Rating:
PG-13
House:
The Dark Arts
Ships:
Ginny Weasley/Harry Potter
Characters:
Harry and Hermione and Ron
Genres:
Crossover Alternate Universe
Era:
The Harry Potter at Hogwarts Years
Spoilers:
Philosopher's Stone Chamber of Secrets Prizoner of Azkaban Goblet of Fire Order of the Phoenix Half-Blood Prince
Stats:
Published: 05/24/2006
Updated: 06/04/2007
Words: 91,458
Chapters: 67
Hits: 75,013

Harry Potter and the Dark Lord of the Sith

LunaIsCool

Story Summary:
On Christmas morning in their seventh year, a flying accident causes the Trio to vanish. They reappear in a galaxy far, far away... where a war against the Galactic Empire rages.

Chapter 40

Posted:
12/14/2006
Hits:
902


Chapter 40.

Harry and Mara managed to make it down one corridor before they ran into trouble. At the first corner, as soon as they turned, they were met with blaster fire. They both drew their lightsabers and began blocking the shots.

"It's those ceiling turrets!" Mara shouted over the whine of blaster bolts.

Harry understood. Three turrets, each with a pair of repeating blasters. They were armored, so deflected shots did nothing to them. He saw that Mara had several blasters with her, but no heavy weapons.

"Mara, can you hold them off by yourself for a moment?"

The woman nodded. Harry raised his saber and hurled it forward, spinning, at the first turret. The machine was neatly sliced apart, and fell to the floor with a loud crash.

"Nice job," Mara said approvingly.

They repeated the exercise on the other two turrets (Mara insisted on handling the last one herself) and proceeded up the stairway at the end of the corridor.

At the top of the stairs, doors opened on both sides and stormtroopers ran out. "Freeze!" they yelled.

The reply they got was two lightsaber blades. Harry deflected two shots, cut down one trooper, Force-pushed another back downstairs, than leaped over and sliced up the remaining two. He turned to Mara, who was standing over her four attackers, and nodded.

Mara was about to move ahead through the door in front of them, when Harry held her back.

"What, Potter? The hangar is this way."

"Yeah, but don't you feel it? There's too many of them in there."

Mara stood for a moment. "So what's your plan?"

"First, we take the side corridor," he said, pointing to one of the doors the stormtroopers came out of. "And second, you know the mind trick?"

Mara nodded. "However,"--she looked at him-- "we'd better split up. I'll take the right corridor, you go left."

"Sure," Harry agreed.

The chamber ahead had at least fifty stormtroopers patrolling it. If they tried to fight it out, it would be too much. But the place was so full of crates, columns, balconies, vehicles, and other obstacles that he was never in the line of sight of more than two Imperial soldiers at once. Mind-tricking them away was all too easy--and since he heard no blaster or lightsaber noises, he presumed Mara was equally successful.

He exited the chamber through another side corridor, and immediately faced Mara.

"Beat you," she said.

For the first time in days--or maybe weeks, or months, since he had no idea how long he was kept unconscious--Harry smiled. "Whatever."

The next room was dark and nearly empty. To the left, Harry noticed a tall staircase, but Mara was going forward. She pointed to a large switch on the wall. Harry flipped it with the Force.

The heavy gate ahead of them opened revealing a large open platform with many vehicles, and beyond that, a skyline with enormous buildings--the largest city Harry has ever seen.

We must be on Coruscant, he thought. He was about to ask Mara, but then, he felt danger, and looked up. The gate they came through was smashing back down. Harry jumped backwards, only to realize that Mara was already on the other side. He heard intense blaster fire before the gate slammed shut, cutting off the sound.

"Mara!" he yelled.

"She served her purpose admirably," a new voice rang out in the dark. "Of course, she had no idea I was here. She was just following her master's orders."

Harry got up. Mara betrayed me... "Who are you?"

The voice laughed. "The great Harry Potter, fooled by a simple voice-changing spell. DON'T RECOGNIZE ME?" The voice had changed with that last phrase, and Harry did recognize it. He recognized it all too well.

"Voldemort," he said.

XXXXXXXX

The address Luke gave her was a safehouse in Mos Eisley. It belonged to an old couple whom Luke knew when he lived on Tatooine. They were sympathetic to the Rebellion, and would help hide the Twi'leks until they could be taken off-planet. Hermione approached the house and gave a coded knock.

"Luke, is that you again?" a voice from inside shouted. The door opened, revealing a woman. Hermione didn't know how old she was, but she seemed to be quite healthy.

"Who are you?" she asked.

"Hermione Granger. Luke gave me the address," she explained.

"Well, do come in. Lingering outside is suspicious."

She stepped in and looked around. The room was small, and almost all the space was covered with furniture of some kind - tables, chairs, shelves. Before she took it all in, another Twi'lek entered from the back and rushed over to hug her companion.

"Sienn!" Oola breathed out. "You were right to go when you did. I nearly got killed. If it wasn't for Hermione..."

Sienn turned to her. "Thank you."

The elderly woman looked at her. "Sorry I haven't introduced myself. Jeni Arrel. How did you manage to get her out of Jabba's palace?" she asked.

Hermione didn't want to reveal much about magic, but fortunately, she had a better explanation. "Jabba is dead," she said, "thanks to Luke. We got out after they left the palace."

"Oh," the woman nodded. "Well, that'll make Lady Valarian happy."

"Huh?"

"The other crime boss on Tatooine."

"I see."

"You'll be going away, now?"

"Yes."

"Please, have dinner with us."

"Oh, I don't want to--"

"It's not an intrusion."

"Well, all right. You need some help?" she offered. She wasn't much of a cook, but at the very least, she could help set the table.

After dinner, Hermione wanted to leave, put the Arrels pointed out to her that going out into the desert at night was suicide. So she stayed the night. Surprisingly, she slept quite well. Tatooine was very quiet at night.

In the morning, she bid farewell to the Arrels and the two Twi'leks, and headed out of Mos Eisley. But even before she left the city, something unexpected happened.

"Well, there's a surprise," a rather familiar voice said.

"Kyle Katarn," she recognized the man. "What're you doing here?"

"I could ask you the same thing."

"How's Jan?"

"Back with Intelligence, last time I heard."

Intelligence. That's what Ron does now. I better change the subject. If he asks about Ron or Harry...

"So, what're you up to--no 'impregnable' Imperial bases around here."

Kyle looked at her. "How much did Jan tell you?"

"Everything."

"Look, I'm not any sort of hero. Right now, I'm just looking for whoever killed my parents."

"Wasn't it the Empire?"

"It was, but that's the issue. Whoever it was, he acted on his own authority, and I found out he went specifically after my father."

Hermione didn't know how to reply. Kyle continued. "I hoped to get into Jabba the Hutt's palace, and extract some information out of the regulars there."

"I doubt you'll find much. Jabba's dead."

"How did that happen?"

"He held Han Solo captured in carbonite. I came along with Luke and Leia to get him."

"I see. I'm not saying the slug didn't deserve it, but damn. This will make it harder. Well, at least I won't waste any time here. Where're you going?"

"Well, Luke and I didn't want to attract attention, so we didn't take our X-wings to the spaceport. We left them beyond the Dune Sea."

"I can give you a lift in the Crow. It'll be much faster than going across the desert in a speeder."

"Thanks," she agreed. Driving a speeder across the desert wasn't something she was looking forward too, either.