devon... The GA... They killed them... All of them..." I brought up a full picture of the area and could see why... "They've brought the Eclipse... and a remade Executor class Super Star Destroyer... There's nothing left out there but junk and ruble..." The words just tumbled out of me... just as the thrill of having thought I saved my people had reached it crescendo... they fucking ended them... All of them... My brothers... my sisters... the children... all of them... Dead...

"Sir... Permission to fucking end them, SIR." All of my brothers, save Devon cried out in similar fashion.

"Granted... Fly straight and true... Leave nothing of your target behind..." I solemnly replied, knowing what they planned to do... Even what I planned to do...

"Corpus... Why... Why did they..."

"Have to do this? I cannot answer that question Devon... But all I can do is say that we will give them a FUCKING DAMN GOOD REASON TO HATE THE SITH!" I cried out, opening my channel to a full fleet-wide transmission to the enemy, just so everyone of them could hear my hatred for them.


I could feel my men die... all of them, each one going out in a burst of light, ramming themselves into control centers when their torpedoes ran out and their cannons over heated and could't fire another shot without cooling off. Devon had taken his ship and armed the five remaining Shadow Bombs and took out the Eclipse Super Star Destroyer... Ramming his ship clean through one of its engines and igniting the fuel... which then turned even worse for them when the bombs went off, tearing a large hole into the back of the SSD, leaving it to slowly drift down towards the planet below... doomed to its fate.

I was flying about the ships, hammering away at any and all fighters they had left for patrol, knowing that they couldn't hit me in the debris strung stretch of space. I weaved in and out of dead wrecks and laid waste to those ships that didn't have any shielding left to speak of, leaving a trail of destruction in my wake.

"Well G-R... I think this is it... I'm out of Torpedoes... Shadow Bombs... and the guns are cycling again... And I just know if I make a run for it they'll just shoot me down... So... Lets use it..." G-R gave off a few queries about what I meant, though I knew he was just delaying me, but I decided to humor him anyway.

"I'm talking about the force storm... And I know you know what I'm talking about... The one that the clone of Palpatine used... Yes... The Planet Render... I will need you to hide us while I gather my strength... It won't be easy my friend... We will die... But it will be instant..."

G-R accepted my words, knowing that he couldn't argue with me, he took control of the fighter and set us down on the back of a star destroyer, magnetizing us to the hull. I quickly went about gathering the force within me, channeling the anger and fear, even jealousy, of the beings around me, concentrating it into the power... I knew this would consume me so I did not limit myself on the amount of power I was going to exude.

It took over half and hour, with them still searching for me all the while, to collect the needed energy...

"I think I'm ready G-R... Set us loose... I want a clear path of these bastards." He unlatched us from the ship and we shot off above them, dodging hundreds of laser volleys as we did so. Once we had gotten about three miles above them we made an intimidate u-turn, and faced down at them. I reached over and reactivated the inter ship communications, making it a fleet wide transmission.

"This is Dark Lord Corpus of the Demi-Sith Empire... You have attached the Empire without precedent and annihilated all its citizens... As king and patriarch of this Empire... I, DARTH CORPUS, sentence you all to death!" I yelled across the comms, I then lashed my hands forward and projected the contained energy into the middle of the fleet, Destroying several of their ships instantly... But what i saw made me rethink the purpose of the power itself... It was more than just a vortex... It was a wormhole! And it was sucking them in... Along with me... Though I knew nothing else as I fell unconscious from the sudden drain in power... falling into the void of hyperspace.


Perspective third person limited G-R

The droid was slightly shocked to see the massive amount of destruction the Force Storm had wrought to the GA forces. The fighter was speeding through the wormhole, not alone mind you, dipping in and out of the way of swirling debris, managing just barely to get by without any damage. The droid inside, known as G-R affectionately to his Master and friend, of the fighter was running hundreds of calculation on where the massive storm might place them, coming up with intangible numbers, even for a droid, and having to recalculate every other minute, each time coming up with a totally different calculation.

"Master Corpus is unconscious... He will not be able to direct the ship with his senses in this state... I must take control and get us safely out of this mess... If we stay here to long we will be destroyed eventually..." The droid thought to itself, trying to run the calculation of when this thing would end. It had done over a trillion calculations before coming to a horrifying conclusion...

"We're set in a loop..." The droid had done up the calculation... and they specified that the Wormhole had locked on to its beginning and had attached itself in a finite loop, meaning that there was almost no escape from the infinite prison that his Lord Corpus had created for their enemies... The droid then went about a process of trying to calculate the probability of them surviving the shift from an active hyperspace loop, just pulling out and slamming full force into space, thought the inertia shouldn't affect them all to much, seeing as there is no resistance in space.

After an hour of countless calculations and recalculations the droid came up with the idea of just saying fuck it and punched the maneuvering thrusters and pointed the nose sideways at, what should not have been, the wall of the wormhole. Lining up the nose correctly, as they flew sideways through space, the droid set the thrusters to full and launched the ship full speed through the debris fields and right into the blue and white wall of the wormhole, slamming through it and out into real space, at which point the starfighter started tumbling about at extreme velocities, something that the droid had over looked when it went through the last minute calculations.

The droid spent the next half hour stabilizing the fighter and reorienting the fighter to a nominal xyz axis. Once the ship had was slowed down enough, the astromech had turned off the engines and used the maneuvering thrusters to side fire ad slow the fighters beyond terminal velocity. Once it had come to a more stable speed the astromech activated the long range planetary sensors and went bout trying to find a suitable place to land the ship for a safe landing, the droid was looking for a place that might allow for an indefinite living capacity for his master.

Finding over a hundred stars in the vicinity, yet only one with a habitable planet, the droid made the logical choice and headed for it, not wanting to waste time in trying to gather resources for his master to consume and re-energize his system with. When the fighter got within a half light-year of the target planet it started picking up life signatures on the planet, being slightly intrigued by this the droid decided that remaining hidden until his master reawakened would be the best possible course of action, so, with that logic in mind the astromech set a course for an outlaying forest, in which he had picked up a large enough clearing to set the Delta 7 down and camouflage it from any prying eyes.


Author's Note

Thank you all for reading this, it brings a warmth to my tattered soul that I have such faithful readers!

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