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Welcome
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Nathaniel Reed's
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:: An ongoing episodic story of fan-fic set after Episode VI Return of the Jedi, and inspired by George Lucas' historical draft concepts ::
FAQs
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| July 2021 |
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'Rebels' Inquisitors to appear in the 'Obi-Wan' show ?
31st July 2021 |
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With several reports here and here surfacing of the secondary cast training with lightsabres or meeting "Darth Vader and other Jedi", as well as a report that a young Princess Leia has been cast - potentially the mcguffin / impetus to propel the old Jedi Knight from Tatooine - it seems highly likely now that the 'Deputy Sith' characters of the 'Inquisitors', introduced in the 'Rebels' show, will fill the villainous role (alongside Darth Vader ?) against Obi-Wan.
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Earlier in the month it was announced that there would be a special 'Making Of' programme to be released on Disney+ on the 25th of August dedicated to the climactic scenes from the second series of 'The Mandalorian' : this introduced Luke Skywalker as the young Jedi Master, summoned by Grogu's telepathic call, who would take the youngling back to his fledgling Academy ; it also saw Djarin win the Mandalorian Darksabre from Moff Gideon, which, like the 'Elder Wand' trope in the Harry Potter series, can only be earned through combative defeat, witnessed by the true heir and inheritor, Bo-Katan.
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The illustrated virtual edition of Episode VII : Plague of Doom continues, and Weesla, the incumbent Hutt Lord of Kessel, having helped the hostage Huttlets to escape, is gunned down by Commander Kane with the sonic canon !
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| You can see the VE artwork in the 'Kessel' art gallery as well as in the online illustrated story, and you can discuss this in the forum here ! |
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My prose writing for virtual edition Episode X 'The Riddle of the Pirates' begins to race towards its epic climactic batle and conclusion, and an unsuspecting arrival is forced to run the Pan-Alliance blockade......
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| Nathaniel Reed, 31st July 2021 |
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“Sapro to Troig Base, do you read me ? This is Sapro, come in Troig.”
Adelly sighed once more, and flicked the comms switch. The blue-white of hyperspace swirled ahead of her. The yellow-skinned Umbaran had been trying to contact the pirates’ base for the last ten minutes, and now her shuttle was barely sixty seconds from reverting to sublight at Gensys-Sucal.
She had become quite concerned as to why there was no response from them. There could have been a technical breakdown with the comms feed, or equally there could have been a massive integral failure within the super-structure – cool and dispassionate tech-speak for a shield-fail resulting in the base being pummelled by asteroids !
She had recently enlisted four new comrades to their cause, and they were currently sat quietly in the closed cabin behind her. She tapped the internal comms and leaned into the microphone stick that projected out from the dashboard beside her.
“Cabin, we’re coming up on our destination soon,” Adelly announced. “Reversion from hyperspace in twenty seconds.“
Her long slender fingers reached forward and curled around the hyperdrive actuator handle. She glanced ahead through the cockpit window, all the while reviewing the discreet countdown display on a small screen to her right.
As the counter hit its mark, she pushed the handle forward and the swirling marble effect ahead of her collapsed into bright pin points of stars... and the tumbling asteroid plane of Gensys-Sucal to starboard... and several large PA capital-class starships also flitting into view all about her !
On board the PACS Judiciary, Admiral Merityme surveyed the deployment of the blockade. His capital ships - in a variety of designs but all possessing humbling firepower – were now appearing from hyperspace and moving into their stations above and below the orbital plane adjacent to this quadrant of the carbonaceous genesis system of Sucal where the pirates’ base had been identified.
“Sir !” one of the comscan helmsmen called out. “We have an unauthorised and unidentified visitor in sector seven !”
“Attack shuttle class,” confirmed another helmsman. “Reverted from hyperspace, and turning on a vector towards the foe’s dorsal hyper relay beacon.”
“The shuttle is not responding to our hails, admiral,” updated an officer from the communications station.
Merityme turned to his aide. “Which ships are closest ?”
The aide checked his datapad that was updating in real-time.
“Sir, the Guardian and the Liberty are moving in to sector seven.”
The admiral nodded curtly. “Instruct them to have tractor beams on standby, move to intercept, fire to shepherd them.”
The aide nodded, and began tapping into the datapad.
As soon as she recognised the Pan-Alliance flotilla moving into a classic blockade formation, Adelly accelerated hard and fast for the dorsal hyper-relay beacon. The fingers of her left hand were tapping out a coded sequence to activate the drone to request a jump timing from the super-computer deep inside the Troig base.
She spared a quick glance out of the cockpit window and saw two of the capital ships turning towards her on an intercept vector. She knew that they’d be powering up their tractor beams as per standard procedure. There would be no casual greeting here.
With her right hand she opened the internal comms.
“Cabin, strap yourselves in, we’ve got company out here, I’m going to try and make it to the hyper drone !”
The shuttle was heavily modified, as expected, but favoured boosted speed over armament. It carried two hidden sub-hull canon, which had now appeared, but Adelly was relying on the engine thrust to reach the drone. She was acutely aware that the sheer size and number of the capital ships’ engines meant that she was unlikely to out-run them, but her smaller ship could at least out-manouevre them. She just hoped she wouldn’t get caught up in a dogfight out here. Completely unaware as to the nature of the PA’s blockade, she had the choice of trying to jump off-system or in to the asteroid storm and the relative safety of the base ; she opted for the latter, which the besiegers might not be expecting.
She glanced again at the screen that was presenting a status report ahead of the micro-jump into the base : still on standby. Damn it ! The soop-comp was still calculating a clear path between the tumbling asteroids ! It didn’t normally take this long ?!
Green turbolasers flashed aross the cockpit.
Adelly glanced across to where they originated, and saw the capital ship’s hull in too much detail for her liking.
She banked the shuttle hard towards the PA ship, narrowly missing another barrage of canon fire. Suddenly she was racing across the huge vessel’s nose, then dipped over its far edge and arced away from the ship and back towards the beacon.
The capital ship pursued with its green turbolasers and shifted its attitude to angle the tractor beam generator more accurately. Lights surrounding the tractor control tower began to flash as the beam was activated.
Inside the cockpit of the shuttle several alarms were sounding : from the proximity to the tractor beam, to the insistent ping of the hyperspace relay beacon coming online.
“Now ya calling !” Adelly cried out triumphantly, and she reached for the hyperdrive actuator stick. She smoothly drew back on the control, and the inkiness of space and the blur of perpetual rocky motion stretched into starlines.
Inside the forward hold of the Millennum Falcon, Harker let out an equally triumphant roar.
“Yes !” she yelled, punching the air with her right hand. “I’ve got the code !”
Fondon and the others looked at her in expectation.
“When that shuttle jumped...?” he asked her.
“Yep ! I was watching the comp do its thing, calculating for the rocks and a safe path,” Harker clarified. “Gimme a mo, I can replicate her call signal and force the comp to give us a micro-jump too !" She glanced towards Artoo. "You ready to do your thing, little guy ?”
The droid beeped and spun his head, and began coordinating the hyper-jump calculations with Harker's computing set-up and the Falcon's own navi-comp.
“Oh ! That’s wonderful !” agreed Threepio, caught up in the drama. “Yes, Artoo, General Solo needs to be warned that we’re about to make a jump.... oh, wait,” Threepio trailled off, realising the implication of the discovery, “that means...”
Harker had already grabbed a comlink from the desk beside her, and thumbed it on.
“Solo ! Get the ship ready for the micro-jump ! Coordinates are about to come through...”
“I hear ya, kid,” came Han’s tinny voice. “Engines are coming up !”
In the cockpit, Han signalled to Chewie to be ready to pull the hyperdrive handles, and then flicked the comms channel to hail the lead PA cruiser.
“Admiral, we’ve got a fix on their beacon, we’re going in.”
“Understood, General,” came Merityme’s voice. “Clear skies !”
Han nodded to the Wook, and, with a bark, Chewie activated the hyperdrive. The stars and asteroids ahead of them blurred... and then, barely a second later, the astro-nav decelerated the ship, and the all-enveloping view before them was of brown and grey craters and ridges, and a cluster of hexagonal and cuboid modular pop-up buildings anchored to the surface. One of the larger buildings presented several openings of various sizes, with landing control guide lights arrayed around and within. At the top of their view through the cockpit, they could see the purple shimmer of a high-grade energy shield, with smaller asteroids and meteors flaring against it in bright flashes. The pirates’ computer had brought them in under the shield and close to the terrain, clearly a holding point for arrivals.
“Get us down low,” instructed Han, and Chewie growled in agreement as he leaned in on the yoke.
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