Star Wars: The New Jedi Order: Vector Prime Read online

  In Vector Prime, based on a story line approved by George Lucas, New York Times bestselling author R. A. Salvatore takes the Star Wars universe to previously unscaled heights of action and imagination, expanding the beloved story of a galaxy far, far away …

  Twenty-one years have passed since the heroes of the Rebel Alliance destroyed the Death Star, breaking the power of the Emperor. Since then, the New Republic has valiantly struggled to maintain peace and prosperity among the peoples of the galaxy. But unrest has begun to spread and threatens to destroy the Republic’s tenuous reign.

  Into this volatile atmosphere comes Nom Anor, a charismatic firebrand who heats passions to the boiling point, sowing seeds of dissent for his own dark motives. And as the Jedi and the Republic focus on internal struggles, a new threat surfaces from beyond the farthest reaches of the Outer Rim—an enemy bearing weapons and technology unlike anything New Republic scientists have ever seen.

  Suddenly, Luke Skywalker; his wife, Mara; Han Solo; Leia Organa Solo; and Chewbacca—along with the Solo children—are thrust again into battle, to defend the freedom so many have fought and died for. But this time, the power of the Force itself may not be enough …

  Please turn to the back of the book for an interview with R. A. Salvatore.

  A Del Rey® Book

  Published by The Random House Publishing Group

  Copyright © 1999 by Lucasfilm Ltd. & ™.

  All Rights Reserved. Used Under Authorization.

  All rights reserved.

  Published in the United States by Del Rey Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc.

  DEL REY is a registered trademark and the Del Rey colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.

  eISBN: 978-0-345-46740-9

  Map design by Daniel Wallace

  Map by Chris Barbieri

  www.starwars.com

  www.delreybooks.com

  v3.1

  To Diane, with all my love, and to my kids,

  Bryan, Geno, and Caitlin,

  who make it easy for me to empathize with Han Solo!

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  This, as much as anything I’ve ever done, was a team project, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t give credit where credit was due. First, to Shelly Shapiro, for holding my hand through the Star Wars maze, and for bringing a fresh vision to an old story. To Jenni Smith, for her support, enthusiasm, and knowing eye. To the folks at Lucasfilm—Sue Rostoni, Lucy Autrey Wilson, and Howard Roffman—who brought an honest and unyielding concern for quality that forced me to stay at my best. And to two fellow authors: Mike Stackpole, for giving me insights about this world I was entering, and Terry Brooks, who reminded me that it would be incredibly stupid to say no to Star Wars!

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Map

  Chapter One - Fraying Fabric

  Chapter Two - Intergalactic Eyes

  Chapter Three - The Role of Politics

  Chapter Four - Seeds Planted

  Chapter Five - The War Coordinator

  Chapter Six - Take Me Far, Far Away

  Chapter Seven - Launch

  Chapter Eight - Layers

  Chapter Nine - The Honor of Dying

  Chapter Ten - Running the Belt

  Chapter Eleven - Boom

  Chapter Twelve - The Game, the Reality

  Chapter Thirteen - Minus Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen - Closer, Closer

  Chapter Fifteen - Awaiting the Goddess’s Arrival

  Chapter Sixteen - Worthy Opponent

  Chapter Seventeen - The Last Pose of Defiance

  Chapter Eighteen - Storm Brewing

  Chapter Nineteen - The Perfection of Teamwork

  Chapter Twenty - Point of View

  Chapter Twenty-one - False Serenity

  Chapter Twenty-two - Turning It Back

  Chapter Twenty-three - Into the Web

  Chapter Twenty-four - One Trick to Play

  Chapter Twenty-five - Connection and Coincidence

  Chapter Twenty-six - Eulogy

  About the Author

  Also by this Author

  Introduction to the Star Wars Expanded Universe

  Excerpt from Star Wars: Dark Tide I: Onslaught

  Introduction to the Old Republic

  Introduction to the Rise of the Empire

  Introduction to the Rebellion Era

  Introduction to the New Republic Era

  Introduction to the New Jedi Order Era

  Introduction to the Legacy Era

  Star Wars Novels Timeline

  ONE

  Fraying Fabric

  It was too peaceful out here, surrounded by the vacuum of space and with only the continual hum of the twin ion drives breaking the silence. While she loved these moments of peace, Leia Organa Solo also viewed them as an emotional trap, for she had been around long enough to understand the turmoil she would find at the end of this ride.

  Like the end of every ride, lately.

  Leia paused a moment before she entered the bridge of the Jade Sabre, the new shuttle her brother, Luke, had built for his wife, Mara Jade. Before her, and apparently oblivious to her, Mara and Jaina sat comfortably, side by side at the controls, talking and smiling. Leia focused on her daughter, Jaina, sixteen years old, but with the mature and calm demeanor of a veteran pilot. Jaina looked a lot like Leia, with long dark hair and brown eyes contrasting sharply with her smooth and creamy skin. Indeed, Leia saw much of herself in the girl—no, not girl, Leia corrected her own thoughts, but young woman. That same sparkle behind the brown eyes, mischievous, adventurous, determined.

  That notion set Leia back a bit, for she recognized then that when she looked at Jaina, she was seeing not a reflection of herself but an image of the girl she had once been. A twinge of sadness caught her as she considered her own life now: a diplomat, a bureaucrat, a mediator, always trying to calm things down, always working for the peace and prosperity of the New Republic. Did she miss the days when the most common noise around her had been the sharp blare of a blaster or the hiss of a lightsaber? Was she sorry that those wild times had been replaced by the droning of the ion drives and the sharp bickering of one pride-wounded emissary after another?

  Perhaps, Leia had to admit, but in looking at Jaina and those simmering dark eyes, she could take vicarious pleasure.

  Another twinge—jealousy?—caught her by surprise, as Mara and Jaina erupted into laughter over some joke Leia had not overheard. But she pushed the absurd notion far from her mind as she considered her sister-in-law, Luke’s wife and Jaina’s tutor—at Jaina’s own request—in the ways of the Jedi. Mara was not a substitute mother for Jaina, but rather a big sister, and when Leia considered the fires that constantly burned in Mara’s green eyes, she understood that the woman could give to Jaina things that Leia could not, and that those lessons and that friendship would prove valuable indeed to her daughter. And so she forced aside her jealousy and was merely glad that Jaina had found such a friend.

  She started onto the bridge, but paused again, sensing movement behind her. She knew before looking that it was Bolpuhr, her Noghri bodyguard, and barely gave him a glance as he glided to the side, moving so easily and gracefully that he reminded her of a lace curtain drifting lazily in a gentle breeze. She had accepted young Bolpuhr as her shadow for just that reason, for he was as unobtrusive as any bodyguard could be. Leia marveled at the young Noghri, at how his grace and silence covered a perfectly deadly fighting ability.

  She held up her hand, indica
ting that Bolpuhr should remain out here, and though his usually emotionless face did flash Leia a quick expression of disappointment, she knew he would obey. Bolpuhr, and all the Noghri, would do anything Leia asked of them. He would jump off a cliff or dive into the hot end of an ion engine for her, and the only time she ever saw any sign of discontentment with her orders was when Bolpuhr thought she might be placing him in a difficult position to properly defend her.

  As he was thinking now, Leia understood, though why in the world Bolpuhr would fear for her safety on her sister-in-law’s private shuttle was beyond her. Sometimes dedication could be taken a bit too far.

  With a nod to Bolpuhr, she turned back to the bridge and crossed through the open doorway. “How much longer?” she asked, and was amused to see both Jaina and Mara jump in surprise at her sudden appearance.

  In answer, Jaina increased the magnification on the forward screen, and instead of the unremarkable dots of light, there appeared an image of two planets, one mostly blue and white, the other reddish in hue, seemingly so close together that Leia wondered how it was that the blue-and-white one, the larger of the pair, had not grasped the other in its gravity and turned it into a moon. Parked halfway between them, perhaps a half a million kilometers from either, deck lights glittering in the shadows of the blue-and-white planet, loomed a Mon Calamari battle cruiser, the Mediator, one of the newest ships in the New Republic fleet.

  “They’re at their closest,” Mara observed, referring to the planets.

  “I beg your indulgence,” came a melodic voice from the doorway, and the protocol droid C-3PO walked into the room. “But I do not believe that is correct.”

  “Close enough,” Mara said. She turned to Jaina. “Both Rhommamool and Osarian are ground based, technologically—”

  “Rhommamool almost exclusively so!” C-3PO quickly added, drawing a scowl from all three of the women. Oblivious, he rambled on. “Even Osarian’s fleet must be considered marginal, at best. Unless, of course, one is using the Pantang Scale of Aero-techno Advancement, which counts even a simple landspeeder as highly as it would a Star Destroyer. Perfectly ridiculous scale.”

  “Thank you, Threepio,” Leia said, her tone indicating that she had heard more than enough.

  “They’ve both got missiles that can hit each other from this close distance, though,” Mara continued.

  “Oh, yes!” the droid exclaimed. “And given the proximity of their relative elliptical orbits—”

  “Thank you, Threepio,” Leia said.

  “—they will remain within striking distance for some time,” C-3PO continued without missing a beat. “Months, at least. In fact, they will be even closer in two standard weeks, the closest they will be to each other for a decade to come.”

  “Thank you, Threepio!” Mara and Leia said together.

  “And the closest they have been for a decade previous,” the droid had to slip in, as the women turned back to their conversation.

  Mara shook her head, trying to remember her original point to Jaina. “That’s why your mother chose to come out now.”

  “You’re expecting a fight?” Jaina asked, and neither Leia nor Mara missed the sparkle in her eye.

  “The Mediator will keep them behaving,” Leia said hopefully. Indeed, the battle cruiser was an impressive warship, an updated and more heavily armed and armored version of the Mon Calamari star cruiser.

  Mara looked back to the screen and shook her head, unconvinced. “It’ll take more than a show of force to stop this catastrophe,” she replied.

  “Indeed, it has been escalating, by all reports,” C-3PO piped up. “It started as a simple mining dispute over mineral rights, but now the rhetoric is more appropriate for some kind of a holy crusade.”

  “It’s the leader on Rhommamool,” Mara remarked. “Nom Anor. He’s reached down and grabbed his followers by their most basic instincts, weaving the dispute against Osarian into a more general matter of tyranny and oppression. Don’t underestimate him.”

  “I can’t begin to give you a full list of tyrants like Nom Anor that I’ve dealt with,” Leia said with a resigned shrug.

  “I have that very list available,” C-3PO blurted. “Tonkoss Rathba of—”

  “Thank you, Threepio,” Leia said, too politely.

  “Why, of course, Princess Leia,” the droid replied. “I do so like to be of service. Now where was I? Oh, yes. Tonkoss Rathba of—”

  “Not now, Threepio,” Leia insisted, then to Mara, she added, “I’ve seen his type often.”

  “Not like him,” Mara replied, somewhat softly, and the sudden weakness in her voice reminded Leia and Jaina that Mara, despite her nearly constant bravado and overabundance of energy, was seriously ill, with a strange and thankfully rare disease that had killed dozens of others and against which the best doctors in the New Republic had proven completely helpless. Of those who had contracted the molecular disorder, only Mara and one other remained alive, and that other person, being studied intently on Coruscant, was fast dying.

  “Daluba,” C-3PO went on. “And of course, there was Icknya—”

  Leia started to turn to the droid, hoping to politely but firmly shut him up, but Jaina’s cry stopped her abruptly and swung her back to face the screen.

  “Incoming ships!” Jaina announced, her voice full of surprise. The telltale blips had appeared on her sensor viewer as if from nowhere.

  “Four of them,” Mara confirmed. Even as she spoke, the warning buzzers began to go off. “From Osarian.” She turned her curious expression up to Leia. “They know who we are?”

  Leia nodded. “And they know why I’ve come.”

  “Then they should know to leave us alone,” Jaina reasoned.

  Leia nodded again, but understood better. She had come to the system not to meet with the Osarians—not at first, at least—but with their principal rival, Nom Anor, the cult figure stirring up trouble on Rhommamool. “Tell them to back off,” she instructed Mara.

  “Politely?” Mara asked, smiling, and with that dangerous twinkle in her eyes.

  “New Republic shuttle,” a halting voice crackled over the comm. “This is Captain Grappa of Osarian First-Force.”

  With a flick of a switch, Mara put an image of the captain on the viewscreen, and Leia sighed as the green skin, spiny head ridge, and tapirlike snout came into view.

  “Wonderful,” she remarked sarcastically.

  “The Osarians have hired Rodians?” Jaina asked.

  “Nothing like a few mercenaries to quiet things down,” Leia replied dryly.

  “Oh, dear me,” C-3PO remarked, and he shuffled aside nervously.

  “You come with us,” Grappa insisted, his multifaceted eyes sparkling eagerly. “To Osa-Prime.”

  “Seems the Osarians want to talk with you first,” Mara said.

  “They’re afraid that my meeting with Nom Anor will only heighten his stature, both among the Rhommamoolians and throughout the sector,” Leia reasoned, a notion not without credence, and one that she had debated endlessly before making the decision to come here.

  “Whatever the reason, they’re closing fast,” Mara replied. Both she and Jaina looked to Leia for instructions, for while the Jade Sabre was Mara’s ship, this was Leia’s mission.

  “Princess Leia?” an obviously alarmed C-3PO asked.

  Leia sat down in the chair behind Mara, intently studying the screen, which Jaina had switched back to a normal space view. The four approaching fighters were clearly visible.

  “Lose them,” she said determinedly, a request that neither of the pilots needed to hear twice. Indeed, Mara had been eager to put the shuttle, with its powerful twin engines and state-of-the-art maneuvering systems, through a real test.

  Green eyes sparkling, smile wide, Mara reached for the controls, but then retracted her hands and put them on her lap. “You heard her, Jaina,” she said.

  Jaina’s mouth dropped open; so did Leia’s.

  “You mean it?” Jaina asked.

  Ma
ra’s only reply was an almost bored expression, along with a slight yawn, as if this whole thing was no big deal, and certainly nothing that Jaina couldn’t easily handle.

  “Yes!” Jaina whispered, clenching her fists, wearing a smile nearly wide enough to take in her ears. She rubbed her hands together, then reached out to the right, rolling her fingers over the floating-ball control of the inertial compensator. “Strap in,” she ordered, and she dialed it down to 95 percent, as fighter pilots often did so that they could gain a tactile feel to the movements of their ships. Reading the g’s, Jaina had heard it called, and she always preferred flying that way, where fast turns and mighty acceleration could push her back in her seat.

  “Not too much,” Leia said with concern.

  But her daughter was in her element now, Leia knew, and she’d push the shuttle to its limits. Leia felt the lean as Jaina veered right, angling away from the approaching ships.

  “If you run, we shoot you down!” came the uneven voice of Grappa.

  “Z-95 Headhunters,” Mara said derisively of the closing craft, an antiquated starfighter, and she flipped off the comm switch and looked back at Leia. “Can’t shoot what you can’t catch,” she explained. “Kick them in,” she added to Jaina, motioning to the primary thrusters, thinking that a burst of the powerful engines would shoot the Jade Sabre right past the befuddled Rodians and their outdated starfighters.