Chapter Twenty Four

Master Giiett turned his starfighter around just slightly, coming in on another strafing run against the second of the four pirate ships which had docked with the Explorer, avoiding its return fire with an ease that was almost supernatural thanks to his Force-given Battle Precognition. Of course the ship only had a single gun which could range on him at the moment because of how the pirate ship had latched onto the larger training vessel.

And even worse of the pirates, their ships only had a single shield generator, which meant that their shields were down at the moment. A shield generator a cargo ship's size could not cover the Explorer, and a shield could not be generated when a portion of it would intersect another solid object without covering that object too.

The shield generator in question exploded under Micah's fire, making certain the pirate vessel's current straits would remain that way. Another second and Micah's fire impacted the boarding ramp. As the small extrusion, loaded with plasma cutters in order to cut into the opposing ship's hull, exploded Micah idly wondered why in the Force it was called a ramp anyway, but put it out of his mind a moment later as he zoomed along the Explorer's hull toward the next pirate vessel.

To one side of Micah's personal engagement, the Consular class ship was ducking in and out away from the two remaining pirate vessels. Like most pirates, those ships had been heavily modified with larger weapons systems, and somewhat decent shielding for their size, but their maneuverability was far worse, and their structural integrity even worse than that.

The Consular class had better shields, but far lighter weapons, a single quad laser on a pintle along its underside being its only weapon. Knight Brandon, the captain of the vessel knew that however, so instead of even trying, he got the pirate's attention in a different fashion. He used his ships lock on systems to make it seem as if he had concussion or proton torpedo launchers, as a few Consulars built for the small and threadbare Republic fleet did, and was just waiting to lock on. That kept the pirates hopping and out of Micah's way.

Just as he finished with the second ship the two remaining pirate vessels broke off, streaking away under maximum sublight drive, a sight that made Micah anxious. Why would they run away in normal space when they could simply hyperspace out? There is no gravitic shadow here, nothing that could have forced them to wait and their shields are strong enough to take our fire while they do it so why…

Just as that thought coalesced in his mind, Micah received a warning through the Force, his danger sense enhanced for a moment. He suddenly saw the two ships still attached to the Explorer blowing, taking the larger training vessel with them, a force vision that was so clear it nearly blotted out his normal senses.

Desperately Micah twisted his starfighter around, coming back in and down against the last two pirate vessels still linked to the Explorer. Slamming his hands down on the communicator he shouted "To Master Yoda and anyone else aboard the Explorer, the pirates are going to blow their engines! Suggest you evacuate or find some other way of protecting the younglings!"

OOOOOOO

At the same time the Force's warning hit Micah it hit Fay and Yoda as well. Both of them had been busy calming the children down or carrying the wounded via the Force towards the medical bay, but they both stopped, the joyful song of the Force suddenly shifting into a scream around them.

With no time to waste, Yoda halted his progress, letting the younglings hovering in the air around him down gently. Gathering up the minds of the other Jedi aboard the ship and on the Consular class into one single entity quickly he began to push away at the nearest pirate vessel. This was a Jedi trick which the Sith had never really perfected, the ability to join their Force powers and direct them towards one purpose, one goal. He did not reach out for Micah though, Micah was already doing what he had to.

The children felt the pressure in the Force. To Yoda's surprise a few of them, notably the young Duros boy, pushed their own Force power out to join the effort not even questioning what was going on. Yoda spared them all a nod of approval, before the red-haired Force Ghost was in Yoda's face asking, "What's going on?!"

That she couldn't feel it through the Force was interesting to Yoda, but he answered nonetheless. "Pirates ships docked with us, going to explode they are! Push them away from this vessel we must."

With that he closed his eyes, ignoring the material universe around him as he pushed out his Force powers, extending them away from his body pushing at the one ship that Micah had already attacked. He spared a brief second to be thankful that the ship in the bay had already been dealt with, all of its com gear destroyed and every pirate aboard incapacitated or killed by Masters Saa and Tholme.

The target ship began to move away from the Explorer, but at this distance it was very difficult to concentrate on and power intensive. All around him the younglings who had joined the effort fell out of it quickly, exhausted. Only the young Duros boy and two others, a Falleen girl and a human boy stayed in for more than a few seconds. But one after another they too fell out of the working, collapsing into unconsciousness.

The Duros initiate was barely able to gasp out, "I'm sorry Masters," before falling out of the gestalt. Quinlan barely caught him with one hand, most of his being concentrated on his part of Yoda's effort, and then the ship they were concentrating on exploded.

The Jedi all gasped, reeling backwards slightly as the Explorer rocked all around them. Luckily, explosions didn't propagate very well in space, and the ship had already moved far enough away to save their ship. Debris peppered the outer hull, but that was all.

The other ship however had not yet been cut off, though Micah was seeing to that at the moment. It allowed the Jedi a moments rest to gather themselves in their gestalt before attempting it again. It also gave Yoda a moment to realize that the Force Ghost had disappeared and he wondered where she had gone, or if she had simply rejoined the Force. She wasn't the first Force Ghost he'd seen, though it had been several centuries since the last one, and that one had not been around for very long.

OOOOOOO

Lily had not rejoined the Force. In fact, if asked she would be hard-pressed to decide whether or not she could. And frankly even asking would seem quite an insult to her, considering how Lily wanted to watch over her son as long as she could. Which was what Lily was doing now: watching over Harry and everyone else aboard as best she could.

She raced through the ship, phasing down through the ship's decks, towards where she thought the generator room was along with the emergency shield control console, which the Knight named Clortesh had tried to turn on before the battle began. Lily had thought he had, but she wasn't certain, and frankly she didn't know enough about shielding technology to know whether or not they could be turned on again after faltering but Lily couldn't do anything else, so she was doing this now.

Entering the engine room she nearly ran into a stocky alien with a powerful looking frame hidden under his robes and an all encompassing mask which covered his face and all his features save for large, insect-like eyes. The being moved back quickly looking at her before nodding slightly. "You would be the Force Ghost that had Master Illaveil all atwitter. This one is Master Zeltesh, in charge of the ship's engines and other things of that nature."

Lily noticed one of his arms was hanging loose at his side. He also looked out of it somehow, his eyes unfocused even as they tried to look at her, and his other hand seemed to shake occasionally as she looked at him, and there was damage to his mask as well. He looked as if he had a concussion, but if that affliction effected his race in the same manner it would a human Lily had no idea, along with what race he was.

There was a body of younger looking alien who she recognized as one of the knights by the doorway to the engine room to one side, along with what looked like several dozen dead attackers. But Lily had no time to wonder about the battle that had occurred here, instead looking around desperately. "The shields!" she shouted, "we need to reactivate the shields!"

"Why?" he slurred, unable to focus even now despite the desperation he heard in her voice.

"One of the pirate ships is still connected to us and it's going to explode!"

At that the alien's compound eyes widened, and he tried to push himself off of the ground, only to flounder back to his knees. From within the mask Lily could make out the sounds of ragged coughing. "This one, this one is, am, ugh, they are over there. You, you will be able to restart them, they were overwhelmed, but we still, ha-have the port shield generators… Gand is sorry he cannot help…"

Lily nodded, frantically moving to toward that center, where she looked down at her ghostly hands for a moment. She had yet to try to use any real magic or try even to touch material things other than Force users and she normally passed through things but…

Gathering her will for a moment, Lily reached forward, trying to will her hands to become physical, to visualize them touching the controls. It didn't work. They simply passed through the controls, and she growled in frustration. Closing her eyes again, she pulled her hands out of the controls, then gathered herself and gestured forward with one hand.

"Move!" She screamed, forcing all of her will into it, visualizing the controls moving as if struck by a charm spell.

She felt the magic leave her for a moment and Lily gasped, shuddering in pain. But the spell worked, and suddenly on the screen in front of her a dim blue line appeared around the port side of the ship.

OOOOOOO

Micah finished blasting away at the boarding ramp as the Consular class ship came close, using its tiny tractor beam to pull the other ship away as the Jedi aboard the Explorer pushed at it from the other direction. Just then Micah's systems told him that some of the shields aboard the Explorer had come up, and Micah slammed his communicator button again. "Brandon don't bother with the pirate vessel, let the Jedi aboard the ship keep pushing it away. Instead use your tractor beam to rotate the Explorer!"

He needn't have bothered giving that order aloud, because the moment that thought had hit his head, the Jedi aboard the Consular class ship had been aware of it as fused with the other Jedi in this battle as they were thanks to Master Yoda's presence. Very few Jedi Masters could have created or held that gestalt, but three of those few were here, and their presence was uplifting to say the least.

The Consular class ship backed away from the pirate vessel, moving downwards and away, it's tractor beam flicking out to grab at a specific area of the training vessel, where the ship's large engines merged into the rest of the hull pulling it around so that it's shields faced the pirate ship. The larger Explorer turned slowly under the other ship's power, but turn it did.

Seconds stretched on as Micah watched, then the pirate ship exploded , and Micah quickly pushed power to his engines, racing away from the explosion. Despite his quick reaction his ship was still thrown end over end through space for a few moments before he could right it. But their efforts had gained enough space between the second pirate ship and the Explorer.

That space plus the shields protected it from this second, far closer explosion. The ship rocked noticeably, and the shields went down, but the training vessel was still in one piece.

Micah allowed himself a brief moment to thank the Force before smiling slightly and opening his communicator. "Well done Captain, very well done indeed! Now let's bring our ships into the hanger bay, I have a feeling that we'll probably be needed aboard the Explorer, if only to help repair the damage."

"Roger that Master Giiett," said the young knight on the screen, shaking his head. "That was a little too close for my tastes."

"For me too my young friend, for me too."