Chapter 7
[<<] [<] [>] [>>] [Table of Contents]

CHAPTER SEVEN:        "Janson, Matthews," The captain waved over, "stand watch."

            "Aye sir." The two officers responded, making their way to opposite sides of the corridor and peering around the corner.

            Xavier and the rest of the away team leveled their phaser rifles at the wall. "All right," Marc said, pointing, "we're going to cut from this point, strait across to here and try to make a clean slice."

            Lanna turned to Xavier and nodded, aiming for the point where Xavier had indicated. The rest of the away team did the same and began to concentrate their fire on the point. The wall shielding instantly began to peel away, as the officers made a clear slice horizontally across it. 

————————————

            Admiral Raschuu stared out the viewing window toward the FELIX. "Governor," he turned, calling Tarvik, "Whatever she is, she has re-entered range of our superlaser. Shall I commence primary ignition?"

            Tarvik rubbed his chin, "No. Charge up our surface cannons, but do not fire until I give the command."

            "Yes, governor."

            "Milords!" One of the other command tower officers called.

            "What is it?" They both turned.

            "I'm detecting a radiation leak in our main reactor core!" he reported.

            "What?" Tarvik snapped.

            "I don’t know sir; radiation levels on the surrounding decks just jumped up by a factor of thirty."

            "Sound the evacuation alarms and seal off the area." The Admiral grimaced; he had feared that cold-starting the reactor would have dire consequences. Apparently he was right.

"How did this happen?" Tarvik demanded.

            "I don’t know, sir," he said, "the shielding is designed to withstand levels well beyond maximum reactor load. There shouldn’t be a leak; it's almost as if somebody punctured the reactor casing."

            "Abort the—"

            "Governor, I've just received a report from that deck confirming they've spotted someone cutting into the reactor housing."

            Tarvik was incredulous, "Get a trooper detachment down there now!"

————————————

The away team was halfway through cutting away the shielding from the reactor chamber when an alarm began to sound. An ensign's eyes widened a moment as a battalion of officers clad in white pressure suits and carrying blasters appeared on the other side of the corridor he was watching. He turned to the rest of the away team. "Captain!" he called, raising his hand phaser, "We've got company!" As he leveled his weapon to fire, he only managed a futile shot or two before being cut down by a barrage of crimson blaster fire.

            Marc paused a moment, looking down at the ensign's body; there was a small column of smoke rising from his chest. Time paused for a split second; the ensign was the first man he had ever lost under his command. But there was no time for regret or reflection, "Sanceau, Chang!" he shouted, "cover us!"

            The two officers obediently rushed over to where their comrade had fallen and did what they could to fend off the barrage. As the last piece of wall was cut away, Xavier kicked the sheet of material to the side and rushed into the reactor. Lanna, Cyber and Deano followed quickly on his heels.

            The inside of the main reactor was an amazing sight; Xavier and his colleagues found themselves inside of a giant perfect geosphere that seemed to extend forever. Around its axis was a walkway that went all around the core. Only four thin paths approached the reactor itself, each extending out at least half a kilometer before reaching the center of the chamber. Above it was an even more breathtaking sight: two huge spires reached down from the ceiling and came to rest just above the small chamber where the Omega reaction actually took place. Even from this distance, everyone could see clearly the incredibly bright chain of particles snaking their way down the huge spire and flashing to life just before they sank out of view into the reaction chamber.

            Xavier strapped his phaser to his back and began to sprint down one of the four catwalks that approached the reactor. His stomach turned slightly nauseous on him, but weather it was from the radiation or from seeing that ensign's dead body in the corridor, he didn’t know.

            Lanna Tigris, Deano Fuhrer and Cyber Hare each dashed over to the other walkways and covered the entrances to the reaction chamber. The three remaining ensigns scrambled into the large open area as well as they tried to hold off the approaching troopers.

            Deano kept a sharp eye out as Xavier continued his sprint toward the central reactor, to make sure no trooper could get a clear shot at him. But as the captain passed the halfway point, a stray blaster bolt hit the guardrail and set up a white plume of smoke that tossed the captain over the side. He desperately grabbed and caught hold of the walkway with one hand. The force of the impact threw the small phaser from him and Marc watched as it fell down toward the bottom of the sphere and out of sight. He never actually heard the device hit the ground.

            "Captain!" Lanna Tigris called, aiming her phaser at the trooper who had managed to crack off a shot and blowing the walkway out from under him. He screamed through his helmet as he went over the edge.

            The catwalk was slick on the edge and Xavier was beginning to lose his grip. He clenched his teeth together and pulled his other arm up to grab the bottom of the walkway. His feet dangled off the edge into the dark eternity below. Marc began to swing his feet back and forth and after a few tense moments managed to get a foot back up on the walkway. He pulled himself up and flopped down on the path, still in shock. But the captain's timer beeped, reminding him that three minutes had already gone by. He dragged himself to his feet, hoisted his remaining phaser rifle off his back, and continued his mad dash toward the center of the reactor.

By now, all three senior officers and what remained of the away team were concentrating their fire on the storm troopers, and for a good few minutes they were able to hold them off. Lanna Tigris turned and saw the captain enter the inner chamber. "All right!" she called, she pulled back her sleeve a bit and yelled into a wrist communicator, "he's in."

            The rest of the officers began to run toward Lanna's position, picking off storm troopers as they went. When they each arrived at Tigris' position, Lanna removed her backpack and handed everyone a pattern enhancer. She took two, one for herself and one for the captain and tossed the backpack back on.

———————————— 

Inside the inner chamber, the captain was in a cold sweat and was feeling dizzy. He checked his chronometer. Four minutes fifteen seconds. He removed the neutralization device from his pocket and set it on top of the reaction point between Omega and the power absorption matrix. The small device emitted a high pitched whistle that pierced through the air. Xavier covered his ears and watched as the bluish white glow of the Omega particles slowly began to fade and blink out like Christmas lights. By the time the swirling chain of energy had ceased and the last of the particles was neutralized, Marc noticed he was having a hard time concentrating. He glanced at his timer again; Four minutes thirty seconds . . . 

———————————— 

Captain Xavier burst out of the reactor room and sprinted as fast as he could down the catwalk and toward the rest of the away team. The onslaught of storm troopers had mysteriously stopped and there was a momentary calm in the situation. Marc felt lightheaded, but did his best to shake it off.

But as the captain again passed the halfway point, all the doors to the reaction chamber burst open and an army of storm troopers poured into the area. The away team suddenly found themselves surrounded on all sides by the guards.

            Lanna, Cyber, Deano and the other two officers exchanged weary glances and looked at their pattern enhancers. Lanna took a deep breath and whirled around, throwing one of the devices with all her might at the captain. The enhancer sailed through the air for several seconds, Xavier's eyes locked on it. As it reached the peak of its arc and began to come tumbling down, Marc leaned over the guardrail and grasped at it—it was at least three feet short. But as he reached out toward the device, it mysteriously pulled out of its natural path and came closer to the captain's hand. Closer and closer until it just brushed Xavier's fingertips and then dropped out of sight below the catwalk.

            The captain dropped to his knees and reached down for the device. It was gone.

            Lanna saw the enhancer fall out of sight and reached for her pack to toss another, but the troopers had raised their weapons to fire, Deano grabbed her by the shoulder and activated the pattern enhancers, sending a signal to the FELIX to take them back home.

            Marc's heart sank as he watched the rest of the away team vanish into the sparkly blue glow. He let out a dejected sigh. When the troopers approached him, he offered no resistance as they hauled him away. 

————————————

"Here, sir." The Beta Team officer said, motioning down into the chamber. There was a blinding white flood light rising from the holes the AT-PTs had poked into the ground.

            The team leader took a device from one of his subordinates and turned the dial. "I'm going to scan it with a trioculus beam," he said, "that should cut through the radiation interference." The officer turned the device toward the small point of blinding light. No sooner did he activate the scanning beam did a column of blue light shoot straight up into the sky.

The men glanced around, perplexed.

"What did you do?"

But before he could answer, the entire search party was caught up in an incendiary shockwave. The explosion vaporized everything in the area and sent ripples of energy convulsing through the planet. The shockwave cleared the atmosphere in less than a second, expanding out in a bright white ring.

"Admiral!" came a shout on Zinc's bridge, "there's been another energy surge!"

            Zinc looked up and out the viewing windows. A huge translucent plume of energy was quickly expanding from the curvature of the planet and approaching the INTIMIDATOR. "Mr. Ceteris, get us the hell out of here . . ."

            The huge wave passed over the INTIMIDATOR, rocking her to the core, but without major damage.

            Zinc looked around, perplexed, "What happened?" He snapped.

            "The shockwave is dissipating," The officer said, "It wasn’t powerful enough to cause us any damag—"

            The man was suddenly cut off by another event he had not been expecting. As Zinc looked on in utter disbelief, the molten red world of Sullust exploded in a brilliant display, sending huge chunks of rock sputtering off into space.

"My God," he mouthed, "Get us behind Sulon, now!"

            As the planet degenerated from a nearly perfect molten sphere into a swirling mass of cooling asteroids, the INTIMIDATOR withdrew behind the shield of Sullust's sole moon, as to not be caught in the onslaught of the distant dying planet.

            The side of Sulon which faced the planet was utterly obliterated by chunks of her mother planet. Craters formed on craters, and giant red explosions of energy rippled across the face of the child world until the death throes of Sullust ceased, and her remains rocketed off in every direction, never to return.

            Lisard appeared on the bridge again, demanding to know what had happened.

            "Sullust has . . . it exploded, milady."

            "What? How?"

            Zinc looked helpless, "I do not know. There was an energy surge, then a shockwave, and then the planet simply came apart . . ."

            Some of the blood drained from Lisard's face, "Do you realize what this means, Admiral?"

            Zinc was still to shocked to produce an answer.

            "The Rebel Alliance has managed to develop a weapon with the same destructive capability as a superlaser device." Ysanne composed herself, not believing the words as she spoke, "With it, they've destroyed one of the Emperor's DEATH STARs, and now have further demonstrated their power with the eradication of Sullust. The repercussions of this are beyond your capacity to comprehend, Admiral; it could send the entire galaxy spiraling into anarchy. I must speak with the Ubiqtorate immediately."

            There was a sudden beeping from another one of the sensor stations, "Milords," Another voice called, female this time, "I—I have news."

            "I don’t think anything could surprise us at this point, lieutenant," Ysanne said dryly, "what is it?"

"I've detected a large object on sensor grid 556-45-2," she paused a moment as she tried to confirm what the computer was telling her, "I—It's the DEATH STAR, milords."

Chapter 7
[<<] [<] [>] [>>] [Table of Contents]