Star Wars: The New Jedi Order: Vector Prime (51 page)

In addition to his novel writing Salvatore is hard at work creating a brand new world for 38Studios, Llc. which will be the setting for their first MMORPG, currently code-named Copernicus. This also serves as the setting for the new RPG
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning
, an epic, open world role-playing video game, due out in 2012.

Salvatore makes his home in Massachusetts, with his wife their dogs Oliver, Artemis and Ivan and Jilseponie, a gray tiger cat. He is a trustee on the Leominster Library Board and he spends his “free time” coaching and playing softball on a team made up of family and close friends. His gaming group still meets on Sunday nights to play games, ranging from MMORG’s to Dungeons & Dragons and board games

You can find him on Facebook at:
http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/pages/RA-Salvatore/54142479810

Star Wars

The World of Corona

The Demon War Saga

Saga of the First King

The Crimson Shadow

The SpearWielder’s Tale

Chronicles of Ynis Aielle

The Legend of Drizzt

The Stone of Tymora
with
Geno Salvatore

The Hunter’s Blades Trilogy

The Sellswords

Transitions

The Neverwinter Trilogy

The Cleric Quintet

A Reader’s Guide to R.A. Salvatore’s The Legend of Drizzt edited by Philip Athans

Tarzan: The Epic Adventures (novelization)

You saw the movies. You watched the cartoon series, or maybe played some of the video games. But did you know …

In
The Empire Strikes Back
, Princess Leia Organa said to Han Solo, “I love you.” Han said, “I know.” But did you know that they actually got married? And had three Jedi children: the twins, Jacen and Jaina, and a younger son, Anakin?

Luke Skywalker was trained as a Jedi by Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda. But did you know that, years later, he went on to revive the Jedi Order and its commitment to defending the galaxy from evil and injustice?

Obi-Wan said to Luke, “For over a thousand generations, the Jedi Knights were the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic. Before the dark times. Before the Empire.” Did you know that over those millennia, legendary Jedi and infamous Sith Lords were adding their names to the annals of Republic history?

Yoda explained that the dreaded Sith tend to come in twos: “Always two, there are. No more, no less. A Master, and an apprentice.” But did you know that the Sith didn’t always exist in pairs? That at one time in the ancient Republic there were as many Sith as Jedi, until a Sith Lord named Darth Bane was the lone survivor of a great Sith war and created the “Rule of Two”?

All this and much, much more is brought to life in the many novels and comics of the
Star Wars
expanded universe. You’ve seen the movies and watched the cartoon. Now venture out into the wider worlds of
Star Wars
!

Turn the page or jump to the
timeline
of
Star Wars
novels to learn more.

Standing there, on the bridge of his Nebulon-B frigate, the pirate Urias Xhaxin clasped his cybernetic left hand to the small of his back with his right hand. He stared straight ahead at the tunnel of light into which his ship, the
Free Lance
, flew. Given the nature of the frigate’s design, with the bridge far forward, he felt as if he were flying there alone, making his way deep into the territory of the Outer Rim where no one in his right mind would be found.

He glanced back over his shoulder at the Twi’lek working the navigation station. “Time to reversion, Khwir?”

The Twi’lek’s long lekku twitched. “Five minutes.”

Xhaxin turned on the comlink clipped to his jacket’s collar. “All hands, all hands, this is Xhaxin. Red and Blue Squadrons, prepare for launch. You will be moving to the outbound vectors and disabling the smaller yachts. Gunners, we will aim for the escorts. Everyone look sharp and this may be the last run we ever need make. In and out, clean and easy. You’ll all do well, I know. Xhaxin out.”

A dark-haired woman stepped up beside Xhaxin. “You really think this haul will earn us enough to retire?”

“It depends upon the quality of retirement you desire, Dr. Karl.” The white-haired, white-bearded man turned and smiled at her. “Your skills will earn you a good living almost anywhere in the New Republic, and your share of this raid should be enough to buy you a new identity or two.”

Anet Karl frowned. “Ever since the peace between the Imperial Remnant and the New Republic six years ago, we’ve been forced to go after smaller and smaller targets. The New Republic never condoned what we did, but they turned a blind eye to it while the Imperials were still a threat. Pickings were good as unreconstructed Imperials fled out here to the Remnant, but that trade has been trickling off. Is this raid going to be different?”

Xhaxin pursed his lips for a moment, then lowered his voice. “It’s a fair question you ask. The answer is yes, I can feel it in my bones. This raid will be like nothing we’ve seen in the last five years.”

Anet smiled mischievously, her brown eyes sparkling. “You’re not going Jedi on me, are you? The Force tells you about this raid?”

“No, I’m far more practical than the Jedi, and more dangerous, too.” He spread his arms. “We’ve nearly nine hundred crew on this ship—nine times the number of Jedi in the whole of the galaxy. And while they have the Force to aid them, I have two powerful allies with me: greed and arrogance.”

“Oh, your plan was good.”

“Correction, my plan was brilliant.” Xhaxin laughed. “We let a couple of ships go free because they’re traveling together, then I set up a guy who says he can organize convoys through deep space to the Remnant. We had people demanding positions in our convoy. In fact, they paid well for the privilege of traveling safely.”

“But no refunds, correct?” The doctor smiled. “The credits they’ve spent are just a down payment?”

“Exactly. They gathered at Garqi, have headed out, and the last of them should be hitting the rendezvous point in ten minutes. We’ll round up what’s already there, then pick off the last one and go.” Xhaxin smoothed his mustache with his flesh-and-blood right hand. “It’s been a grand run. This last raid—it will be remembered. I would have had history recall me in other ways, but this will be good enough, especially if all of you can be rewarded for your hard work.”

Anet Karl looked at the various humans and aliens busy at their duty stations on the bridge. “We had no love lost on the Empire either, Captain. We owe you our thanks for keeping us alive and allowing us to pay them back all these years. We’d keep going, too—”

“I know, but the New Republic has made peace with the Remnant.” Xhaxin sighed. “One cannot underestimate the allure of peace. I think, perhaps, we’ve finally earned some ourselves.”

“Ten seconds to reversion, Captain.”

“Thank you, Khwir.” Xhaxin waved a hand toward the viewport. “Behold, Doctor, our destiny.”

The tunnel of light shattered into countless stars of varying hues. They’d come out into the middle of nowhere, literally—a point in space that had been selected only because gravitational forces made it perfect for speeding the way from Garqi to Bastion in the Imperial Remnant.
This place is supposed to be empty
.

Empty it was not. Aside from the burning wreckage of a twisted freighter spinning madly, life pods and yachts darting about, a large object hung there in space. Xhaxin thought at first it had to be an asteroid because of its appearance, uneven surface, and torpid pace. Other smaller asteroids seemed to orbit around it, then streaked out on attack runs on the yachts.

And now they’re orienting on us!
Xhaxin spun away from the viewport. “Full shields up, now! Deploy the fighters. I don’t know how some fool managed to fit a hyperdrive core to an asteroid, but he’s not stealing our ships! Gunnery, get a firing solution on that big rock and open it up.”

“As ordered, Captain!”

Even as he issued orders and pondered making a planetoid somehow mobile, Xhaxin knew that that line of reasoning did not explain the smaller rocks that moved like starfighters. “Sensors, what’s going on out there?”

A Duros looked up through holographic displays of data, his long face wearing an expression that was even more morose than usual. “Gravitic anomalies, sir, everywhere.”