Tales from a Galaxy Far, Far Away

The Face of Evil

All Creatures Great and Small

The Crimson Corsair and the Lost Treasure of Count Dooku

High Noon on Jakku

© & TM 2015 Lucasfilm Ltd.

All rights reserved. Published by Disney • Lucasfilm Press, an imprint of Disney Book Group. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. For information address Disney • Lucasfilm Press, 1101 Flower Street, Glendale, California 91201.

ISBN 978-1-4847-5686-7

Designed by Gegham Vardanyan

Visit the official Star Wars website at: www.starwars.com.

Do not wait for opportunity to strike. Steal it instead!

—The Book of Hondo

Contents

Title Page

Tales from a Galaxy Far, Far Away

Copyright

Epigraph

Prologue

Chapter 01

Chapter 02

Chapter 03

Chapter 04

Chapter 05

Chapter 06

Chapter 07

Chapter 08

Chapter 09

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

A LONG TIME AGO…

The battle droid designated B1-CC14 focused its photoreceptors and scanned the ruins of the Separatist cruiser’s bridge. There was very little positive information for the droid to process. The Republic gunships had come out of nowhere, dropping from lightspeed into a sector previously believed to be off the grid. The battle cruiser had little opportunity to raise its defenses.

Fire erupted from a nearby console. B1-CC14 heard an MSE droid scream in panic as it searched for a safe haven that did not exist. The ship was doomed.

Tilting his bone-white elongated face, B1-CC14 accessed multiple simulations. Only one had any reasonable percentage of a chance for a desirable outcome.

“Programming primary hyperdrive to activate. Coordinates random,” B1-CC14 said to no one in particular.

The droid knew that what it was doing was generally considered to be a very bad idea; blasting into hyperspace without a set of preprogrammed coordinates was almost certainly going to lead to the battle cruiser’s total destruction. But given the value of the cargo on board…B1-CC14 had been programmed with very specific orders. Under no circumstances could Count Dooku’s prize be seized.

B1-CC14 pulled back on the hyperdrive lever, and the stars in the cracked viewscreen began to warp. The computer beeped and chirped in droidspeak, delivering a torrent of discouraging data.

B1-CC14 complied with protocol, initiating the homing beacon and broadcasting a heavily encrypted message on Confederacy frequencies. It was a useless gesture, the droid knew. There was no salvation for the ruined ship. But protocols were written for a reason and B1-CC14 followed his orders, always. Then, feeling a need to answer the robust computer system that was struggling pointlessly to take the ship somewhere safe, the droid vocalized a response.

“Roger, rog—”

Sadly, however B1-CC14 was going to complete that sentiment will likely never be known; it was at that moment that the massive Confederacy battle cruiser abruptly dropped back out of lightspeed and crashed directly into the sunbaked southern hemisphere of a remote desert planet on the far Outer Rim.

And B1-CC14, the Separatist cruiser, and the precious cargo that it carried, were considered lost forever and were forgotten. And the Clone Wars raged on without them.

SEVERAL DECADES and quite a few wars later…

From within the shade of the derelict bar that the crew of the Meson Martinet called home, Quiggold sighed heavily. The planet Ponemah was not known for its hospitable climate. Nor was it renowned for its incredible wealth of goods and resources. It did, however, have a vast overabundance of one thing: sand.

Yes, even by the standards of the many dry and hot desert worlds that seemed more and more commonplace throughout the galaxy, the Gabdorin pirate thought, Ponemah was particularly overrun with an excess of sand.

Quiggold unceremoniously shook some of the aforementioned sand from his thick sandal and wiped his nostril ridges clean with the heavy sleeve of his tunic. Months of desert living had not been kind to the large, roundheaded Gabdorin, an amphibian from a wet world.

A tall and thin cloaked figure leaned against a nearby wall, his face impossible to read under the red Kaleesh mask he always wore. His name was Sidon Ithano—though most simply referred to him as the Crimson Corsair—and he was waiting with a cool patience that seemed out of place on the uncomfortable world of Ponemah.

“Well…it’s an old signal,” an Ishi Tib by the name of Pendewqell said, uncomfortable under the cold gaze of the red-masked pirate captain. Pendewqell was hovering near a large piece of equipment the crew had salvaged—a signal receiver capable of picking up almost any open transmission on the planet.

“Like…‘Clone Wars’ old,” Pendewqell continued. “We picked it up…” he said, tapping the receiver. “Probably no one else has decoded it yet. Here…”

Quiggold pressed a button on the ancient receiver system, initiating playback. The sound was broken and filled with bursts of static, but overall the message was audible: “—have sustained heavy damage en route to the palace of Count Dooku on Serenno. The Count’s cargo is intact and must be retrieved.”

The broadcast continued. “All Separatist ships…this is a code three mission. Mayday. Mayday. This is B1-CC14 of the cruiser Obrexta III. We have sustained heavy—”

With an abrupt crack of static, the message went dead. The crew exchanged glances. There were six of them in all: the Corsair, Quiggold, Pendewqell, an Arcona named Reeg Brosna, a red-skinned female Twi’lek called Reveth, and an axe-wielding but surprisingly friendly Gamorrean nicknamed Squeaky.

The Crimson Corsair eyed the Gabdorin. Quiggold felt his massive sweat glands tingle. But it didn’t matter. He turned toward the Ishi Tib and asked the question he knew the captain wanted answered: “You sure about this, Pen? Big waste if you’re wrong….”

Pendewqell grimaced and turned to face the Crimson Corsair.

“Captain, listen…that’s what we’ve been waiting for.” The Ishi Tib licked his beak. “The lost treasures of Count Dooku…ours for the taking.

“This is our big score. I know it.”

UNFORTUNATELY for the Corsair’s crew, they were not the only group to pick up and decode the signal. That was unsurprising, really: the population of Ponemah comprised mostly scavengers and mercenaries—pirates, thieves, and outlaws of all kinds, always on the lookout for the next score. Any and every broadcast on the planet would eventually be picked up and distributed across the grid.

The broadcast originated from the southern hemisphere of the planet, a region known as the Sea of Sand. It was an unpopulated sector of the desert world, for as inhospitable as the northern section was, the area in the region of the Southern Pole was particularly nasty: fifteen-meter waves of caustic sand continually rose and cascaded down again, intermittent lava geysers randomly peppered the already dangerous landscape, and the sky…the sky was filled with a never-ending storm of ionic lightning. Flight was impossible. Cruisers would be swallowed instantly. The only vehicles that could manage the hellish sea were repulsor skiffs; they could surf the waves, provided they weren’t disrupted by a stray ionic bolt or blasted apart by the turbulent lava geysers.

And then there were the worms.

There was little indigenous life on Ponemah, but as any colonist or pirate worth his salt might tell you, there is life everywhere—and it usually wants to eat you.

No one knew how big the worms could grow. The largest known beast (found dead on the shores of the Sea of Sand) measured over ninety meters long, with a mouth that was nine meters wide. And if all that weren’t bad enough, it was said the creatures could spit acid.

Generally, they were avoided. Generally, the entire territory was avoided.

But no one lived on Ponemah because they were rich. The chance—even a life-risking, meager chance—of attaining wealth, of finding a buried treasure like the one promised by the Separatist battleship? Impossible to resist.

So they sailed forth, rushing to be the first to reach the prize. Scorza and his Weequay gang. The one-eyed Ortolan. Plus the Gray Gundarks, Toltek the Devaronian…

The race was officially on.

QUIGGOLD, along with several other crew members, sat in the shade of the massive solar panel sails on the top of the Shrike—a retrofitted sail barge painted blood red, with the two-eyed flag of the Corsair flying from its mast. Years before, those barges were used mostly as pleasure vehicles. Though largely considered out of date, the heavy armor and strong engines on the easily customized vessels made them excellent for pirates and other criminal groups.

“But what could it be?” asked Reeg Brosna. The Arcona’s triangular head was hidden under a heavy hood for extra shade. Despite belonging to a desert species, Reeg looked far more uncomfortable in the heat than Quiggold did. “The Clone Wars is ancient history. What could possibly be intact on that ship that would matter now?”

“Ha!” Pendewqell yawped. “I imagine you never heard the stories. Old pirates like to tell them after too many drinks in the cantinas. What was the most valuable of prizes during the Clone Wars?”

Reveth shrugged, her red lekku swaying back and forth. “Credits? Pre-Empire would be mostly worthless now…Aurodium?” she mused. “Wupiupi coins?”

Quiggold nodded. He knew the stories as well as anyone. He leaned in and whispered conspiratorially, “Lightsaber crystals. Ripped from the weapons of the fallen Jedi during the wars. Even one is worth a fortune, and Count Dooku is said to have collected them all…but when he fell, no one ever found them. This ship…this could be where they went. I suppose. But it’s just a story….”

The Ishi Tib looked flustered, and his beak clattered nervously. “We know the ship was carrying a treasure for Dooku—it has to be the lost crystals!”

Quiggold stared toward the bow of the barge. The captain stood there, staring out across the endless expanse of sand, his cape billowing in the breeze.

“You’d best be right about this, Pen,” the first mate said, rubbing the prayer beads he always carried. “You’d best be right or there’ll be dark sailing ahead.”

SCORZA HATED being second.

The aging Weequay climbed up the ladder from the hold of the battered sand skiff he had commandeered, his leathered face and sunken eyes giving him a permanent expression of anger. The rig hadn’t come cheap, but it didn’t matter; it was fast. Faster than the old junk heap the Corsair was sailing, anyway.

Scorza and Sidon Ithano had served together years earlier, back on the ill-fated Outer Rim cruiser named the New Gilliland. The Gilliland had burned after a particularly nasty run-in with the Hutt syndicate, and yet somehow, against all reason, the Corsair had not only survived the ordeal but had gotten out with enough plunder to finance his own gang—a gang that Ithano had stubbornly refused to invite Scorza to join!

Scorza growled to himself, deep in thought. Yes, maybe he had been the one to betray the New Gilliland to the Hutts in the first place, but business was business. The Corsair had a nasty habit of making things personal.

Ever since, Scorza had always found himself one step behind the captain of the Meson Martinet. Well, not that day. That day the Weequay and his crew were ready to strike. A monitoring beacon hidden on the Martinet had alerted Scorza’s crew to the broadcast. There was no way Scorza was going to miss that haul; no way would he come in second to the Crimson Corsair again.

“Sir?” The voice belonged to C5-D9, a bright-green-and-purple protocol droid that served as cabin boy and general messenger to Scorza and his crew.

“Sir?” the droid continued, in a deeply polite baritone voice. “I have the sad duty to report that we are far behind the trail of Sidon Ithano, and according to long-range sensors, he is already preparing to enter the Sea of Sand.”

The Weequay captain rubbed his temples fiercely. “I thought this ship was fast. I thought we were supposed to reach the sea hours before anyone else could.”

“It seems…” the droid said, “that we have been misinformed, and that the Crimson Corsair’s barge has been outfitted with an aftermarket set of illegal repulsor boosters. Honestly, it’s really not fair. No, not fair at all.”

The droid angled his head quizzically. “Would you like me to send a message and see if they will wait?”

Scorza’s crew knew better than to complain when he threw C5-D9 overboard.

THE BIKER gang known as the Gray Gundarks, a gang made up of a dozen species—none of which were actually gundarks—revved their speeders. They knew they had intercepted the signal late. They knew that it had taken time for them to decode the ancient encryption system of the Clone Wars–era battle cruiser.

Didn’t matter.

Too many pirate crews had intercepted the brief broadcast. Too many old rivalries would resurface and soon…soon it wouldn’t just be a race to the prize. No…

It would be a full-on pirate war. Chaos. Explosions.

The Gray Gundarks weren’t about to miss that kind of fun.

THE ORTOLAN known as One-Eye sat within the bowels of his massive heavily armored and heavily air-conditioned sandcrawler.

He was in the circular control station, scanning the data with his one good eye. His vehicle was slow, yes. But it was sturdy. The Sea of Sand was a nightmare to traverse, and few ever returned from that hell alive.

But none of them had a reconditioned war-grade sandcrawler.

The crawler had been refitted a dozen times over; it could withstand ionic lightning, caustic sand, intense heat. There wasn’t a storm on the planet that could crack the hull of the beastly vehicle.

One-Eye pressed a button on the keyboard to his left, and the music of his people blasted through the crawler’s comm system. Most Ortolans were gifted with an acute sense of hearing—but not One-Eye. The same explosion that had cost him his eye had also made him a bit deaf.

The crawler pressed forward. It was an imposing sight: painted with an angry-looking Ortolan skull on the side, bursting with flames from its aftermarket engines, and blasting the thunderous tones through gigantic speakers—“music” that could only appeal to an angry, half-insane Ortolan.

Inside, One-Eye smiled. He’d be damned if some jumped-up pirate and his crew were going to beat him to the prize.

THE SHRIKE’S repulsor engines whined as the mighty sail barge crested the peak of a ten-meter wave of sand.

Sidon Ithano nodded to Quiggold.

“Hold steady!” yelled the Gabdorin as he stood on the deck.

The crew was determined to do exactly that—in part because their leader inspired confidence and determination, but also because every member of the Shrike’s crew was desperately hoping to stay alive.

Alongside the ship, an explosion of lava burst from the sand. “Port side!” the first mate shouted. And indeed, the blast forced the sturdy barge to the port side—right toward another deadly geyser.

“Captain!” Quiggold signaled as he clung to a railing, “it’s too much! The tide of sand is pulling us off course…toward the…the…”

Quiggold squinted.

Through the colossal squalls of acrid sand that cleaved the air, he saw a shape…a funnel-like shadow rising from the surface of the Sea of Sand and up into the black sky.

“Just what in blazes is that?”

Squeaky pulled a winch, the Gamorrean’s considerable strength barely holding the sails in place. With great effort, the massively overweight pirate emitted a loud grunt from his porcine snout.

Quiggold’s face dropped. “It’s a storm,” he muttered. “It’s a tornado of sand!”

Sidon Ithano silently held up a hand, then dropped it abruptly. Quiggold knew what that meant and turned to shout at the crew. “Squeaky! Starboard sharp! All engines! Reeg, prepare the torpedoes!”

The Gabdorin gripped the rail firmly, knowing that what the captain planned could easily backfire. “All hands to stations! We’re taking this desert down!”

AS HIS SKIFF crested a massive sand wave, Scorza stared through the lens of the ocular scope. The image was distorted, but still…he knew the outline of that barge.

The Crimson Corsair was not so far ahead as rumored.

The captain sighed, waving forward his first mate—another Weequay by the name of Grinko.

“It makes me sad,” Scorza said with a heavy, insincere sigh. “So sad to watch a good ship speed toward certain destruction. I’ll tell you what…”

Scorza grinned, his sharp teeth framed by thick-scaled reptilian skin.

“I’m a compassionate man. Bring all cannons to bear as we pass. Let’s put Sidon Ithano and his crew out of their misery.”

DO YOU HAVE any idea what the odds of surviving direct contact with a class three sandstorm are?” Not waiting for an answer, the easily panicked Pendewqell continued. “Zero! The odds are zero! The barge will be torn apart!”

Quiggold nodded in agreement. “You’re absolutely right. Unfortunately, someone on this ship swore that this was the path to the greatest treasure haul of all time! So…here we are!”

The Corsair raised a gloved hand, signaling Quiggold.

“Three,” the first mate shouted. Reeg Brosna activated the torpedo’s targeting system.

“Two…”

The Arcona chambered the special missile. They only had the one, and if it missed its target or misfired…

“One.”

SCORZA COULDN’T help himself, pushing his fellow Weequay out of the gunner’s seat. The heaving dunes made the shot difficult, but hardly impossible—not for an old pirate like Scorza. He gripped the cannon’s twin triggers as he hungrily scanned the screen of the targeting computer.

The skiff dropped ten meters, the repulsors struggling in the powerful windstorm. The air was caustic and thick. High above, ionic lightning arced across the inky skies.

And then there it was, like a gift from Am-Shak, the god of thunder himself: the ship of the Crimson Corsair, spiraling into the great sand vortex.

“At last…” Scorza muttered. “At last I will have my revenge.”

And with that, he squeezed the triggers.

FIRE!” SHOUTED THE FIRST MATE.

Reeg Brosna didn’t hesitate. With his yellow eyes closed, whispering silently to himself, he slammed his three-fingered fist onto the torpedo launch button.

The Shrike’s missile screamed across the ocean of sand, piercing through a rising drift and blasting its way straight into the heart of the swirling vortex of death that threatened to engulf and destroy the heavy sail barge.

Nothing happened.

“Well…that’s a problem,” Quiggold muttered.

To underscore that point, several heavy blasts abruptly struck the sail barge, causing it to lurch violently to port. Quiggold whirled. Squeaky snorted. Reeg, particularly well-known for his grace and agility under fire, fell overboard and was immediately swept away by the increasingly volatile maelstrom of sand.

The Shrike was under attack.

SCORZA COULDN’T stop laughing. He had watched the Shrike fire its useless missile into the vortex. Whatever the great and mighty Crimson Corsair was planning, it had clearly failed.

Finally, the Weequay captain would watch his hated enemy suffer. It was a great day to be a pirate.

And that’s when the distant Shrike launched its tow cables. Hundreds of meters of heavy cable suddenly locked on to the hull of Scorza’s skiff via a powerful magnetic clamp.

Scorza had neither the time nor the inclination to be impressed with the shot, as suddenly the cable between the two vessels was pulled taut and the skiff found itself being wrenched toward the sandy gyre and the Shrike.

“All engines!” Scorza yelled. “Reverse!”

TOW CABLES ATTACHED, Captain!” yelled Reveth, who had taken over the gunning station.

“It’s working!” whooped Quiggold, usefully. “They’re pulling us away from the vortex!”

The first mate ducked as a volley of blaster fire struck the rigging above his head.

“And they’re shooting at us, too!” he added, less usefully.

SCORZA’S SKIFF’S capable engines were pulling the Shrike from the vortex while, in turn, the Shrike’s even more powerful engines were pulling Scorza and his crew closer and closer to the sail barge.

As a result, the two ships—connected through a heavy magnetic tow cable—were rapidly closing in on each other.

Scorza scowled. “So,” he said to no one in particular, “it comes to this.

“Brothers!” the Weequay captain roared. “Prepare for boarding!” All around him, his vicious and cutthroat crew of thieves and killers drew their weapons.

So of course, that’s exactly when the Gray Gundarks attacked.

THE SPEEDER bike gang circled the two larger vessels, firing concussive blaster weapons. Two of them, a pair of greenish-blue Rodians in spiked leather vests, began climbing the side of the Corsair’s barge. A third, a large and furry, double-axe-wielding Hassk, hooked the skiff with a grapple cable.

Scorza howled with rage, nearly drowning out the sound of the storm itself. The Weequay captain grabbed a handy vibro-pike, and with a look of pure bloodlust in his sunken yellow eyes, leapt from his skiff to the larger sail barge, intent on confronting his old nemesis face to face.

ALL THE WHILE, the Ortolan’s slow-and-steady sandcrawler plodded forward. One-Eye laughed as he watched the battle unfold from his viewscreens deep within the armored hull of the crawler. It was mayhem, and it seemed quite clear to him that all sides would soon perish in the oncoming storm.

The crawler plowed forward, barely affected by the punishing, turbulent tempest outside. While everyone else was fighting, the Ortolan had his eye on the prize. It wasn’t far, really, but the combination of the storm and the battle had kept all the other pirates on all the other ships far too busy to search for the treasure. If his luck held out, the treasure would be his for the taking.

One-Eye stretched, breathing in the cool reconditioned air of the crawler. It was really turning out to be quite a lovely day.

And then the crawler was swallowed whole by a gigantic sand worm, and the one-eyed Ortolan disappeared from the field of battle without anyone actually knowing he had been present in the first place.

Turned out the day wasn’t quite so lovely for One-Eye after all.

QUIGGOLD DUCKED the long metal blade of a Rodian biker while Squeaky kicked another over a railing.

The Gabdorin peered over the edge. Hard to tell, between crashing waves of sand and the chaos of the battle, but it looked like more pirates were climbing the hull.

A lot more.

Of course there were, Quiggold thought.

Just then, a geyser of lava erupted from the desert right next to the barge, and suddenly everything was on fire—including most of the Gray Gundarks and the Weequay skiff.

That just meant there were even more attackers leaping onto the deck of the Shrike—a deck that was now burning and melting simultaneously.

“Even better,” Quiggold muttered, without the barest trace of sincerity.

UNAWARE THAT the transport he had just vacated was exploding, Scorza landed with a heavy thud and a roll on the careening deck of the Shrike. The Crimson Corsair was only a few steps away, defending himself against a pair of Gray Gundarks who had suddenly appeared before him. With a quick draw of his blaster, Scorza dispatched the enemies of his enemy.

In the immediate vicinity, only the Corsair and Scorza were still standing—with a fire spreading across the deck that left the Corsair cut off from his crew. This was it. No one was going to rob the Weequay of his revenge.

Scorza laughed. “You always thought you were better than me, didn’t you, Corsair? All these years you’ve taken the best contracts, stolen plunder that was mine by right, treated me like I was nothing! Like I didn’t even exist!”

Scorza’s smile disappeared as he aimed his weapon. “Well…look at you now,” he sneered. “Bet you never thought it would end this way.”

The Corsair glanced around. He took an uncomfortable step forward. A honking noise from an inhuman throat emanated from behind the Corsair’s bright red mask.

Scorza felt a rage that dwarfed anything he had ever known before.

“What?” The Weequay choked back bile. “How…how can you not know who I am?” he hissed.

Sidon Ithano, the most dangerous pirate ever to sail the Lost Clusters beyond the Outer Rim, the most feared fighter of the skirmish of Adratharpe 7, the most notorious thief of his species, simply shrugged apologetically. He had met a lot of Weequay pirates. They were kind of everywhere.

Dropping his pistol, Scorza drew his high-density vibro-blade from its scabbard. He would end the life of his enemy with his own hands; nothing else would restore the Weequay’s honor.

The battle was on: Scorza swung his weapon wildly. The Crimson Corsair moved deftly, parrying the attack with his own blade and stepping inside the Weequay’s guard. For a brief moment, Scorza thought he had the upper hand. Then Sidon Ithano lashed out with a solid kick and sent his surprised enemy over the edge of the sail barge.

Just then, the heart of the churning vortex exploded with a pale blue energy, and suddenly every grain of sand in the desert froze in place.

THE MISSILE the Shrike had fired wasn’t just any missile; it was a rare and highly illegal piece of hardware known as a kinetic disruptor.

The kinetic disruptor had been designed for use on gas-mining colonies, intended to separate particulate matter from gaseous resources in volatile work conditions. In a factory setting, the disruptors were highly effective, and for a brief time they were in high demand.

Unfortunately, when they were used outside simulated environments, it soon became clear that the kinetic energy disrupted by the missiles would return, much more dangerous and volatile than it had been before. Meaning that if you disrupted, say, a sandstorm…you had a certain number of minutes before the frozen particles resumed motion. An hour after that, those previously frozen particles tended to become extraordinarily explosive.

Consequently, the disruptors were pulled from the market; however, they remained available in limited supply in less-than-reputable corners of the galaxy.

The vortex that had been slowly drawing the two tethered repulsor vessels together abruptly dissipated. The desert froze. Accustomed to the never-ending movement of the sand dunes, several of the pirates, bikers, and thieves abruptly stumbled to the deck. But the Crimson Corsair and his crew were ready.

“Release the tow cable!” Quiggold yelled. “Reset coordinates! We’re not through this yet!”

Pendewqell shoved a confused Gray Gundark over the edge of the still-burning sail barge.

“There it is! The battle cruiser!” he shouted excitedly.

And so it was—the ancient wreck of the Confederacy, just on the other side of where the vortex had been raging only moments before.

And with that, the Shrike blasted forward, leaving the disoriented pirates and bikers behind to their burning doom.

THE DESERT was already returning to life by the time the crew of the Shrike reached the air lock of the Separatist ship. To make matters worse, it was immediately clear that the Shrike was not the first to reach the prize.

Struggling with the controls of the battle cruiser’s hatch, Squeaky grunted. Quiggold nodded, gesturing to the heavy speeders lashed to the hull of the cruiser. “The Fangs of the Hutt! Leave it to those filthy womp rats to sneak past us. If we see them—”

The hatch opened, and Quiggold stopped his ranting. Inside were all the members of the Fangs of the Hutt. Dead.

“Well…” continued Quiggold. “Okay then.”

Squeaky managed a frightened squeal. The Corsair waved the pig-snouted pirate’s fear away with a gloved hand. Quiggold echoed his captain’s sentiment. “They…were unprepared. We are not. This ship has been leaking durilliam gases from its core for decades. Everyone…breathers. Now.”

Masked against the dangerous fumes, the crew members of the Shrike made their way into the belly of the downed ship, seeking their spoils.

CRAWLING UP from the burning hull of the Shrike, where he had been clinging since being kicked overboard, was the furious Scorza. He was a patient Weequay, and once inside the Separatist ship, he knew he could best his hated foes.

Then the plunder he so richly deserved would at last be his.

THE CRUISER’S interior was difficult to navigate: decades of corrosion had done a thorough job on the walkways, and there was very little room to maneuver among the fallen debris and inactive battle droids.

But maneuver they did, and in short time the Corsair’s crew had reached the command deck—ruined and derelict as the rest of the craft, with a half-smashed battle droid sitting at the command station.

The droid in question was moving, albeit slightly. There was a small click and whir as the droid’s arm moved up and back down again—over and over.

Reveth was baffled. “It…it has power?”

“Barely,” Pendewqell answered. “A magnetic storm six months ago caused a system reboot of several derelict ships in the region. The charge has been slowly building in the ship’s energy cyclers ever since. That’s what sparked the broadcast we’ve tracked.”

“Ah,” Quiggold said. “So the ship has been slowly powering back up?”

“Exactly right,” Pendewqell answered, scanning the cruiser’s manifest.

The Corsair shook his head, dismayed.

“Pen,” Quiggold began as he used a portable booster to spark the ship’s secondary computer. “You and I have served together a very long time. So I want you to know I ask this in the kindest possible manner.”

“Uh…yes, Quiggold?”

“Are you an idiot?”

“Um.”

“It’s a yes-or-no question, Pendewqell. Are. You. An. Idiot?”

“Uh…no, sir. Nope. Not I.”

“Oh, good,” Quiggold said with mock sincerity. “Then I suppose the fact that we are on a battle cruiser filled with reactivating battle droids is something you considered when you first suggested this treasure hunt?”

The Ishi Tib paused, turning to look back and forth between the impassive captain and the irritated first mate.

“Oh,” he said. “Ah,” he added.

Neither of which was any help.

OUTSIDE, Toltek the Devaronian had finally reached the ship.

The band of Devaronian pirates had seen the battle from afar, and wanting no part of it, had circled wide around, hoping to cut off the combatants and reach the downed Separatist ship first. Unfortunately, when the sandstorm died, so did their wind-powered sailer—and it had taken the better part of an hour for the momentum of the storm to return with enough intensity for the Devaronian ship to become mobile again.

Toltek smiled. It didn’t matter. He had all the other pirates outgunned, and his crew had control of the exit. All they had to do was wait, and the Crimson Corsair would eventually emerge with the prize.

Simple.

Unfortunately for Toltek, he did not know about the spectacular reaction the Crimson Corsair’s kinetic disruptor would soon cause, and he and his crew were completely unprepared for the moment when each and every grain of sand swirling around them suddenly began exploding with the force of a thermal detonator.

And thus ended the tale of Toltek the Devaronian.

THE CRUISER shuddered. The crew of the Shrike ran through the ruined corridors as quickly as the wreckage would allow. They all had been briefed by the Corsair, so they knew the window for their escape was closing rapidly.

Reveth studied the ship’s holo-schematics. “The vault should be this way,” she said, pointing to a large partially open door.

Pendewqell paused. “Right through there? You mean right through the droid-charging stations?”

“They’re not active,” countered Reveth.

“They’re not active…yet,” exclaimed the Ishi Tib.

“Here or in there,” Quiggold said, waving away the concerns. “Either way we’ve got problems once they’re active. So let’s get the treasure and get off this ship.”

The crew moved through the large chambers. Hundreds of battle droids hung lifelessly from their inert charging stations.

“I’ve got a bad feeling about this…” muttered the Ishi Tib.

Quiggold glared at Pendewqell. “You have a bad feeling? Really? Now of all times you suddenly have ‘a bad feeling’?”

The Ishi Tib looked a bit defensive. “It’s just a figure of speech….”

“Well it’s stupid! Of course you have a bad feeling! We’re in the middle of a derelict warship that’s half-buried at the heart of a sand maelstrom, filled with droids programmed to kill intruders! We all have a bad feeling about this! And it was your idea!”

“The treasure!” Pendewqell squawked. “That will make it all worthwhile! Billions of credits’ worth of crystals! You’ll see! You’ll all see!”

“We better…” muttered Quiggold.

Behind them, far enough not to be seen by anyone except the seemingly inert droid army, Scorza followed, planning his inevitable revenge.

A cryo-cycle stasis pod?” said Pendewqell, his voice laced with desperation.

The crew had reached the vault and, with some quick blaster fire and well-placed explosives, had managed to break it open.

But there were no lightsaber crystals to be found. Just a single cryo-cycle stasis pod. Cryo-cycle stasis was usually used only for short periods, but this pod had clearly been here a long time. The clear glass of the pod was frosted over, making it impossible to discern what was inside.

The cruiser shuddered again. The explosive storm outside was putting the final touches on the already ruined warship. Soon the infrastructure would fail completely.

“Okay, look…there could be anything frozen in there!” Pendewqell said with an optimism he didn’t really feel. “I bet it’s something, or someone, really valuable!”

In unison, the crew glared at the Ishi Tib.

“Well…if it’s not valuable, why is it in a vault?” Pendewqell yelled in exasperation.

The Corsair nodded.

Quiggold shrugged in agreement. “It’s a fair point. Let’s deactivate it.”

Squeaky and Reveth took hold of the pod while Pendewqell began pressing buttons on the side panel of the emergency generator system that had kept the stasis field intact. Within seconds, the pod began to open and the form of what was stored within became clear for all to see.

A Republic clone trooper.

Alive, decades after the end of the Clone Wars.

“Where…where am I?” stammered the trooper.

BATTLE DROID B1-CC14 had seen better days. In the decades since the crash on the surface of Ponemah, the droid had been subject to corrosion and circuit degradation. Not that it had mattered, since the droid had also been without power all that time.

Until now. Now something had sparked the power receptors of the crashed ship and its systems were slowly recharging.

With his one good sensor, B1-CC14 took note of a troubling alert on the half-shattered console before him. The cargo—Count Dooku’s prize—had been released from cryo-cycle stasis. That wasn’t supposed to happen. The clone trooper had been captured on Coruscant at great peril and locked in long-term medical stasis after rigorous interrogation. Apparently, the clone had been the last being to speak to a well-known Republic traitor and was believed to be in possession of vital information—not that he had been willing to confess said information to his droid interrogators. So under strict orders from Count Dooku, the clone had been frozen in stasis, and no one else, not even the droids, were to speak with him further. Not until Dooku himself could question the clone directly.

That had been the plan. But something—B1-CC14 didn’t really know what—had gone wrong. It didn’t really matter. The end result was that the ship had been detected and was attacked by an overwhelming Republic force, and all the droid’s attempts to escape the destruction had failed.

Now there was only one command left that mattered. Count Dooku had been very specific. The captive was not allowed to escape, no matter what the cost.

Well, B1 knew he could still fulfill that part of the order.

With his last ebb of energy, the droid triggered the emergency activation systems—the ones that would mobilize a contingent of super battle droids on a fail-safe battery. Within minutes, more than a dozen super battle droids would sweep the corridors and remove any unwanted visitors.

And with that, B1-CC14 returned to the sweet oblivion of deactivation.

REVETH QUICKLY moved to help the trooper to his feet. It was a mistake; despite decades frozen in stasis, it was clear the clone’s fighting instincts were intact.

“You don’t understand!” the trooper yelled as he shoved Reveth backward. The clone looked panicked. Feverish. He was babbling.

“I’m a medic,” he said between gasps of air. “And I…I learned something…something horrible. Fives knew….He’s the one who figured it all out after Tup…and it got him killed. But I kept investigating. They said it was a virus….”

The Corsair gestured subtly to Squeaky and Pendewqell, and the two pirates began circling to either side of the sick clone.

“A chip in our heads. In all the clones’ heads! And an order. A command to betray…kill…and it comes from the Chancellor!”

The clone grabbed Squeaky’s outstretched hand and flung him into the advancing Pendewqell. The effort was too much though, sending him staggering.

“The Seppies…captured me.” The soldier was speaking fast—almost too fast to follow. It was as if the clone was unaware he was speaking out loud.

“Interrogated me to find out who else knew.” The clone was sweating. Shaking. He looked sad. “I never had a chance to tell anyone else what I learned. I didn’t know who I could trust. But I wouldn’t tell them anyway….

“So they said…” The pirates were quiet, listening as the sick and delirious clone continued. “They said they were sending me to someone I couldn’t keep secrets from…to the Sith….The cold…the freezing, burning cold…”

The clone slumped to the ground. His eyes were rolling into the back of his head.

“Stasis poisoning,” whispered Reveth. “He was trapped in there for too long.”

“No…! I can still save them. Skywalker…” the clone whispered intently. “Get me General Skywalker! He’ll help. We can save…save the Jedi…save the Republic!”

“What’s your ID, trooper?” Quiggold asked the recently unfrozen soldier.

“CT-6116.” The trooper coughed. “Kix. They call me…Kix…sir….”

And with that, the soldier slipped into unconsciousness. Reveth moved quickly to place a breather over the soldier’s face.

“Well,” Quiggold said, breaking the long silence that had descended on the band of pirates. “That certainly was priceless information, Pendewqell. I bet the Galactic Republic will be super happy now that they can stop the Emperor from rising to power. Probably save the galaxy a whole lot of lives, too. Maybe we can go to the Jedi Council and get a nice fat reward!”

The first mate turned to face the Ishi Tib who had foolishly led them on that treasure hunt. “So all we need to do now is travel back in time! What do you say—”

But Pendewqell was gone.

THE ISHI TIB had gambled heavily on the lost treasures of Count Dooku. Gambled and lost.

The Crimson Corsair was a fair captain. Fair but not forgiving. The mission had already cost too much, more than Pendewqell could ever repay. So it was probably best for all parties if he departed now and avoided any awkward confrontations.

He just had to reach the hatch, grab one of the single-user skiffs in the barge’s hold, and blast his way out of that hellish Sea of Sand before anyone could catch up with him. Then he could make his way to another sector. Maybe to a backwater like Wasco or Andui, or somewhere else no one ever went. Then—

Pendewqell rounded a corner and walked directly into a large crowd of recently activated super battle droids.

“Roger, roger,” said the one in front, and the entire droid company opened fire.

And those were the last words the Ishi Tib ever heard.

THE ANCIENT SHIP was coming apart, and it was all the crew of the Meson Martinet could do to stay ahead of the debris.

The captain had ordered that the crew carry the unconscious clone. Quiggold couldn’t understand why, but given the Crimson Corsair’s mood after Pendewqell’s abrupt departure, the first mate decided maybe it was best not to argue.

As he hauled the clone across his back, Squeaky muttered something incredibly rude. Fortunately, no one much felt like translating it. There really wasn’t time to argue anyway. With the sandstorm outside in a total frenzy, there was no time for anything but running to the docking port and escaping on the sail barge.

So of course that was when Scorza decided to strike.

FOOLS!” SCORZA SPAT, drawing his blaster and stepping out from the mouth of a ruined corridor to accost the fleeing pirates. “Did you really think you could escape with the treasure so easily? Did you really underestimate your nemesis so badly?”

The crew exchanged glances. Quiggold shrugged.

“Who are you exactly?”

“I am Scorza!” the Weequay shouted. “I am revenge incarnate! I am your complete and total destruction!”

“Okay,” said the first mate.

“‘Okay’? Is that all you have to say for yourself? Is that the best you have to offer?”

“It’s just…” Quiggold paused.

“What?” Scorza said, gesturing with his blaster. “Speak!”

“There’s something you haven’t considered, I think.”

“Oh, really?” said Scorza, his voice dry with contempt. “And what exactly might that be? What clever trick does your captain have up his sleeve this time, eh?”

“No trick. It’s just…” Quiggold glanced at his captain.

The Corsair raised one gloved hand and pointed at something past the Weequay.

Quiggold continued. “There’s a company of super battle droids standing right behind you.”

Scorza turned in surprise, half expecting to discover that he had fallen for the oldest trick in the book. He hadn’t. The droids were very real. As were their blasters.

The droids opened fire, and so ended the tale of Scorza’s quest for revenge.

LUCKILY, the super battle droids spent quite a bit of time shooting Scorza. And in that time, the crew of the Shrike made their escape. Down one corridor after another—until finally they reached the hatch where their barge was docked.

Quiggold and Squeaky pulled the emergency release, opening the hatch—just in time for the crew to witness a giant sand worm ripping the sail barge off its moorings and crushing the vessel with its powerful enormous jaws.

It was impossible to tell behind his mask, of course, but Quiggold had known Sidon Ithano for a long time, and he was pretty sure the Crimson Corsair was rolling his eyes in exasperation.

“Well…” said Quiggold, “there’s always the escape pods.”

THERE WAS only one escape pod.

More specifically, there was only one working escape pod that wasn’t either on the side of the ship buried in sand or surrounded by the contingent of super battle droids—which meant that not everyone would fit, and one person would have to stay behind.

Quiggold imagined a scenario where he bravely sacrificed himself so the captain and crew could escape. But that was not what happened. Instead, while Squeaky, Reveth, and Quiggold shoved each other back and forth, vying for a position of safety, the captain stepped forward.

Without a word, the Corsair shoved his crew and the unconscious clone into the pod. And before anyone could argue, Sidon Ithano, his face as impassive as ever behind his crimson plasteel mask, slammed the activation switch and launched the crew at high velocity through the Sea of Sand and away from the doomed cruiser.

QUIGGOLD and the rest of the crew watched with sadness as the escape pod hurled them to safety. The cruiser was burning and sinking into the maelstrom of explosive sand.

“Maybe…” offered Quiggold, “maybe he’s okay.”

The crew all winced as the giant worm exploded through the hull of the ancient Separatist ship, screaming in a monstrous way that is best not described in detail.

“Still…” Quiggold began in an optimistic tone.

The entire ship exploded in a rage of fire and light.

“Guess not,” said Quiggold, his voice heavy with regret.

A WEEK PASSED. Then another. Then a third. In a derelict bar, the remnants of the crew of the Meson Martinet waited for their captain. Soon they would have to leave. Supplies were low and the desert planet was hardly a place to be without food or water.

Still, they waited as long as possible.

Kix, the clone, had eventually recovered—physically anyway. The trooper still seemed in deep shock over the many revelations of galactic history he had learned since awakening, particularly in regard to the assault on the Jedi Order and its fallout.

While Kix pondered his destiny in the strange new future, the pirate crew was busy wallowing in the past.

“He’s gone, Quiggold,” said Reveth. “And we might as well have sunk with him. We’ve lost everything. We’re ruined.”

“I know…I know…” said Quiggold. “I just think we should wait one more week. I mean…maybe…”

“Maybe what?” asked Reveth, agitated. “Maybe the captain somehow tamed the giant worm and rode it through an explosive desert of sand and lava? Is that what you’re hoping for?”

Quiggold shook his head. He knew there was no chance the captain could have survived. Not really. No one…not even a Jedi of old could have escaped that hellish—

The first mate’s jaw dropped. Reveth stood up in shock while Squeaky squealed with joy. In the doorway stood the Crimson Corsair. His cloak was in tatters and his red helmet in need of a polish, but there he was…alive.

“H—how…?” Quiggold was at a loss.

The Corsair waved away the questions, instead tossing a metal cube to Kix.

“What is it?” asked Quiggold, confused.

“It’s…it’s a Separatist cruiser’s memory core,” answered Kix. “These were designed to self-destruct. But this one…it must have malfunctioned.” The clone looked up. “This cube carries a complete map to every hidden droid factory ever built by the Separatists. Secret bases. Weapons warehouses. Everything.”

Reveth took the cube from Kix, whistling appreciatively at it. “This would have been impossible to decode fifty years ago. Now? Easy. We track down those installations…that’s our ancient buried treasure! We’ll be rich!”

Quiggold whistled. “And we just happen to have an expert in Clone Wars–era military installations and their security systems on hand. Welcome aboard, Kix.

“Okay…” Quiggold continued after the shock of potential wealth had worn off, rubbing his prayer beads. “Okay…but really.” He looked up at the Corsair. “Really…how did you survive? The fire…the sand…the worm…How…?”

The Corsair sat down on a dusty couch and stretched casually, as if nothing exciting had happened to him in ages, and leveled his gaze at his first mate. In a raspy, mechanical voice that was rarely ever heard, he said, “You know better than that, Quiggold. I’m Sidon Ithano….

“I don’t die so easily.”