Smurths and Smithies Chapter 22
Based on a true story.

Sebastian and Meryl made their way back to Sebastian’s starfighter the Baguette of the Stars. The door to the hanger housing the Baguette slid open ahead of them. Sebastian slid a hand into his pocket.

“How can I contact you in the future?” he asked.

She smiled. “I usually work on my own. Invisibility and all that. It’s just easier. I’ll find you when I need to.”

They stopped just outside the hanger. The other Smurths were gathered inside the hanger, back in ambush positions.

Meryl sighed, “Now you have to make it look like you escape. Please the security cameras, but try not to hurt anyone.”

“Not a problem.” Sebastian turned to go, but Meryl stopped him.

“Hang on, one last thing. Are there any other Smithies that I can trust?”

He winked at her, “Trust a Smithy? I don’t even make that mistake. You’ll have to use your own discretion.”

With that he walked five steps into the hanger. Smurth blasters came to be Meryl stepped just inside the door behind him, activating her lightsaber.

“Surrender Smith–”

It was as far as she got. Sebastian squeezed the detonator in his pocket. Flashbangs and flares sprayed from a hidden missile tube on the Baguette’s prow, detonating all over the hanger. Sebastian had been prepared for it and was able to block out the sound and blinding light and run Force-guided to his ship. By the time Meryl and the Smurths could see or even think around the ringing in their ears Sebastian had fired up the Baguette’s engine and squeezed the starfighter sideways through the opening hanger ceiling.

* * *

Tyler Crow, Shawn Turner, and Jonathan Greene came out of hyperspace in the middle of nowhere. Green in the Emigrant and Crow and Shawn in the starship previously belonging to Brandon Roth, who met his end on the point of A-Ndr3a’s hidden wrist-vibroblade.

“Almost the middle of nowhere. We’re not terribly far from Lamaredd,” Green said. “We are well out in Wild Space though.”

Crow was not pleased, “Why did you strand us out here?”

“We’re not stranded. The Smuths would never imagine we would head straight out into Wild Space. If, and that’s a big if, they manage to follow us they’ll never go farther than Lamaredd. We’ve lost them.” Greene seemed pleased with himself.

“You did well, Greene.” Shawn said. “What’s the next step?”

“We’ll hop around the outside of the galaxy till we find a safe port. I was thinking… wait, I’ve got something on my scopes.”

“We’ve got it, too,” Ceerow said. “It’s big enough to be a small moon.”

Shawn sat back in the co-pilot’s seat. “That’s no moon.”

Crow was quickly becoming pleased with the quality of the technology on the starship previously belonging to Brandon Roth.

“No life-signs. Massive technology readings though. Its power output and usage are barely registering.” He pressed a couple more buttons on the touch screen. It’s 19,000 meters across.”

“How big was the Death Star? The first one.” Greene asked.

“120 kilometers across,” Crow replied, “Not comparable.”
“I see… well, we should definitely check it out.” Greene was already engaging his sublight engines.

“Check it out?” Crow was less certain. “I just got this ship, and I’m really starting to become attached to it. I’d like to enjoy it awhile longer.”

“You said yourself there’s nothing alive there.” Greene flew a slow circle around Crow and Shawn. “What are you worried about?”

“Automated defenses, battle droids, and… yep, the atmosphere is bad. Gravity is average for a space station, but there are places with no atmosphere pressure and everywhere else oxygen is very low.”

“We should check it out.” Greene flew another circle around Crow and Shawn.

Crow had other ideas. “If we leave now we can be resting comfortably on Execron in eight hours.”

Greene appealed to the president, “What’ll it be, Shawn?”

The wise Smithy hesitated before relenting. “Very well. We’ll find out what this thing is.”

Crow immediately volunteered to stay with the ships.

* * *

The reaction to Tyrel’s disappearance was mixed. The handmaidens around the queen gasped and chattered excitedly, except for one, who moved over to Jordan and began conferring with him and the queen. Tony ran to the spot where Tyrel had been, waved his lightsaber through the empty space to be certain Tyrel was gone and just not invisible, then gave a grunt of irritation and horror and kicked Marshal’s remains. Seth and I put up our lightsabers, and I motioned him to one side so we could speak. The security guards moved forward to secure Marshall’s body as Tony whirled and stalked away to look out one of the shattered windows.

I put a hand on Seth’s shoulder, ‘You okay?”

“Never better. I took so much of Marshal’s life energy even my blaster clip is re-energized.”

“Really?”

“No not really. What the hell happened to Tyrel?”

I shrugged and glanced at the Queen, deep in discussion with Jordan. “Your guess is as good as mine. He saved us all, and that’s what matters.”

“Yea.” Seth nodded to Lauren and the Smurths. “We should get out of here before the Smurths decide to make his sacrifice a moot point.”

“They won’t attack us. Not here.” I watched Tony make his way over, glare locked on a dark haired, glamorous looking Smurth.

I grinned at him. “Friend of yours?”

“That’s the one that put the dagger through my arm,” he reminded me, “She’s a real wildcat.”

At the mention of a wildcat I lowered an eyebrow in irritation, finding the creature somehow important, but unable to remember why. I could tell from Tony and Seth’s expressions that they had similar thoughts.

I shook my head. “Yes, well. The one Tyrel saved is not quite the small, frightened women one would hope to rescue.”

Seth snorted. “There are no such things as small, frightened women.”

I smiled at that. A security guard came over and told us that the queen wanted to speak with us. We approached the dais with due reverence, bowing as we got to the bottom of the steps. Jordan finished speaking to the queen and the handmaiden with the bright white aura and came to stand with us. The queen looked us over, and the unimpressed expression on her face hurt just a little, but then she smiled and nodded.

“Against my initial judgment, I will allow you to remain at the mountain facility you already occupy, so long as you clear any visits to Naboo cities with my security captain. The Smurthwaitians will be informed that you are under Naboo protection for the time being.”

“Thank you, your majesty.”

She only nodded. “Now, please. Take your companion…” It took me just a moment to realize she meant Marshal. “…and leave.”

We left the palace by private underground passages to avoid meeting any of the populace and emerged into the evening near the space port. Marshal, inside a casket fitted with anti-grav , was hitched to the back of the speeder and we headed back to our spaceships.

“What are we gonna do with him?” Seth asked, nodding to the casket as we passed from flat plains into the forest.

I shrugged. “I was hoping you had an idea.”

He turned his eyes back to the road, “Nope. I was hoping – whoa!”

Seth slammed on the speeders’ decelerator, stopping us just shy of hitting a man standing in the middle of the road. The four of us stared at him, thoroughly confused. I stood up, hand on my lightsaber, and addressed the man.

“Pardon us. We didn’t expect anyone to be on this road. Almost didn’t see you.” I examined his dark clothes, normal civilian clothing, typical of a Core Worlder. “You’re not exactly dressed for jogging.”

He was not amused. “Surrender the dead one.”

I blinked. I blinked again. I would have been less surprised if he had asked me to sing a lullaby.

“Come again?”

The stranger pursed his lips. “Surrender the dead one. And his lightsaber.”

“What exactly do you want with the body?” Seth asked, also standing.

“That’s not your concern,” was the reply.

Seth leaned over to me, “Dead is dead. We could hand him over, no big deal.”

“He deserves to rest in peace, with proper ceremony.” I glanced at the stranger. “Besides, I don’t like people demanding things of me.”

Seth turned back to the stranger, “And if we say no?”

The stranger hefted a blaster-rifle.

We four Smithies unclipped our lightsabers *click* “What the…!” *click-click-click* “Sith spit…” Our lightsabers refused to activate.

“As you can see, your lightsabers are no good here.” The stranger gestured at the surrounding forest. “I have enough fire power to wipe you all out right now. Please, surrender the dead one and his lightsaber.”

* * *

“It’s the Eye of Palpatine.” Greene had found the command center.

Crow replied over the com-link. “That was destroyed. I heard rumors that there was another one, but nothing more than hearsay.”

“This is a little more than hearsay, don’t you think?” Greene was pulling data up on the screens. “It’s been inactive for a long time.”

Shawn was in the communication center of the battle-moon, not far from Greene. “Be careful, you have no idea what it might do if you wake it up.” He brought up a computer display. “These communication systems are pretty sophisticated. Crow, get up here, let’s try and contact the other Smithies.”

* * *

I don’t know what prompted me to try my red lightsaber, but in an instant I closed my scaled fist around it and it sprang to life. The man before us fairly leapt back in surprise, but no amount of leaping would have saved him. I flipped forward over the nose of the speeder Force-aided, planting both feet squarely into the stranger’s chest. I landed straddling him, and with a sweep of my saber I took his head off. Behind me Seth, Jordan, and Tony threw up Force-shields, deflecting a hail of blasterfire that came from all sides. I dove off the road to the right as our assailants broke cover and attacked. Every one of them looked very surprised to see a lightsaber, and several died eyes fixated on the red energy blade. An explosion from a grenade bucked the speeder, almost flipping it tail over nose. For a few seconds more the blasterfire continued as smoke from the explosion clouded everyone’s vision. Then it stopped just as suddenly as it all began.

When the smoke cleared I could see why. Our speeder rested on the ground, anti-grav plates wrecked, and its engines were charred and melted. The hovering coffin we had been towing was gone, stolen by the stranger’s minions. The dead attackers were gone as well.

I extinguished my lightsaber and hurried over to the speeder. The other three were regaining their feet.

“I am very upset.” Seth activated his lightsaber and slashed at the speeder’s twisted chassis to fee his legs. With a groan he pulled himself out of the wreck. Jordan had remained mostly unharmed in the backseat. Tony had been thrown out of the speeder, but caught himself using the Force.

“Your lightsaber works again.” I drew and tried my right-hand lightsaber; its dark blue blade buzzed out with no delay. “They must have a device that interrupts lightsaber power flow.”

“Your red one worked just fine,” Tony said.

“Thank goodness, huh?”

“Oh yes… we might have had to surrender and avoid a fight,” Jordan said, a bit sardonically, “The Force forbid we see the day Smithies don’t get to fight.”

I shot him a glare, “We should have just given them Marshal’s body?”

“No no, you’re right.”

Seth limped over. “I think my leg is broken, well, cracked I guess.”

Tony looked at his lightsaber and decided it didn’t matter whether it worked or not. “Back to Naboo?”

“I’ve still got a com-link,” I said, ‘We should be able to get through.” I clicked it on. “Smith House, come in. Naboo party a bust, requesting pickup.”

Aaron replied, “Hang on a second. There’s something you need to hear. Let me patch it through.”

Shawn’s voice came over the com-link, “Smith House come in. Smith House come in. Respond code 15-87-RE5. Smith House come in…”

Aaron took over, “I’m patching that through from the Smurthbane. It’s been repeating for about fifteen minutes.”

“All right, come and pick us up,” I said. I turned to Seth. “This is getting ridiculous. We need to regroup.”

“Whatever Shawn wants is important, or he wouldn’t risk sending that transmission.”

“We’ll see.”

Smurths and Smithies Chapter 23 >>

Author's notes.

While perusing Wookiepedia, I came across the article on the Eye of Palpatine.  The most exciting part about the article was the bit about the rumor that another Eye had been built.  "That," I thought, "I can write into Smurths and Smithies."

Someday we'll make it back to Naboo and reveal just who that handmaiden is.