Excerpt from: The Force Wars

Emissary, enroute to Vladet

Pro Moon couldn't sleep.

The last twenty-four hours had been a precisely timed sequence of well-planned events. Despite the work he had yet to complete in the Western Province, the magnitude of this undertaking required him to drop everything and make straight for Vladet.

The Cerean Prime Minister tightened his grip on the back of the copilot's seat, staring intently at the blue-black swirl of hyperspace. “When we arrive,” Pro Moon said in a measured tone, “inform Imperial Center that the Prime Minister of the Coalition has arrived, and wishes to meet with Emperor Kraken.”

“Yes, Sir,” the pilot acknowledged, not taking his eyes off of his instruments.

“I'll be in my quarters until then.”

It was a massive risk, he knew, heading into the heart of the Empire and meeting the head of the Coalition's sworn enemy face-to-face.

But this was not Regrad's Coalition. And this was not Hyfe's Empire. It was time for a change.

The fate of the galaxy depended on it.

In his quarters, hastily stocked with the bare essentials for the trip, Pro Moon found something he hadn't been expecting: a bag. A very particular bag, from a very particular source.

His wife had managed to sneak the “good luck” package on board while he wasn't looking. Pulling the draw string at its top and opening the bag to inspect the contents, he set the box of chocolates and datapad full of bad romance novels aside, and withdrew the Kasha crystal she'd left for him.

Pro Moon wasn't a particularly religious man – neither was his wife, for that matter – but the galaxy was indeed filled with wonders beyond sentient comprehension, and as he hefted the glowing gold crystal in his hands, the Cerean Prime Minister felt his mind begin to clear and his worries abate. Pro Moon sank to his knees and then sat with his bottom resting on his feet, pressing the round crystal against his chest as his eyes fell closed.

It was in that state of serene clarity that Pro Moon understood what he had to do. He was not Regrad of Azguard; he could not be. His was not the path of the warrior. He had to make Emperor Kraken understand. He had to be strong; he had to be firm; he had to stand his ground.

For all of the evil that the Empire was, a far greater darkness was gathering against the inhabitants of this galaxy. He had to make Park Kraken understand, or he would have to watch as the Empire dragged the whole of the galaxy to ruin.

* * *




The Prime Minister of the Galactic Coalition had walked willingly and confidently into the heart of his sworn enemy's domain. Arrayed around him now were what he assumed to be the most loyal and committed supporters of the new Emperor: admirals, generals, senators and bureaucrats of varied stripe and station, and elite guard enough to kill Pro Moon a hundred times over. And there, at the far end of the great hall, seated upon his throne, was Emperor Park Alexei Kraken, self-appointed ruler of the New Order of the Galactic Empire.


When Regrad had stood in this very same position a few years ago, he had done so with an Azguardian sword at his side, a symbol of his leadership and resolve. Pro Moon now held a symbol of his own rule at his side, but Pro Moon was not Regrad, and Park Kraken was not Daemon Hyfe. He approached the Imperial throne until he saw its honor guard tense with his proximity, then stopped and rested his hand on his weapon of choice: the datapad clipped to his hip.


“Four years ago, Prime Minister Regrad came before the Imperial Court on bended knee to beg mercy from it for a Coalition on the brink of destruction. Your Imperial majesty, I come before you today with knee unbent, standing in the midst of men and women who would call me their mortal foe, to meet you as an equal, as leaders of nations that have been shaken to their cores yet still they endure.”


Pro Moon unclipped the datapad and held it out in his open hand. “On this device is stored the record of every experiment, test, research summary, error, accident, and success of the three year project that resulted in Mark Three Panacea; a suite of medical injections, diagnostic software, and specialized communications disruption hardware that, when deployed properly, result in an eighty percent cure rate among early-stage victims of Reaver infection. With surgical intervention, cure rates among mid-stage victims only drops to sixty percent. Your guards,” he added, turning to the side a little and pointing over his shoulder with his free hand, “confiscated the briefcase containing one of our Mark Three emergency response kits that I brought along. I think the Panacea triggered your bioagent security scanners.” Pro Moon smirked as he turned back to regard the Emperor fully. He did not seem amused.


“At any rate, it's yours. The Empire's, I mean. Free of charge, and without precondition. If I were Regrad, I would no doubt have tried to use it to buy a couple of planets from you.” He smiled again, recalling the time Regrad had described then-Regent Zell's demeanor when the Azguard had named the price for the original Panacea formula. “But I am not Regrad, and this is not his Coalition.” He paused for a second, allowing one of the guards to take the datapad from him. “Neither are you Daemon Hyfe, and I suspect that this is no longer his Empire. I hope that you will take this gift as a sign of my good faith, because while it is only the first of the favors I wish to extend to you, it is the only one that does not require your collaboration.”


That seemed to intrigue the Emperor, not to mention his supporters. “So on to my second offer. I want to convince you to cede formal authority over the Occupation Zone to the Galactic Coalition House of Representatives, at which time the House will devolve its authority to the Coalition's newest member state, the government-in-exile of the Onyxian Commonwealth, whose admittance I authorized immediately before my departure for Imperial City.


“The Empire has spent four years pursuing Daemon Hyfe's goals for the worlds of the Onyxian Commonwealth: occupation and pacification. In that time, it has failed to break the back of the Onyxian insurgency, and has lost fully half of the Zone to the advancing Palestar Crusade. Turn over the Occupation Zone to the Coalition, and we will reinforce the worlds you currently hold with the only military in the galaxy the insurgency will not fight: its own. I'm offering you the opportunity to close down an entire Imperial theater of war, freeing the Imperial forces of the Occupation Zone to reinforce other positions more vital to your cause, and all that it will cost you is the loss of two enemies.


“Because I can assure you, Emperor Kraken, whatever hatred for the empire the people of the Onyxian Commonwealth hold, it pales in comparison to what has been stoked in them by the bloodshed, and the murder, and the rape, and the savagery of the Palestar Crusade. Give them five years of war to reclaim their lost worlds from that nightmare, then see how eager they are to start it all over again with some vendetta against the Empire.


“It is vital, for both of us, that we consolidate what power and resources we have, that we turn the instruments of greatest effect against the sources of greatest threat. And that is why, thirdly, I intend for the Coalition to arbitrate a ceasefire between the Empire and the Republic.”


The statement elicited murmurs of surprise and discontent from the Emperor's supporters, who had remained quiet while Pro Moon explained his designs for the Occupation Zone. He wasn't sure if it meant they had been expecting the Onyxian move, or were hopeful of an opportunity to end the war with the Republic before it began in earnest, but he decided it best not to pause long enough to find out. He still had an objective to sell.


“This war is the perfect cover, Emperor. It will allow both sides, as well as everyone caught in-between, to move massive military resources into key positions without eliciting the slightest concern from third parties. That is absolutely essential, because it will take the full weight of all our combined military assets to destroy the Reavers before anyone can move to stop us. And we must destroy the Reavers with all haste, because I have become convinced that there are those who would move to stop us.


“Three months ago, the Supreme Commander of Coalition forces shared with the leaders of the Compact Fleet an outline for a plan in development to devastate the Reavers in one fell swoop. The Coalition has solved the technical problems hindering that plan's implementation, and now we require only the cooperation of the other major galactic powers to make it a reality. We have an opportunity to eliminate the Reaver threat to galactic civilization before it becomes larger still . . . and what's more important, to deprive the Cree'Ar of further opportunity to exploit the Reavers as a weapon of mass destruction, a weapon that we believe they will begin to use in earnest as their war against the galaxy intensifies.


“And there is my fourthly, my finally: the Cree'Ar must be stopped. They have conquered Coruscant, destroyed Varn, struck at the heart of the Contegorian Confederation. We saved Azguard by the narrowest thread and only then with the intervention of the Force itself. Imperial warlords who deny your right to rule continue to defect and cower under the protection of the Cree'Ar. Billions of sapients throughout the galaxy have joined them in their crusade against Force-users. Everything that we do, you and I, from this day forward, must always and only be as a component of an overall strategy to defeat the Cree'Ar and save the galaxy from their Dominion.


“We have been enemies for so long that I fear none of us know how to be anything else, but I am asking you to change that. Help me fight the Cree'Ar. Let us work together to eliminate these lesser threats, so that when the day comes, the Empire and the Coalition can stand together against the greatest foe either of us have ever seen.”