The Void Within- Chapter Two- Surprised Goliath

   The war was going to bring in a new age of peace, of domination and conquest, of power and glory; at least that's what the vids had said. When Captain Nathanial Bronson signed up with the forces of the new Sith fleet, under the command of their victorious leader, the Dark Lord Revan, he thought that the campaign was going to be intense but successful. That they were going to emerge victorious from the ashes of the Republic and bring a golden age of power to the galaxy. Seeing the might of the Star Forge had only reinforced the idea that they, the Sith, were invincible!

   So... what happened, why had the Republic won? Why did Malak die and the Star Forge fall to its fiery doom? Why was he now running with a handful of other dissident ships, the remnants of the great Sith fleet, from the Republic's triumphant forces? How could they have lost??

   Simple... they were betrayed, and he knew by who...

   MALAK!!!

   It was obvious; he had betrayed his Master and so he betrayed the Sith. Nathanial was sure; Malak had had his own agenda and orchestrated the whole thing to make it look like a Jedi victory. The Sith would never know why but he was sure Malak walked away from that battle and was now elsewhere. It made sense, if he betrayed his Master why should he have ever been trusted and why did the Dark Jedi rally around him like he was Revan? Idiots!

   But such ideas were unpopular amongst the remaining Dark Jedi and several members of his command staff had already met an unfortunate death at the wrong end of a lightsaber because of them. So Nathanial kept these thoughts to himself but he would find Malak and take his revenge. Since that fateful day at the Star Forge, his ragtag fleet had been hopping around the Outer Rim, attempting to outrun, outwit and outmanoeuvre the Republic's patrols.

   The Dark Jedi he had had with him during the final battle had proven exceptionally useful in detecting hotspots of Force activity and as such his fleet survived a little bit longer every cycle. Nathanial didn't like relying on such unpredictable characters as the Dark Jedi though, as you never knew where their loyalties lay. It must have been his experience in fleet navigation and battle tactics that had allowed him to remain in command of his ship the Goliath. This Sith Interdictor was a magnificent vessel and he had been greatly honoured when the Sith Lord Revan himself gave him command of it.

   It was certainly more powerful than that Republic crate he had left Coruscant in all those years ago. With over fifty Blaster Cannons at his command the Goliath had laid waste to countless fleets, innumerable battle craft and even played a part in the orbital bombardment of several planets. The last had been Dantooine, home of a 'prestigious' Jedi Academy but totally defenceless, showing just how unprepared the Jedi and the Republic were.

   They had been able to waltz into orbit, position themselves over their target area and let loose the Goliath's immense power. And they did all this without being opposed once, by any ship, defence network, orbital gun or outpost. With that in mind Nathanial should not have been surprised by the pitifully small fleet that the Republic sent at the Star Forge.

   So...

   HOW DID WE LOSE?!?

   That question had troubled his thoughts ever since the Goliath had been forced to retreat to a safe distance as soon as the Star Forge's orbit began to decay when the Republic's fleet destroyed her orbital stabilisers. Many of the Sith ships just sat there though, as if mesmerised by these strange events. And as such a lot of them were destroyed by the ensuring explosion as the Star Forge's hypermatter drives went critical. Fools!

   In a way he was glad he didn't have them in a fleet, for how can you rely on Captains who can't accept the fact that the fight had been lost?

   That had been the situation up until this moment, ever since their retreat from the Rakatan System to safe ground. The rally point that had been set up for fleet regrouping, in case anything should go wrong, had been Korriban for some odd reason. It was suspected that this was decision made by Malak, who had apparently scoffed at the idea that the Sith would even need such a fallback position. The area that he chose reflected this disbelief for Korriban was simply home to the Sith Academy and had few defences and absolutely no shipyards of any sort. These were not the sort of resources you could use to repair a war weary fleet.

    Czerka Corporation was there but they didn't have the stockpiles of resources they would need nor the staff necessary for such an operation. As marvellous as the Star Forge was any good commander should have known that it was a good idea to provide the fleet with a well stocked shipyard which could at least act as a secondary command facility.

   Revan had employed such a system throughout the entire campaign against the Mandalorians. The fleet that had set out from Coruscant was large but without the support of the Jedi Council, and the Senate still weak from Jedi civil war with Exar Kun, they were going to be strapped for resources. Revan had improvised and set up trade links with Outer Rim mercenaries and smugglers and as the fleet won victories they gained Mandalorian supplies and even a few baggage trains.

   Considering the status of Korriban, Nathanial could now see why Revan had been leader and not Malak.

   The Goliath had made it to Korriban without delay for the Republic had not even set up Interdictors around the Rakatan System and therefore there were no confrontations on the way to Korriban. At least Malak had had the sense to scout out a safe hyperspace route between Korriban and the Star Forge though that was probably more for his Dark Jedi than the fleet.

   Arrival at Korriban was almost as painful as watching the Star Forge fall into that sun. A slow trickle of ships came to meet them at that lonely outpost. The Academy was no help either as some Jedi had been able to break in and killed many of the students and their guards. Czerka was pulling out, all support for the Sith cause had evaporated which gave Nathanial great pleasure in shooting down their escort ships and capturing their transports as well as sending down troops to raid their warehouses. He had to chuckle, Czerka was on the way out: they had already pulled out of Kashyyyk because the natives revolted; Tatooine was totally unproductive, Manaan would certainly take a more active step now that the Republic was finally winning and due to their Sith connections Czerka was certainly no longer welcome in the Republic.

   After about four hours of waiting several more capable Captains started to make an appearance though they only brought more bad news. Saul Karath was actually dead, the rumours were true and apparently he had died at the hands of another Jedi though they were not sure who. Yet, contrary to common opinion the Admiral's ship, the Leviathan, was still intact though it had not been present at the final battle and was therefore elsewhere. Slowly but surely more forces of the great Sith fleet continued to arrive, some more damaged than others. After three more hours there were only thirty-five ships present out of a fleet that had once numbered thousands.

   The more optimistic Captains had hoped that there were others scattered around the galaxy in hard-to-reach areas. Nathanial knew this wasn't true, he had seen the figures and as he'd suspected the Sith fleet's role in military superiority was effectively nonexistent. In order to organise the fleet for a huge push into the Core, Malak had rallied every ship to the Star Forge's location. As such the entire fleet had been there and therefore many ships had been destroyed by the Star Forge's destruction or by the Republic's fleet. Guerrilla tactics were needed now; they could not fight a pitched battle and hope to win especially now that the Republic had won a pivotal battle in the entire struggle.

   Unfortunately the Dark Jedi had not agreed.

   After about ten hours at Korriban a small flotilla of medium class warships turned up, filled to the brim with Dark Jedi. The medium class was an offshoot of the Republic ships used in the Mandalorian wars, which had been redesigned for more strength and firepower on the nose and were used to break through fleet blockades. They were known as Blockade Breakers, or BBs for short. Rather than neglect them Revan had had these ships retrofitted by the Star Forge and set up as a reserve fleet only to be used when absolutely necessary.

   Upon their arrival a wave of relief had swept through the Sith remnants as their contingency plans were still intact. However, instead of joining the ranks the commander of this relief flotilla claimed authority over the entire fleet and ordered a new strike on the Republic fleet's flanks while they were still moored at the Rakatan homeworld. Nathanial agreed, such a tactic would have completely outmanoeuvred the Republic and caught their exhausted strike forces at their weakest.

   Even with Sith losses as high as they were the Republic task force had been very small and was even smaller now that most of them were probably docked and powered down with only a few vessels on patrol. Also the Rakatan homeworld had blind spots all around it caused by the large amounts of ship hulls on the surface. These wrecks could throw off sensor readings giving the Sith the edge over their enemies. Even from a campaign point-of-view the plan gave the Sith a chance to kill Admiral Dodonna as well as her staff and any surviving Jedi. It would also crush the Republic's propaganda throwing their victory into question. And they had enough ships to bombard the planet thus turning the graveyard world into its own crematorium. The plan was sound and many consented to its execution until suddenly another Sith interdictor, the Blackstar, voiced its own counter-command.

   Captained by Dark Jedi the Blackstar claimed that they commanded the fleet and that such an attack would destroy any chances for attacking the Core. Then the Avenger had piped up stating that Guerrilla tactics were needed in order to preserve the Sith's assets. This had prompted the Blackstar to foolishly fire on the lead Blockade Breaker and the fleet had broken up to avoid the ensuing conflict.

   Nathanial had ordered his crew to move the Goliath away from the conflict and to take up a flanking position below the Blackstar. His blaster turrets were already armed; all he had to do was warn the Blackstar off. Unfortunately a number of other ships had had similar ideas though they weren't very keen to send a warning and simply fired on the Blackstar's underbelly. The Dark Jedi Interdictor had veered off, its turrets retargeting onto these new threats. As predictable as ever the Sith fleet split into two attacking sides, with some supporting the Blackstar and some backing up the medium warships. Others simply sat there and watched the unfolding battle, unsure who to fight. Messages offering stronger Sith leadership passed through the ranks whilst death threats and curses of various degrees zipped along the communications net.

   Nathanial had simply watched this display of stupidity with a grim look of dissatisfaction on his face. As any good history textbook could tell you, the Sith had reverted to their old ways of infighting, survival of the fittest and usually at the sacrifice of the moment. Several ships joined the ranks of the Goliath's passive stance whether out of uncertainty or wisdom. Let them destroy each other he thought, I don't need idiots like this slowing me down! He was surprised that the Dark Jedi present on his bridge hadn't protested at their lack of action but they must have been stunned into silence by the recent catastrophe. This disaster became all the more evident when the Blackstar's hull crumbled under a sustained volley of blaster fire and the entire ship disappeared in a cloud of white vapour.

   And as if to dot the exclamation mark of the Blackstar's violent demise, it was at this moment that a large fleet of Republic vessels emerged from hyperspace. The flotilla was made up of around forty ships, most of them armoured transports but there were a few capital ships in the mix. They were obviously here to take the Sith Academy and therefore destroy the last vestiges of the Sith infrastructure. The fleet of thirty medium to heavy capital ships that followed them out of hyperspace a few seconds later showed that they had anticipated a few Sith ships to be here. Conflicting battle chatter had assaulted the Goliath's bridge speakers. Some ships called for a general retreat while others stated that all should engage and destroy the Republic flotilla. Nathanial was not having any of this, not anymore, not after everything that had happened.

   Malak had somehow set all of this up to ensure his victory over the Sith, whatever that may mean. Korriban was not a good rally point and Malak must have known it. Despite Revan's tactical genius Malak also knew how to organise his fleet. His epic destruction of Taris had sent clear messages to everyone showing that even his own soldiers (the garrison on the surface) were expendable in this Great War. Dantooine had been yet another example of his tact for taking out the most significant targets; the sites that mattered. But to play the Sith as he had: bringing them so close to victory and then simply destroying their chances, tricking the remnants into killing themselves and setting up a backup site that offered no immediate strategic value...

   Malak was responsible; he had planned all of this and had claimed some strangely perverse victory out of the carnage. It was then that Nathanial had vowed to destroy Malak wherever he may be. And with that solemn oath he he taken his small fleet out of Korriban and fled for the Outer Rim.

   For four months they had been out here, avoiding the Republic and her growing fleet, trying to reassemble. Out of his petty band of seven ships they had already lost two, one to an old Sith mine that could no longer discern between a friend or foe, the other mutinied and fell in combat. Five ships against the whole Republic, the situation was bleak and the hope for salvation was very small indeed. The supply situation had not improved much either as very few planets wanted links with a renegade Sith fleet whose days were obviously numbered. The only places that could be accessed were those areas that harboured the type of scum that would do anything if it meant they could get to kill something for no apparent reason except that they could.

   For a long time Tatooine had been a good site of refuge though with Czerka's withdrawal a great deal of business had disappeared and with it went Nathanial's hopes for a reliable supply of resources. As it was, running the fleet had become extremely expensive and their stockpile of supplies was rapidly depleting. The Goliath was dying, her power numbing, her crew starving and no hope in sight apart from a timely death. Many had pushed for one last strike on the Republic but as the fleet became more and more desperate and resource starved such a tactic had become less and less desirable. Nathanial did not want to go out fighting a pointless battle nor would he sacrifice his small fleet on some damn foolish crusade.

   Malak was out there like a Kinrath at the centre of her nest, waiting. Yet there seemed no chance to find him and all reports he had come across said that he was dead. But there was something that may offer a lead: the hero of the Jedi. His name hadn't been released but apparently this person was responsible for many acts of 'kindness' and 'heroism' throughout the galaxy. He had freed the Wookies from slavery by Czerka, stopped the Sand People attacks on Tattooine, uncovered Sith plots to seize governmental control on Manaan, destroyed the Sith Academy and even brought one of its masters back to the light side. If that was not enough he had bested Malak's apprentice Darth Bandon, defeated Calo Nord, killed Admiral Saul Karath, turned Malak's second apprentice Bastila Shan back to the light and had even killed Malak, though he knew this to a complete lie.

   Such a dizzying display of victories explained a great deal of the Republics' success in those weeks before the final battle. Maybe, if Nathanial could contact this person he could find Malak, though that would be a big problem in itself and he had not yet figured a way round it.

   Then fate intervened and gave him a good reason not to seek out this mystery hero. For the past three weeks the Republic had been reinforcing its forces and increasing the number of patrols. The Dark Jedi had helped sense those patrols that had Jedi with them but that didn't always guarantee success especially when they were unable to gather advanced sensor recon. As such they were caught near the Obana asteroid belt in close proximity to Tatooine [1].

   While the high (though inferior) metal content of the asteroids threw off scanners and tracking systems it also blinded anyone using it as cover and therefore they were not expecting to suddenly encounter six Republic warships. The Goliath was caught completely by surprise, no sooner had the contact appeared on the scanner scope than the Republic ships were assuming flanking positions around the Sith fleet. Suddenly alarm bells were blaring and the bridge was full of activity as people ran to their battle stations.

   Nathanial had marched onto the bridge still doing up his flight jacket. Now he stood at his command station, the Goliath's massive hull stretching out before him. And in the distance sat the Republic fleet. Six ships was alot but the amount of booty that could be scoured from their battle ravaged carcasses was an ambition he was not willing to give up, let alone flee from. His ship was larger than theirs by almost a mile and he had advantage in terms of firepower. This will be a good fight!

   "Report!" he ordered.

   "Republic ships, reading six targets, all heavies. They've got a target lock on us!"

   "Shields up, activate defence grids and get our blaster turrets warmed up." Nathanial said calmly. Often a panicked crew would look to the confidence of their Captain for guidance. Nathanial wasn't prepared to let them down now.

   "Sir, we're running cold, it'll take at least ten minutes for all batteries to be at full charge!"

   "Fine, concentrate on our front systems and work backwards towards the bridge. Deploy fighters and bring our escorts closer in around us..."

   "Sir! Our escorts....they're.....they're running!'

   Looking at the scanner screen Nathanial saw that that was indeed true enough. All four ships were moving toward the Republic vessels at flank speed, their shields and weapons down.

   "Those weak fools! Captain destroy them immediately!" ordered one of the Dark Jedi.

   "Negative, maintain target lock on those heavies." Nathanial counter-ordered.

   "What are you doing?" the Dark Jedi spat, "they must be stopped!"

   "I won't waste my time with non-aggressive targets, the Republic ships are of greater concern."

   The Dark Jedi grumbled his agreement and returned to position next to the bridge doors. Nathanial had learnt early on in this war that the Dark Jedi respected strength, even if wasn't from one of their own. If you didn't stand up to them they would walk all over you.

   "Sir, we're picking up chatter between our escor...um, I mean the BBs and the Republic ships. Sounds like terms of surrender..."

   Nathanial rubbed his bristly, unshaven chin in thought. The situation was difficult but not impossible. According to the navicomputer all six ships had taken up semicircular flanking positions around them forcing them into the outer most asteroids of the belt. But the x-axis was clear allowing them to go up as well as down. The Goliath was slow but shielding would hold them back for a while and maybe he could take a few of them out, or at least disable them. It was worth a try, a least until he had moved into the protection of the asteroid belt.

   He was about to order helm to decrease their altitude by ten thousand feet when he suddenly noticed an anomaly coming down from above them.

   It was larger than them, larger than any ship he had seen before in fact. It had no heat, weapons or even shield readings, it was completely cold like space itself. And it wasn't just him who had seen it; two of the Republic ships were repositioning themselves. He looked out of the command decks' front window to see what was happening but his eyes were instantly drawn to the large shadow being cast onto the top hull of his ship. He hurried to another window and tried to look up but all he could see was a large silhouette blotting out the stars, even the twin suns of Tatooine, from above.

   "Sir! Massive contact coming down on top of us, it's almost...two miles in length!" The awe in the young man's voice sent a sudden shiver down Nathanial's back.

   "Captain, Republic ships are moving in and our escorts are joining in with their ranks!"

   "Spast!" exclaimed Nathanial to himself, momentarily letting the stress show. War on two fronts and one of them was an anomaly. "Helm, ex axis minus ten thousand clicks, standby main drives. What's our battery status?"

   "Front batteries are fully charged, ready to fire!"

   "Target port side on Republic forces, lead targets first. Starboard turrets target unknown obj ect. No one fires until I say so!"

   Slowly but surely the Goliath started to descend, away from the Republic and the unknown vessel. The Republic ships did not pursue but remained where they were, apparently engaged in a staring match with the anomalyl. That mammoth of a ship though started to move however, its nose slowly meandered down so that it was pointing straight at the Republic fleet and her newly acquired escorts. Suddenly the unknown ship's engines flared.

   "Energy spike, massive energy spike from the unknown vessel!"

   "Open fire, all hands open fire!" Shouted Nathanial.

   The Goliath's front guns opened up and spewed forth blood red turbolaser bolts at their targets; half headed for the Republic fleet and the rest were sent at the unknown aggressor. At the same time the Republic guns fired but not at the Goliath. Instead their green bolts of flame were sent hurtling towards the great black shadow. Red and green bolts sizzled across its black surface; the hull armour absorbed every shot without buckling or warping once.

   "Redirect all fire from the Republic onto that ship and target any new guns there as wel..."

   His sentence was cut off by a huge shudder as something impacted on the hull. The Goliath groaned in protest and flames bristled from the new hole in her side. Alarm bells rang throughout the ship, damage control teams shouted incomprehensible orders into their console microphones. Another shudder shook the ship, throwing Nathanial to the floor. Sparks erupted from a nearby console, some technician was suddenly on fire, the Dark Jedi were running or getting thrown to the floor.

   People screamed out for orders, another shudder answered their cries, blood spattered the windows, fire leapt up the walls, the lights went out, power went down and then came back up. The Goliath shuddered again and again and all Nathanial could see was the acrid grey smoke of death as he pulled himself to his feet and clawed his way for his console.

   The heat grew in intensity and the Bridge descended into chaos, sweeping their beleaguered Captain along with it. 

[1] McElroy, C, Time Tales, A Star Wars Chronology, 2003, p.230