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Setnin
Star Chapter Two - 2008 short story by Louis Turfrey Thirty-nine years after Episode IV – A New Hope Ryath Centaur got out of the speeder
limousine and walked towards the two men who were waiting to meet him. His
manner was all business, and the sharp suite and stylised gun belt that he
wore spoke money - lots of it. That was the point though. His brief
conversation with Ranth and the meeting that had
followed were both amusing and alarming. Amusing in that Ranth
had been robbed in his sleep and alarming that the item that had been robbed
was a customised gunship, even more powerful than Ranths own arsenal. The two men he was to meet were brokers of stolen goods. The
technical term would have been ‘fence’, but these men were far above that.
Their job was to obtain the unobtainable, and Centaur had on occasion had to
use them to recover goods that had been stolen from clients. "Jacob,
Joseph." He nodded to the two of them and they started walking through
the crowds. Sometimes a crowd was the best way of protecting information. The
one called Jacob spoke first. "We have
located the item that you are after and we have approached the gentlemen in
question. Unfortunately, although our reputation preceded us, we were met
with rebuke. Such a thing is not unheard of." Centaur nodded, suspecting
that would be the case. The one called Joseph continued, "You must
understand that although they have been able to open the container, they have
not yet been able to enter the object. They have spent a lot on both
resources and men in their attempts, so they are reluctant to let it
go." Centaur nodded again, replying with a question. "Were you
able to locate the object and do you have the nearest hyperspace
coordinates?" Jacob nodded. "We do, but
you must realise that the situation required a lot of finesse and delicacy.
It also required a lot of man power, as the transmitter was only short
range." Centaur smiled. "How much
will it cost?" Jacob cleared his throat and looked at his companion. "Three
hundred thousand credits." Centaur nodded. "Done. It
will be paid through the normal Escrow sources, but I will need all the
information that you have obtained. Agreed?" The men both nodded as hailed the limousine that had been
tracking him. Once inside he activated the privacy screen and brought the
communications terminal online. It took only a matter of minutes to move
across the funds and only a few more to obtain the information. It was encrypted
using the standard cycling code that the two men had provided him in the past
– a code that was different for each customer they dealt with. He dialled in
a number on the com-unit. Ranths head and shoulders appeared on the screen. “Ranth I have the coordinates you need and have re-encoded
them and passed them to your data link.” Ranth nodded, reviewing the
information as it arrived. “That’s
interesting. They’re outside the sector. A base in the Hoth
System.” Centaur smiled and relaxed back into his seat. “So what do you
need from me?” Ranth looked at Centaur and shook his
head. “Not just you my
friend. According to this information, I will need a small army. They have two hundred crew manning each ship. Five ships and a base
of operations that rivals most mercenary operations.” Centaur smiled. “Not equalling mine.
But most of my staff are committed to the Ki-Ki War. I could spare perhaps a hundred men.” This time it was Ranths turn to smile. “Fifty will
suffice, but we must contact De’Athe and the
Wanderers. I’ll need ten Jedi, and my wife. If you and Lomona are free that
would also be useful.” Centaur nodded, but then something occurred to him. “Why is this
ship so important to you? There must
be a thousand other ships like it in the galaxy.” Ranth sat back in silence. Centaur
could practically hear him thinking. “That’s just the
point, there are not. Only a hundred of these ever existed. Most have been
destroyed in battle and the few that remain are stripped down and treated as
antiques. This is an early model, and it has…a personal link. It was the one that my great grandfather
first owned, and the one I nearly destroyed. I’ve had it restored
painstakingly with original parts. Can
you imagine how long that took? It’s
worth a small fortune, but that’s not the point.” He paused. “There’s a sizeable fortune sitting in the
hold, thanks to the now collapsed Bank of Chancai. I had just converted
the funds
back to Galactic Alliance standard, on behest of the Setnin Defence Force.” Centaur whistled. “That’s an awful
lot of money. I should have been informed. Okay, I’m in. I have an idea how to stop them escaping but
do you have any idea how you are going to get onboard their base?” Ranth nodded. “I’m going to
walk through the door.” Hoth, a barren and cold world, was
the perfect meeting place. The five ships touched down lightly outside the
giant magnetic doors that were once the main hanger to Echo Base. The doors
were permanently jammed half open, long ago frozen into place by the barren
winds. However, they offered some protection from the outside wind and there
was just enough room to fly an X-Wing through the gap. Inside the snow had
been cleared away and the damaged superstructure repaired. Massive heaters had been attached to the
doors, and engineers were frantically working to try and free them using
every means possible. Six men walked
through the gap side by side and removed face masks. Jan Lomona, Ryath
Centaur, Tar Ranth and Blake De’Athe
were instantly recognisable to anyone that knew anything about the Setnin Sector.
The other two men turned out to be women. Nera De’Athe and Netha Dubra were less well known but no less deadly nonetheless.
A man detached himself from the work
force and moved towards them, saluting Centaur when he arrived. “Sir, we’ve got
the heaters up and running, but the damage to the tunnels was too great.
We’ve compromised by drilling a few new ones and lining them with duracrete. Portable
stealth generators will be online in half an hour and we are hoping the main
hanger will be open in less than two hours. If you wish we can attach
portable heaters to your undercarriage to avoid them freezing?” Centaur smiled, this man was clearly not a spacer. “No need, if it
works in the cold of space, it will work on the planet.” The engineer shook his head. “With respect I
would reconsider sir. The frozen water eventually melts into the hydraulics,
refreezes and expands again. The result is blown joints and torn feeder
tubes. Some freeze solid and crack under the pressure of takeoff or landing.
Sir.” Lomona chuckled under his breath and Centaur was forced
to smile instead of scowl. “Okay, you got
me there. Go sort it.” The man nodded, saluted again, and started yelling to
other workers. Jan sidled up to him and leaned down to whisper in his ear,
arms folded with a smirk on his face. “Please tell me
you already knew all that?” Centaur looked innocently back at him and just smiled. Nine ships exited hyperspace on the edge of the Hoth System. All were painted black, and all were Setnin
class SJ series X-Wings. Three groups formed up, a leader and two
wing men on each one. “We hold here
until the second group arrive, and then we make a move to the asteroid field.
We’ll need to expand our stealth
shields to cover the group. If we don’t we’ll lose the element of surprise.
Everybody got that?” There were various acknowledgements in various languages
from each member of Black Squadron. Jedi Neela Drey relaxed into the Force and started to meditate,
trusting her R3 unit to alert her should there be any problems. She just
hoped that their backup arrived safely, otherwise
this would be a short mission. Ranth landed the heavily modified YT-1500
freighter just outside the energy shield and set the systems to provide
friend or foe auto-defence. He had a transponder on his belt and a sub-dermal
transponder that had been temporarily placed under his skin that would act as
a backup. He had made no attempt to hide his arrival, and had deliberately
tried to contact the raiders with his communicator. He had received no
response, but neither had he been fired upon. He suspected that the raiders
simply wanted to find out who he really was before they made any decisions
about whether to kill him or not. Let’s face it, even a modified YT-1500
freighter was of little worry when you had the sort of defences that they
had. He sealed the clasps on his slightly modified armour and there was a
hiss as the whole unit pressurised against the rigors of space. His lightsabre was held in a modified sheath, much thinner than
usual, and looked like a standard part of his armour. It was also shielded
against scanning. As he approached the barrier, two modified droids
approached from the other side of the energy shield. They were YVH droids, deadly attack droids designed with the aid of
one Lando Calrissian.
Each wore cortosis weave armour sheathing. Somebody
had been expecting him, and Ranth now knew why the
ship had been stolen. It was a trap. Extending his Force ability outwards, he sensed that he
was being watched. Further
concentration revealed two armoured troops, using a long range snipers rifle,
less than half a kilometre away. He frowned. They really had been expecting
him, but they didn’t know that he had been practicing heavily in the last
three months since his ship had disappeared. He was no longer the Bounty
Hunter that sometimes used the Force to get the job done. Once more he was a
Jedi, stronger now than he had been since the merging of his and his
predecessor’s spirits. Blake had helped him find his focus again, and Zeboden has completed the process. He wasn’t a Jedi
Master, but he was a fairly decent Jedi Knight, which was all he needed. If
everything went to plan, he would be flying his ship out of here in less than
a day. If it didn’t, well there were
plans against that contingency. The shield parted briefly, as the two droids waved him to
come through. The gravity on the asteroid was limited, but Ranth used the Force to help him gain purchase on the rocky
surface. He appeared to move as easily as the droids, and stepped through the
gap. The droids motioned for him to
leave his blaster, he shook his head. They
raised their weapons, then motioned again. Ranth was having
none of it. He knew if he drew his blaster, they would mow him down. He
couldn’t draw his lightsabre because that would
expose him to the vacuum of space. Besides
which, the cortosis armour would disrupt the
feedback loop. All he had was his
skill in the Force, but that was all he needed. He flexed his fingers and the
two droids were disarmed. He pushed
out with his arms and the Force and both of them went flying back into the
shield. Ignoring the buzzing and crackling sounds that were feeding back
through his transmitter he started walking slowly towards the base. Twenty-one X-Wings sat in space, silently watching the
interplay between Ranth and the droids. Passive sensors scanned the immediate area
around them, and overlapped stealth shielding made them invisible to anything
but the naked eye. Even then, one
would have to be practically sitting in front of them to see them thanks to layers
and layers of light absorbing matt black paint. Inside one ship, a slightly impatient but very
experienced pilot swore silently at her readouts. “I don’t care if
the power needs to be shut down to repair it. Just stem the leak.” The readout from her R3 droid showed a slight energy leak
from the power coils of her blasters. “Just lock it down and switch to back
up weapons. If that leak gets any larger my shields will drop.” She swore,
and opened a short range channel to her wingman. “Nevick,
come in closer. I need to drop my
shields while my weapons are switched.” The response was calm, and unhurried. “Confirmed Wing
Com. Will it be a problem?” Neela looked into the Force for an
answer, but didn’t find one. “We’ll see. I
might need you to stick a little closer to my tail until my shields
recharge.” Her wingman laughed a deep laugh. “I don’t think
you’ll have a problem. Tell you what though, I hope this doesn’t take too
long, I need the fresher.” Neela laughed and relaxed once more.
She knew this Ranths reputation, and there was something about him that put
her in awe. He seemed to be able to
balance being a bounty hunter and a Jedi without tipping over to the dark
side of the Force. He had a natural honour, and a sense of justice, that
surpassed anyone else she knew. He also had a hard edge, one that wouldn’t be
budged. He wouldn’t hesitate to use the Force as a tool if he needed to, but
if he didn’t then he wouldn’t. She just hoped he wasn’t walking into a trap. The doors opened in front of Ranth
and he walked through the ion field. His suit protected him from the effects, as
they must have anticipated, but his gun sparked and died. He wasn’t worried. He had enough armament left to make life
difficult for anyone that wanted to make his life difficult. Two armed guards, humans this time, asked
him to follow them. They didn’t seem
to be worried about him, so he didn’t feel the need to worry about them. Their guns still sat in their holsters. The corridor was hewn out of solid rock and the door he
had just entered through was a very high security device. Ranths own suit had hacked in the access
codes automatically, but he hoped that he wouldn’t need them. The corridor was straight and went gradually
downwards into the heart of the asteroid. Rock walls lined with duracrete
gave way to solid rock. This base
would take a hell of a pounding even after its shields gave out, and it was
getting warmer. Ranth
could see no sign of heaters, so he surmised the asteroid must be
geologically active. The tunnel widened and eventually came out into a small
cavern. The cavern was well lit and a hive of activity. To his right were
what looked like small shuttles, painted in the colours of the Corellian Navy. To his left
was a Y-wing, stripped to the bone. Through
a large exit at the far end of the cavern was a silhouette that he recognised
immediately. His ship, the newly
re-designated Setnin Star. Despite
himself, his pulse started to race. Luckily his suit hid any sign of it. A man, wearing armour that looked similar to
his own exited the building to the left of the Y-wing and walked towards
them. His eyes were bright and there
was a smile on his face. As he
approached, he waved the guards away and suddenly Ranth
found himself unguarded. “Mr Ranth, your reputation precedes you, and to be honest it
is the only reason you have not yet been killed. May I welcome you to our little organisation.” Ranth nodded but said nothing,
intending to make the man feel uncomfortable.
Yet clearly it didn’t work. Instead the man grinned and sighed,
motioning for him to follow. “No doubt you would like to meet the man that
leads us, and he would also like to meet you, but you should be aware that he
is both enigmatic and a Force user. I
give you this information as a warning. He is able to define the truth, and despises
lies. If you wish to survive this
encounter you will need to make sure you hold no deceit. I would also ask that you remove your
helmet.” Ranth obliged, carefully making sure
that both the audio and video recorders were still working. As he placed it under his arm, the man in
front of him turned pale. He said
nothing more, but opened a door and waved Ranth in
ahead of him. Ranth found himself in a large
office. At one end of the room a man
sat with his back to him. The man kept
his back to him as he spoke. “I have allowed
you here out of curiosity. I have followed your career for a while now. I am impressed, but a little confused. How is it that you have managed to
impersonate someone for so long?” The man stood up and started to turn, a pistol in his hand.
“How is it that you have been able to
impersonate my son?” He turned to face Ranth, gun
pointing at his head, and both men gasped simultaneously. It was at this point that the unknown guide
who had shown him in earlier decided to grasp back his self control. “Mr Ranth, meet Mr Ranth.” Tar Ranth stared into the face
of his genetic grandfather. Setnin
Star Chapter Two - 2008 short story by Louis Turfrey Thirty-nine years after Episode IV – A New Hope Histories – Part
two of Setnin Star, and the clone Tar Ranth finds
out that those he believed dead were very far from. This also features a number of familiar
Setnin supporting characters as well as a bevy of new characters. Cast of Characters Tar Ranth Ryath Centaur Jan Lomona Blake De’Athe Netha Dubra Nera De’Athe Jedi Neela Drey Nevick Joseph Jacob |