Roche

Presently, the Valhalla and her fleet were on station. In the recent past that would have meant that Moff Bhindi Drayson was present, and that would have made Roche an important engagement indeed. But the Ubiqtorate commander had moved up, taking with her the title of Grand Moff and a seat on the Imperial High Command.

Which made the Valhalla's presence in the Roche system even more formidible. It certainly seemed to unnerve the Galactic Coalition presence, who (stretched as they were on this side of the galaxy) had managed to mantain only a paltry assortment of whatever could be spared.

The Valhalla's commanding officer, an old man now with the insignia of a full Admiral on his breast, wondered briefly if the Coalition was wetting themselves yet - the Empire surely would only deploy the one of their Venerator class ships if they meant business, especially when that particular Venerator was the former flag of the Empire's most powerful woman.

The Admiral derived a particular enjoyment from imagining what what was now going on in the command room of the Coalition flagship. The Valhalla's arrival with a full entourage of Star Destroyers and carriers several hours ago had been met with silent resolve: evidently their erstwhile neighbours were ignoring the Imperial presence in what was supposed to be "their" territory.

Coalition territory, deep in the midst of Imperial space. It was unheard of! It would not, in short, be tolerated.

Let the Coalition build their little base. Grand Moff Drayson had said. It will come to naught. Yuri Katarn will come to Roche, and the Coalition will tremble at his construct!

The Admiral had seen the plans, seen the specifications for what Drayson was building here. Already the foundations, such as they were, were in place: great metal struts suspended deep in space by tugs, hundreds of small vessels moving about to bring the massive thing to life.

It would be done, Drayson had promised, within the year. Given the size of the thing, the Admiral had his doubts, but then, construction had started less than a month before, and already it was aparent that something was taking shape.

"Sir? Operation Blind reports they're ready to begin operation."

The Admiral nodded at the report. This was part of what the Grand Moff had ordered, something that would do more to unnerve the Coalition commander than even the presence of the mighty Valhalla could do.

"Commence when ready." The Admiral ordered calmly, watching the space where the metal construct was beginning to go up.

A minute later, it vanished. Where hundreds of ships had been was left only blackness, a void hundreds of kilometres in volume, an area that was conviently enclosed in the formation of the Imperial fleet.

The Admiral smiled thinly. Oh, what the Coalition would find when that cloak came down...

In the dark, things were happening.

Huge tugs moved through space, arranging equally huge pieces of the new construction into coherent shapes. It was as though the Gods themselves had come down and decided to build a puzzle in the Roche system.

To an outside observer it would appear to be sheer chaos. Where ever the large tugs were not, it seemed, smaller craft filled the gaps. Zipping this way and that, they delivered cargos, deployed markers, welded pieces of machinery together, and observed the goings on.

From the bridge of the Valhalla the old Admiral saw nothing. Just a large blanket, hanging in space. What was happening beneath it was hidden from view to both him and the Coalition. No doubt they still wondered why the Valhalla was there. And what was going on in that eerily black patch of space, where not even a star shone through.

They would find out soon enough. Reports from inside the shroud said that the construction was nearing completion: the main modules had been installed and were capable of operating independently now. Perhaps a month, maybe less, and the Empire could reveal her monstrosity to the Coalition.

And then there would be no doubt as to who really "owned" the Roche system.

Thus far the Coalition had made no attempts to get beneath the cloak, as it were. Perhaps their voyeuristic ambitions had been quashed, or perhaps they simply feared to come to close to the Empire's fleet.

Nonetheless, security was tight. TIEs flew regular patrols, accompanied by TIE/recon fighters to ensure no snoops broke the perimeter. Grand Moff Drayson had even procured a Surveyor class ship to monitor the asteroid field for cloaked ships.

No, the secrecy of the Empire's construction was mantained. Until the oppertune moment, it would remain so.

A voice called to the Admiral from somewhere behind.

"Sir, we have a contact from Eternal class Star Destroyer Black Mantis. They say 'the inventer has arrived.'"

That was good news.

That meant it was almost ready.

(Ignore this)

From behind the veil, space looked strange. Such sheer blackness wasn't something the eye was used to percieving, at one moment it looked like black velvet, look again and one could swear there were stars hanging there in the blackness, yet a third time and one thought one's eyes were closed.

The Inventor had grown used to it. He had spent much time in the past year gazing into the unknowable blackness. In fact, he had grown to like it.

As the bearded man gazed into it now, he laughed.

It is complete!

Yes, the empire had long since abandoned the project. Yes, they had grown disinterested when they saw the tactically worthless "Academy" the Coalition was building. And yes, they had abandoned The Inventor when they needed the formidible fleet they had left here elsewhere. The empire, it seemed, was content that the Coalition was, in fact, letting the Empire use the Roche asteroid belt as a docking station... which was, in truth, all they needed it for.

But who cared? It was even a more impressive feat now that he had done it with no tugs, no sentries, no muscle power. Nothing. They had left nothing there but the Inventor and a skeleton crew. And now, now, against all odds, he had finished his work.



From his station on the bridge, Lin saw The Inventor laughing to himself. He looked over to Ted, who was playing with the markers of his low rank that were attached to his collar.

Catching Ted's eye, Lin motioned to the window that The Inventor was looking out of. "He's crazy..." he muttered to his fellow officer.

"You just figured-" Ted began to reply sarcastically.

He was interupted when The Inventor turned abruptly and let out a dramatically maniacal yell-like command.

"Gentlemen!..." he cried, "...start... the machine!"