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Welcome
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Nathaniel Reed's
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:: An ongoing episodic story of fan-fic set after Episode VI Return of the Jedi, and inspired by George Lucas' historical draft concepts ::
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| January 2024 |
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Revisiting artwork animation for the Virtual Edition
31st January 2024 |
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I've continued reviewing and recreating the defunct Flash animations for the Virtual Edition Episode VII Plague of Doom, re-producing them as animated GIFs.
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The latest artwork for the illustrated virtual edition of Episode VII : Plague of Doom recreates the arrival of the GA fleet at Kessel.....
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| And then, later, the flight of the injured Darth Kayos to her Sith Master, Darth Monstross hiding in the Imperial Rehab Centre on Courscant.... |
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| You can see the VE artwork in the 'Coruscant' art gallery as well as in the online illustrated story, and you can discuss this in the forum here ! |
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| As I did with the progression of the Virtual Edition Episode X, I will post below sections of the prose for Episode XI as I draft it.... |
The Millennium Falcon looked like an imbalanced but hungrily determined soil mite against the shipping containers that towered over it. Yet spaceflight engineering did not stop it from angling down to join one of the myriad of approach lanes that directed arriving traffic towards Bastion, the gateway world for the Imperium, the capital of the Imperial Remnant.
In the starboard side rounded cockpit, Han glanced at his co-pilot and friend.
“Hey, pal, good call to swing by that pulsar.”
The Wookiee growled.
“Its magnetic discharges sure have scrambled the last entry on the log. If anyone goes snooping, all they’ll get is half the story.”
Chewbacca harrumphed and snorted a chuckle.
“Yeah, you’re half the story too,” agreed Han.
The Wookiee was dressed in a bulky suit of leather and plated sections, with two bandoliers criss-crossed, one sporting munition cartridges, whilst the other held utility tools. Over-sized three-digit gloves and a fully masked helmet with re-breather pouches and a boxy trans-vocabulator at its base sat on the navigator’s seat behind them.
Similarly, Han was dressed in blue-grey overalls, suggesting a nondescript engineer or haulage pilot. An application hairpiece of a bushy beard now adorned his jaw and chin, and he wore an eye-patch that was currently pushed up on to his forehead.
The control panel announcer chimed. “Freighter D-3-7 Oxen, you are cleared to land at platform 12-09,” a mechanical voice piped out. “Please proceed.”
Han flicked a switch, and leaned on the yoke, one eye on the navi-approach display that had automatically connected from Bastion air traffic control. Several blue dots pointed ahead and to the right, and, through the cockpit window, Han could see an open landing pad with green flashing lights and droid attendants moving into position.
The Falcon lowered smoothly down to the platform, steam outgassing noisily as it settled on its seven landers. With a pneumatic hiss, the boarding ramp lowered, and Han stepped down to meet the droid foreman holding a datapad.
“Welcome to Bastion space port,” announced the droid. “Manifest please ?”
“Building parts for Imperium, sector 4-3-G,” Han answered promptly. “We’re scheduled two rotations here, before we re-load.”
“That is in accordance with my directive here,” the droid replied. “A trans-lifter will arrive within the hour to take your shipping containers to an Imperium-bound transport.”
Han dipped his head in acknowledgement, then turned on his heel, and walked back to the ship’s ramp.
That clears the formalities, mused Han, hopefully we can rendezvous with the agent later.
With a final push, the three Jedi padawans reached out with their boots, and stepped lightly onto the high ledge of their destination. Behind and beyond lay the vast gulf of open space that encircled the Primary Jedi Temple, the Principalle, and the few lanes of sky traffic that they had had to negotiate around as discretely as possible. Drawing attention to themselves at this early stage would have made for no fun at all !
“Thanks Benj,” muttered Gana quietly. “That was really useful, we can do that next time !”
The young Skywalker raised his eyebrow quizzically.
Corsa gently pushed past, and stepped over to a nearby service utilities hatch. She tapped a green button, and the door swung open. She held it to one side, and her brother reached in.
“We’ve only got two, sorry,” announced Gana over his shoulder to Benji. “but, hey, you’re younger and lighter than us !”
“And with that levitation trick, I’m sure we can get you to ride along with us...” agreed Corsa with a grin.
Gana pulled out to dilapidated looking single-user aerial platforms, akin to those found in the military, but stripped down and without a double laser cannon. An anti-grav, a thruster, a foot rest, a handle with thumb controls.
“Come with me,” offered Corsa to her cousin, as Gana stepped on to his.
The remaining two stepped on to their SAP, with Benji holding tightly on to Corsa’s waist.
The Solo Twins flicked the activator switches, and the SAPs hummed into life. They rose a little, Corsa’s a little unsteadily. Benji splayed out his right hand, and the SAP settled.
The two hovercraft smoothly accelerated away across the rooftop and down the far side of the building, towards the mid levels, and keeping to the shadows.
The jungle cacophony was loud enough to break through the whine of the settling engines of the Jedi MPV. The ship had landed on the wide flat section of the river bank, not too far from the waterfall, the gorge curving around them and towering to quite a height. Multi-coloured birds flew from the tree canopies at the top of the cliffs, and circled above, cawing and clacking in competition with the general hubbub coming from the foliage interior and the falling water.
Alana Skywalker stood at the foot of the ship’s boarding ramp with her cadre of three Jedi. She smiled back at Doctor Walcott, who regarded the group from the top of the ramp, and waved.
“See you at the mine ! My two Jedi Knights will be at your disposal. Everything will be fine, just another routine administrative process, like the others.”
“But I still don’t understand why you want to go this way ?” he growled, gesturing at the waterfall nearby.
Alana tilted her head to one side, and smiled benignly.
“Ohh, just call it curiosity. The scans showed this cave pushes back towards the mine. You take the front door, and then they won’t be worried. And we’ll take the back door.”
“Your Force sense is expecting trouble ?” Walcott asked sagely.
The Jedi Master cocked her head to the side.
“Well, you’ll have two Jedi with you, and, besides, we’ll rendezvous with you too,” she answered wryly.
“Humpf !” exhaled Walcott. “You’re all the same !” And he waved her away with a dismissive sweep of his arm.
Alana laughed lightly, but she was acutely aware of the perceived frustrations when such magical soothsayers would proclaim allusions but without apparent evidence of conviction. The Jedi understood full well the slippery nature of future-casting, whereas the common person would demand explicit clarity and guarantee.
She and the other Jedi stepped back away from the immediate proximity of the archaically-titled ‘burn zone’ that would be produced by the anti-grav electro-magnetic coils and the ship’s thrusters.
The MPV powered up, and its boarding ramp and hatch slid shut.
“Right !” announced Alana. “Let’s get going. We need to move fast if we’re to catch up with them inside the mountain !”
She pointed across to the waterfall.
“I can see the cave opening on this edge of the waterfall. Looks like there’s a path leading in.”
“Might not get too wet, either !” chuckled one of the Jedi Knights, named Dixon.
The four of them hurried across the wild grasses and bushes of the stepped river bank, and on to the path that cut in close to the base of the cliff. They carefully made their way in single file right up to the edge of the cascading water.
With Alana leading the way, they took firm grips to the slippery stone face, and, with water lightly pattering about and over them, they slipped between the sparkling veil and the unforgiving ochres of the rock.
Inside the cave, the light shimmered and sparkled magically from the water that fell thunderously an arm’s length from them.
Alana turned her back to the curtain and ignited her lightsabre. The blue glow was joined by three others, illuminating their way visually, while the power of the Force illuminated their way in their mind’s eye.
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| Nathaniel Reed, 31st January 2024 |
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