The Rise of the Empire

by John Jackson Miller

  “What is it?”

  “Whoever they are, they are resourceful.” The Dark Lord turned slowly from the viewports. “They have jettisoned the meditation chamber.”

  The voice of the starfighter squadron commander issued from the enunciator. “Lord Vader, our scanners have detected an object—”

  “Commander, order your pilots to open fire along that vector—lasers and proton torpedoes if they have them.”

  “Lord Vader, we have a detonation,” the commander said a moment later.

  Tarkin leapt from the chair to stand alongside Vader. “Did they hit the Carrion Spike?”

  The answer was slow to arrive. “Lord Vader,” the commander said, “the enemy has taken out the system hyperspace buoy. Our sensors are also picking up wake rotation readings.”

  “They have jumped to lightspeed,” Vader said.

  Tarkin ran a hand over his high forehead. “Then they’ve managed to make themselves untraceable, as well as invisible.”

  ITS TIERED ROOF a canopy of scanner, sensor, and communications arrays, Naval Intelligence headquarters heaved from Coruscant’s metallic crust as if thrust up by tectonic forces from the depths of the planet. Along with the Palace and the byzantine COMPNOR arcology—which housed the Imperial Security Bureau, the Ubiqtorate, and other ambiguous organizations—Naval Intelligence was the third point of the Federal District’s supreme triangle. The fact that the shielded, hardened, near-windowless complex more resembled a prison than a fortress had given rise to speculation that its sheer walls were designed as much to keep the agency’s staff of tens of thousands of military officers inside as to keep ordinary Coruscanti out.

  Constructed soon after the end of the war atop monads that had once made up the Republic’s strategic center, Naval Intelligence was a nexus for gathering and analyzing transmissions that poured in from across the ecumenopolis and from all sectors of the expanding Empire. And yet its operations were not conducted in complete secrecy. During the construction phase, micro-holocams had been installed in every nook and cranny so that the actions and conversations of every staffer could be monitored at any hour of the day or night; not by the members of the Senate’s various oversight committees, however, but by the Emperor and the most trusted members of the Ruling Council. Everyone involved with Naval Intelligence knew that the cams were there and had gradually grown accustomed to their presence. While the officers and others no longer played to the spy eyes as they had early on, they went about their business well aware that at any given moment they might be on stage.

  Just now the Joint Chiefs of the Empire’s military were gathered—Admiral Antonio Motti, General Cassio Tagge, Rear Admirals Ozzel, Jerjerrod, and others—along with several top officers from COMPNOR, including Director Armand Isard, ISB deputy director Harus Ison, and Colonel Wullf Yularen. Naval Intelligence was represented by Vice Admirals Rancit and Screed, who had requested the meeting.

  With the bright light of late afternoon pouring through the tall windows of the Palace spire’s pinnacle room, Sidious studied their holograms from his chair, using controls in the armrest to choose from among several cams and to provide alternative vantages. The droid, 11-4D, stood by him, one of its appendages plugged into an interface socket that routed holofeeds to the summit from what had been a Jedi communications suite in the base of the spire.

  “Tint the windows,” Sidious said without taking his gaze from the projected holograms.

  “Of course, Your Majesty.”

  With the daylight dimmed, the cyan-hued holograms acquired more detail. The intelligence officers had asked for an audience in the Palace, but Sidious had turned them down. Similarly he had declined to attend their meeting virtually. As nettlesome as it was to have learned that the dissidents in possession of Tarkin’s starship had embarked on a killing spree in the Outer Rim, Sidious found the cachet-driven spitefulness of the intelligence chiefs to be even more tedious. So he had dispatched Mas Amedda and Ars Dangor in his stead.

  “I accept the dissidents have managed to wreak havoc in an isolated star system,” Ison was saying, “but the fact remains that they brought only one ship to bear on our facility.”

  “One ship capable of hiding itself from scanners,” Rancit said, “outmaneuvering our starfighters, outracing a Star Destroyer…”

  “Permit me to amend my statement, then,” Ison continued as Rancit allowed his words to trail off. “One fast and powerful ship. Still, they used it to launch an attack on an unimportant outpost.”

  “The start of a campaign of destruction,” Screed interjected.

  The officers were grouped around a large circular table, with Mas Amedda and Ars Dangor occupying prominent seats. Above the center of the table floated 3-D star maps, wire-frame displays, and plotting panels, some showing the locations of Outer Rim bases and installations, others the disposition of ships of the fleet, with symbols denoting Star Destroyers, Dreadnoughts, corvettes, and frigates, on down to pickets and gunboats.

  “We’ve no proof that the shipjackers are on a campaign,” Ison said, taking up the challenge. “Targeting the space station may have been their way of evading capture by Governor Tarkin and Lord Vader.”

  “As a diversion, in other words?” Screed said in elaborate disbelief, his ocular implant glinting in the light from the holograms. “Governor Tarkin came close to losing his life to his own ship. Given his experience and expertise, we have to assume that the Carrion Spike is in the hands of a very competent and dangerous group.”

  “I’ve known Governor Tarkin for over twenty years,” Rancit said in reinforcement, “and I can assure you that if he considers the group to pose a serious threat to the Empire, then they are nothing less.”

  Ison blew out his breath and shook his head. “Repositioning our resources from Belderone to fortify a couple of minor installations was reckless. We can’t run the risk of curtailing pacification campaigns or hunting down former Separatists for a strategy of defeat-in-detail at the edge of civilized space.”

  “And what if the shipjackers’ campaign should expand into the Mid Rim?” Rancit said. “The ship gives them the ability to strike almost anywhere in the galaxy.”

  Ison gaped at him for a long moment. “Is it the navy’s aim, then, to redeploy the entire fleet to effect system-denial to a handful of dissidents?”

  “In major star systems, yes,” Rancit said. “Should the situation warrant it.”

  Rear Admiral Motti spoke to it. “At the risk of sounding too cavalier about this, Governor Tarkin’s ship does not have unlimited firepower.” The traditional cut of his brown hair and the boyish features of his clean-shaven face belied an attitude of perpetual sarcasm. “Whatever course we take, the ship will eventually cease to be a threat.”

  “I concur,” Ison chimed in. “It’s one ship. I recommend we let it go.”

  Mas Amedda came to his feet in anger. “Clearly all of you are oblivious to the real danger posed by this group of privateers. We are not concerned about remote outposts or even important installations. The ship must be captured or destroyed because of the danger it poses to the Emperor’s unchallengeable reign!”

  “That is just the point I was about to make, Vizier,” Rancit said when voices around the table had quieted. He was facing Amedda, but in such a way that he seemed to be speaking more to one of the monitoring cams, as if aware that Sidious was observing, and addressing him directly. “Imperial Security initially stressed that the communications cache on Murkhana could potentially be used to disseminate anti-Imperial propaganda. Now Deputy Director Ison fails to grasp that the intent of the dissidents may be to use Governor Tarkin’s ship for that very purpose.”

  Raven-haired man’s man Director Armand Isard was about to intervene when a junior intelligence officer seated at a comm board spoke first. “Sirs, sorry to interrupt, but we’re receiving reports of another unprovoked attack in the Outer Rim.”

  “Nam Chorios,” Screed said. “Just as Governor Tarkin predicted.”

&n
bsp; “No, Admiral,” the comm officer said. “Lucazec.”

  It was General Tagge’s turn to rush to his feet. The scion of a wealthy, influential family, he was tall and thickly built, with a broad face defined by long, flaring sideburns. “TaggeCo has operations at Lucazec!”

  “We’re in reception of a live holofeed,” the junior officer updated.

  Rancit had amplified an area of the star map and was gazing up into it. “They’ve jumped clear across the sector, inward of the Perlemian Trade Route!” He looked at Motti. “Do we have any resources there?”

  Motti had a datapad in hand and was gazing at the device’s display screen. “A small garrison of ground troops and a squadron of V-wing starfighters protecting TaggeCo’s mining interests.”

  “The holofeed is streaming,” the junior officer said.

  Above the table’s inset projector a holographic video of the attack resolved and stabilized. Centered in the field floated TaggeCo’s city-sized orbital processing plant, an entire section of it engulfed by spherical explosions, the company logo effaced by melted metal. Quanta of unleashed energy were raining down on the facility, blowing chunks of it into local space. Drifting into view between the continuous barrage of beams were pieces of V-wing starfighters and prosaic ore haulers, one of which was falling toward dun-colored Lucazec in flames, its ablative shields glowing red hot. Farther below, clouds of thick black smoke were coiling into the smudged sky.

  “They’ve targeted surface operations, as well,” Tagge said, still on his feet and clenching and unclenching his hand.

  Ison glanced from him to the junior officer at the comm board in visible alarm. “Who’s transmitting this holovid? Is it being sent live by an orbital facility? An outlying ship?”

  “The transmission is arriving on an Imperial HoloNet frequency,” the junior officer said.

  “Yes,” Ison said, “but the point of view…It looks as if one of our own ships is the aggressor.”

  Screed and Motti traded worried glances.

  In the summit of the Palace spire, Sidious sat back into his chair, folding his arms across his chest as sinuous currents of the dark side played through him, and as if he meant to contain them.

  “Have you puzzled out what is happening, droid?” he asked.

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” 11-4D said, simultaneous with a further update from the junior officer.

  “Sirs, we have confirmation that the holovid is being transmitted by the Carrion Spike.”

  Sidious swiveled toward the tinted windows, behind which the sky above and Coruscant below were the color of ash. Narrowing his gaze, he reached out for Darth Vader, whom he sensed was observing the holovid, as well.

  Yes, Lord Vader, Sidious sent through the Force, you shall have your starfighter.

  —

  Moving with fierce purpose, Tarkin exited the Liberator’s hangar command post and walked briskly along the dorsal flight deck, passing starfighters and ground-effect vehicles as he closed on the shuttle craft awaiting him. The Star Destroyer’s massive overhead doors were closed, and the light on the flight deck was dim. The captain of the Liberator was standing at the foot of the shuttle’s boarding ramp. A short man with gray hair and a meticulously trimmed beard, he saluted as Tarkin approached.

  “Sorry we couldn’t be of more help, Governor Tarkin.”

  Tarkin gestured in dismissal. “You’re not to blame, Commander. You came when called, and for that alone you have my gratitude.”

  The commander nodded. “Thank you, sir.”

  Tarkin extended his hand, and the commander shook it decorously. “Are you returning to Belderone base?” Tarkin asked.

  “No, sir. Coruscant has ordered us to jump directly to Ord Cestus.”

  Tarkin’s brow furrowed in question. “Why so far down the Perlemian?”

  “Triage redeployments,” the commander said, “as a result of what happened at Lucazec, I suppose. The same at Centares and Lantillies. No telling where your—uh, the missing ship is going to revert next.”

  “Perhaps,” Tarkin said, and let it go at that.

  He ascended the boarding ramp and walked aft, settling into a seat in the main cabin, the Theta-class shuttle’s only passenger. High overhead, the Liberator’s hangar doors parted down the middle and retracted, and the shuttle rose off its skids on repulsorlift power, dropped its wings, and sped toward its rendezvous point, a pod-shaped support carrier named the Goliath, which had recently arrived from deepdock at Ord Mantell. Tarkin had a port-side glimpse of bleak Nam Chorios as the shuttle angled away from the Star Destroyer, the system’s sun providing barely enough light to illuminate the planet let alone warm it to human standards.

  Tarkin turned inward to consider the commander’s remarks. Capital ships redeploying from bases as distant as Centares and Lantillies, all because of the Carrion Spike. He trusted that naval command knew better than to disperse the fleet too thinly, though there was no denying that the shipjackers had once again taken everyone by surprise.

  That might not have been the case if Coruscant had placed Lucazec on alert, but no one, including Tarkin, had given much thought to the possibility that the dissidents would target a lightly defended TaggeCo mining concern. Entering the star system with an altered transponder signature but transmitting authentic Imperial codes, the Carrion Spike had opened fire on both the orbital facility and groundside operations before Lucazec could react. Jova would have applauded the shipjackers’ tactics, the idea of masking oneself in the scent of one’s enemy.

  He could still summon the odors of musky excretions he had been forced to smear over himself during hunts or surveillance exercises on the plateau. The rodent Jova had struck with the airspeeder one night had only been the beginning. After that had come the dizzying, often nauseating scents of sly vulpines, antlered ruminants, squat felines…But in countless situations the excretions had given them the upper hand, allowing them to kill or infiltrate as needed.

  Except at the Spike. But of course that wasn’t the idea.

  At Lucazec, the shipjackers hadn’t even bothered to activate the Carrion Spike’s stealth systems until they had reached their target. They were experimenting, perhaps in preparation for their next attack. Deflector shields had protected the mining facility for a time, but its fate had been sealed. The destruction and casualties the ship had left in her wake were consistent with what she had wrought at Galidraan.

  When the shipjackers’ HoloNet transmission had been received by the Liberator, Tarkin had tried to convince himself that it was another counterfeit, that the holovid had been cobbled together from wartime news feeds and created images, as had been the case at Sentinel and on Murkhana. In his eagerness to prove himself correct—and to the bewilderment of some of the Liberator’s petty officers—he had practically placed himself inside the blue holofield, searching for evidence of corruption that would have identified the feed as a fake. But he found no such signs. It had taken some time to disabuse himself of the notion that the shipjackers were deliberately provoking him, and to accept that they were merely making use of the Carrion Spike’s sophisticated communications suite to call attention to their agenda, as Count Dooku had managed to do early on in the Clone Wars. And like Dooku, the shipjackers had succeeded in broadcasting the Lucazec holovid live over civilian HoloNet frequencies to thousands of Outer and Mid Rim star systems before Coruscant was able to shut down vast portions of the communications grid.

  Still, the damage had been done. According to the latest reports from Naval Intelligence, the shipjackers were already attracting media attention in some of the outer systems, and certain members of the Ruling Council were worried about blowback: that disaffected factions might begin to think that the Empire was vulnerable, and that imitators would spring up, convinced that they, too, could make themselves heard far and wide.

  Tarkin had also learned that the contentious debate between Imperial Security and Naval Intelligence on how best to proceed had yet to subside, especially with the Carrio
n Spike on the loose once more, hiding in hyperspace or lurking in some remote or unpopulated star system. It appeared, however, that Vice Admirals Rancit and Screed were currently the gears getting the most grease, as the Admiralty had been granted permission by the Emperor to deploy forces to unprotected worlds along the Perlemian Trade Route and the Hydian Way. That, in any case, was how the Goliath came to be at Nam Chorios, and apparently why the Liberator had been deemed needed at Ord Cestus.

  No sooner had the support carrier arrived than Vader had had himself ferried aboard, as it had brought from Coruscant his personal starfighter.

  Tarkin had been busy since he and Vader had parted company, speaking with Commander Cassel at Sentinel Base, with intelligence assets on Murkhana, and with the commanders of Imperial posts throughout the sector; and as well with Wullf Yularen—who had his hands full keeping the peace among the intelligence agencies. Tarkin had spent the past ten hours in the Liberator’s data center, poring over star maps and charts and performing complex calculations.

  He needed sleep, but sleep would have to wait until after he met with Vader.

  The shuttle’s wings folded upward as it lazed through a magcon field into the support escort’s main hangar. The ship’s commander and a dozen of his top officers and black-uniformed noncoms were standing eyes-front on the deck as Tarkin descended the ramp. Alongside the group stood a full company of stormtroopers, in addition to Sergeant Crest and the remaining six members of Vader’s personal detail.

  “Welcome aboard, Governor Tarkin,” the commander said, stepping out of line to greet him.

  “Good to see you again, Ros. I wish it were under better circumstances.”

  “We’ll just have to make them better.”

  Tarkin smiled without amusement “Where is Lord Vader?”

  “Starfighter bay. I’ll escort you.” The commander turned to dismiss the others, then gestured politely to Tarkin and set off across the deck.