Chapter 6

With the latest update from their off-world source, the news of the outbreak of war had been distracting to H’Tes. He knew many Jedi who would be sent off to fight this war. His good friends back in the Jedi Temple would be facing a vast army indeed. How would they be able to face the overwhelming numbers of battle droids that the Seps had at their command? The Jedi had no army and there were not enough of them to fight an entire army, especially one that was so well spread across the galaxy. Then only a months ago, he had also heard that the Jedi did in fact now have an army, some sort of clone army and this also bothered H’Tes as he sensed that this sudden convenience for the Jedi Council would not bode well for them at all in the future.
Sadly though, his thoughts for his Jedi colleagues would have to be put aside as he had a more important and immediate problem to deal with. He had managed to finish off the last parts of his new space ship, built from the scraps of debris scattered in orbit around Kessel, with a gentle rolling of his hand, the power source to his scrap-built starship hummed to life. H’Tes felt a rush of triumph as he powered down his ship and began to crawl out of his cramped hole to let his friends know that now was the time.
Cire and Luap continued to pick away at the solid rock with their mining pikes. Rocks crumbled to the ground as they slammed their pikes into the wall before them. Tiny glistening hints of spice also scattered across the ground and the two stopped working, motioned for the ‘spicer’ droid to hover over to them. They picked up the few pieces of solid spice and dropped them into the large spicer droids barrel. After the droid scuttled away, they turned back to see their small Aleena Jedi Master friend peaking out of the hole they had dug out for him.

The two friends demeanor changed as they watched the small Jedi crawl out of the hole smiling. “It’s done then.” was all Cire said as H’Tes nodded and the three began to dig away at the rockbed.

Far in the cozy lounge of Esuom Llams, a twi’lek dancer bowed and smiled at her master. He grinned at her evilly, but she merely nodded and grinned back, because she knew her freedom was within her grasp.

During her free time, something the entertainment girls all received to the chagrin of the other prisoners, Yas had been working very hard. During one of the many visits he made, General Grievous had locked away several destroyed lightsabers that he had removed from Jedi. The war had only been going on now for a few months, but already the Jedi were being decimated by the battle-hardened droid army. The news of the trophies of General Grievous, the leader of the Seps army, was also being spread quickly around the galaxy. He was collecting the lightsabers of the Jedi that he was responsible for slaying, or so they said anyway.

During one of her many entertainment venues around the prison luxury loungers, Yas had witnessed General Grievous storing a few of his more battered trophies behind a large base relief sculpture along one of the walls of Esuom Llams office. She had snuck back into the office later on and removed a few of his trophies hoping to repair them and make them full-functioning lightsabers again.

In her efforts, she crafted a red bladed lightsaber from a crudely built hilt. The hilt was rugged, almost rock like in texture, but it worked and the blade hummed a deep ominous red hue. She had also reworked a short green hued saber for the one who had been training her in the ways of the lightside of the Force through the Force. Now she had two working lightsabers, one red and one green. All she had to do was await her masters orders to attack.

Chapter 5

During one of Retsof’s numerous jobs, he stumbled upon a couple of dismantled HK droids. HK stood for Hunter Killer and this series of droids was centuries old and very unpleasant to come across when activated. After spending numerous hours working on them, he managed to get them both fully operative and completely loyal and protective of anyone whom he chose. This included himself of course and his trusted R5.

The four of them, heavily armed and ready for war, had intended to hijack a large cargo vessel when the news of the outbreak of war spread across the galaxy. This news meant many things, one was that droids were now unwanted guests in pretty much any quadrant of the galaxy. This made Retsof also of more value to the Seps now because his gift with droids was well known around Coruscant. He was quickly reassigned by some higher up senators to a droid battle ship. He was being delivered to Geonosis to help them develop newer and more powerful battle droids. Since he was reassigned at gun point, Retsof went willingly, he did however insist that his R5 astromech droid and his two HK droids join him. The HK’s he explained, would be used as examples of the kind of new battle droid he could create. The Seps were more than willing to allow them to follow him.

The new problem that Retsof faced now, was that Geonosis and Kessel were not all that close together, in fact, they were several weeks of hyperspace travel apart.

But, as usual, Retsof just did his duty and worked on repairing the droids throughout the battle cruiser he was aboard as it delivered him to Geonosis. After a few weeks of travelling through hyperspace from Coruscant, Retsof had managed to retool almost three quarters of the droids on board. He had worked non-stop, and by only sleeping a few hours a day, and having full access to the entire ship, he plan was starting to unfold.

As the droid battle cruiser neared Geonosis, his commanding droid officer made the sudden decision to make a stop at Kessel first and drop off a number of new battle droids to bulk up the security of Esuom Llams spice mining operation. Conveniently enough, Retsof had been ordered to make a routine repair check up on the commander a few hours before the order.

Now Retsof sat in his quarters, very crampled and uncomfortable quarters too, and he whistled softly to himself as he curled up to go to sleep. In a few weeks time, he would wake be plowing through space ship debris and this ship would be plummeting to its doom onto the spice mining world of Kessel.

Chapter 4

Retsof sat in the cantina sipping on his drink. His nozzle mouth slurped up the last few drops and he shoved the empty cup away from him across the table. He sat at his table with his trusted astromech droid, R5D5. Normally, no one was allowed to bring a droid into the bar, but Resof had rescued the barkeep on more than one occasion and so he was the only person allowed to bring a droid into the bar. It also helped that he was also the biggest creature in the entire cantina and no one wanted to mess with someone who had been known to pull off limbs when angered.

Retsof barely spoke, in fact, he only made soft twittering sounds with his tube-like mouth. No one usually tried to talk to him and he was pretty much just left alone most of the time. So today, like every other day, Retsof sat at his table, with his loyal R5 unit at his side, alone.

But today was not like any other day. Today, Retsof was going to do something he had never done before. Today, Retsof was going to steal a cargo ship, race it to the planet Kessel and crash it through the debris and onto its planets surface. After his little distraction, Retsof would crawl out and join his friends who were all imprisoned on the planet awaiting his arrival.

This plan had been in the works for a couple of years now. Retsof was working mindless jobs here or there and trying to get as much credits saved as he could so once his friends were freed, they could all escape and start a new life.

Retsof was a Talz, and for a Talz, he was immense. His entire body was covered in a thick greyish-white fur with his four black eyes resting in the middle of his face. He had fled his homeworld years ago and joined up with a couple of rogue gunrunners named, Cire and Luap. The two of them had a mishap with some Nemodian and when they were arrested, Retsof had managed to escape and avoid the battle droids.

Retsof had a gift with droids though. He could make any droid work the way he wanted them too. He had done this with the one battle droid commander who had discovered his hiding place over three years ago. Retsof had swiftly swung around and deactivated the droid, quickly reset his protocols and sent him on his way unharmed.
That was the same battle droid that escorted Cire and Luap to Kessel. The same battle droid that had sent off a silent distress beacon back to Retsof and the same battle droid that had made contact with Cire and Luap and informed them of his loyalty to them.

Retsof had stayed in communication with his friends through the Separatist droid network communications grid that he had built under the floor of his modest apartment here on Coruscant. His colleagues had informed him of their new Jedi Master friend, the ship he was building, and their goal to escape. The plan was going very smoothly until they realized that the entire planet was surrounded by ship debris and no one could escape through it and go into hyperdrive without destroying themselves. That was when Retsof knew he needed to clear a path for his friends and the only way to do that was to hijack a large cruiser and force its way through the junk orbiting Kessel. With a path cleared, Cire, Luap and their other new friends could make the jump to hyperspace and escape for good.
Retsof ordered another drink as he purred quietly himself. Soon, he would be reunited with his friends, soon, he would get himself a ship and get them off of Kessel and set them all free. Soon.

Chapter 3

Yas D’nil Blu, a beautiful twi’lek, sat on the floor in her masters office. She had only been in Kessel for a little over a year now, but she knew she needed to get out of this place fast. She was one of many girls who were too pretty to do manual labour. Instead, all the pretty ones were shoved into a large room, scrubbed down, given dresses and were made to entertain their masters and their guests.

The Separatists had invaded Kessel several years ago and chased out the notorious Hutt gangster, Yzzed and his syndicate of criminals. Esuom Llams was a cowardly Nemodian who had lead the attack hidden in his massive battle ships. They had sent in hundreds of droid fighters to clear a path for the enormous battle cruisers and within a few days, Esuom sat in the office of the former owner/operator, Yzzed. Esuom had changed some things about Kessel, he had added a couple of extra hours per day of labour, and he had made the meals smaller to save monies, but one thing he kept of his predecessor was the entertainment.

Yzzed the Hutt had many, many females who danced for him, served him food, and cleaned for him. He never had any males around him but for a select few enforcers, namely his head honcho, Olim.

Yzzed and Olim were a team and together, they had become one of the most powerful criminal organizations this side of Black Sun. They had even crippled Black Sun, another criminal syndicate, when they started running Kessel years ago. They had the only strong source of spice in the known galaxy and they sold it for a very handsome profit. However, their power soon became noticed by others who were equally greedy and that was when Esuom Llams made his move and took over the spice mines of Kessel.

Sitting on the floor, having just danced for several onlookers, Yas was tired. Her red skin was spotted with perspiration as she panted and caught her breath. All over Yas’ body were tattoos. Prior to her imprisonment on Kessel, Yas had been a dark Jedi. She had been trained in the ways of the force by one who had twisted her and taught her that the darkside was good. It wasn’t until Yas had been sent on a mission to assassinate a Republic senator, Atina, a Corellian queen, that Yas realized how much she had been brainwashed by her former master.

She had fled the scene, leaving the queen alive and well, but she was quickly captured by the Separatists. Apparently, her mast had been working with the Seps, and because she had failed to kill the queen of Corellia, she was sent to live the rest of her life as a slave girl on Kessel.

Yas took the mug of jawa juice that was handed to her. She took a long drink and let her mind clear and she closed her eyes and focussed on the Force. She had been using the Force to clear her mind and to released herself, mentally, from her enslavement. Shortly after her arrival, she had discovered another force-user on the planet. She had never met him, but through the force, he had helped her control her anger, her rage, and her fury and she had submitted to his teachings and meditations. She considered herself to be his pupil, even though she had never seen him before. She knew of his quest to build his starship and she knew he had friends helping him do this. She also knew that the ship was almost ready to take flight which meant that her assignment was about to begin and she was going to escape this rock and join her new master and together they would be free.

Chapter 2

Cire, a battle-scarred Weequay, sat down with his tray of mush before him. He grunted unpleasantly to the prisoner to his right and the Verpine twittered at him angrily but walked away leaving the space for Luap.

Luap was a Klaatu, and a large one at that. His dark scaled green skin was covered in the dust from digging away at the mines far below where he rested now. His hands were cracked and calloused from his hard work but he knew his efforts would pay off.

Cire’s hands looked similar to Luap’s. Except his flesh was a rusty brown colour and where Luap had no hair, Cire had long braids down his back, now matted and coated in dust.

The two friends sat down and at their meal silently. Across from them sat the perspiring H’Tes, their Jedi Master friend and the one the were working so hard to protect. Three years ago Cire and Luap were sentenced to work the mines of Kessel because they had a run in with a Nemodian Senator known as Nute Gunray. The Nemodian had them arrested and imprisoned almost immediately and since then, the two childhood friends had been slaving away at digging up spice.

Finally a little over two years ago, a small Aleena was dragged in, he had been severely beaten and was close to death, but he had a drive to live. Cire and Luap nursed him back to health, mostly because they had nothing else to do except mine spices. The two of them had earned a weeks worth of medlab time where they tended to the wounded prisoners. During that time, they became friends with the Aleena who turned out to be a most powerful Jedi Master.

So powerful, that he could see past the layers of rock above them and far into space where the ship graveyard orbited them. After a discussion occurred, the three agreed to forge an escape plan.

For the past two years, Cire and Luap had been working harder than the other prisoners so H’Tes could focus on the Force and build them a ship.

Cire finished off his last mouthful of grub. Luap licked his plate clean, like he always did, and then he lifted H’Tes onto his back and the three friends got into the line up that would march them back down to the mine shafts where they would work like dogs for the next several hours until supper chow. Every day was the same, but every day brought these three friends more hope, hope that one day soon, their ship would be ready and they would escape to freedom.

Chapter 1

H’Tes sat patiently. His eyes closed tightly, his hands stretched out reaching for air and his mind locked into the Force. The small Aleena focused every ounce of his energy on the Force, letting it run through his body, through his mind as he manipulated it and controlled it.
H’Tes had been sitting in this spot for a few months now. Every morning he would walk out with the other prisoners and once the guard droids were not looking, he would squirm his way through the tiny holes his friends had dug out for him. He had been crawling into these tiny, cramped spaces now for over two years. The same routine everyday.
After morning chow the prisoners would be marched down into the spice mines and forced to work until lunch chow, then repeated again until dinner chow. After dinner they worked again for a few hours and then were marched back to their worn out cots and collapsed in exhaustion. H’Tes also collapsed in exhaustion but not from the manual labours that his peers were undergoing.
No, H’Tes collapsed because for every hour his peers dug away into the cave walls searching for the highly prized drug-of-choice called Spice, H’Tes was using the Force. For the past two years H’Tes had been using every essence of the Force that he could muster. Every ounce of power that he held, and being a Jedi Master, H’Tes was very, very powerful, was used to create something over a thousand miles away.
Far into the orbit of Kessel, floating debris of shattered spacecraft hovered. A starship graveyard that had been added to for centuries. Hundreds and thousands of destroyed crafts hung lifeless orbiting the planet Kessel, creating a protective sphere of garbage all around it making it impossible for large ships to charge through without joining the debris themselves.
Back in his hole, H’Tes twitched his clawed finger slightly and far off into the debris, a massive hyperdrive engine drifted through space and landed gently into the socket of the vessel he was building.
For over two years, H’Tes had been using the Force to build a spaceship thousands of miles away from where he sat. It would only be a few days now before his ship was complete and the escape plan would be unfolded.