A Star Wars Story - The Hunted Preview

War has broken out across the galaxy! Rejecting the Jedi Order and the Galactic Republic, Count Dooku has gathered together tens of thousands of star systems in a Separatist movement. After discovering vast armies of droids being made to support the cause, the Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi and his padawan, Anakin Skywalker, were captured along with the Republic Senator, Padmé Amidala, and sentenced to death. It was only by the timely arrival by the Jedi and a newly created army of Clones were they rescued, and thus were the Clone Wars started.

However, word of the start of the war is slow to spread especially to the farthest reaches of the galaxy. A Jedi-led team of explorers have remained on the newly discovered planet, M'uuka'lanek, for many years and contact to them is slim. Now they, along with other scattered Jedi teams, have become targets by the sinister Count.

For the young, inspiring, but untested Jedi, Havardor Grae, this will be his first great battle. However, he will have to face an enemy that is both cunning and ruthless. An enemy forged through hatred of the Jedi, and will stop at nothing to see them extinct...
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He opened his eyes. A feeling came over him that interrupted his meditations and was all too familiar; a feeling of apprehension that forewarned him of surprises. He stared out of the cockpit only to see a black expanse that was covered by stars and star clusters. There was nothing that appeared to indicate any danger, but he knew that looks could be deceiving.

“Coordinates for the Rhuq Star Cluster nearly set,” said Gess Laran.

“You certainly took your time,” commented Meeko.

His brother gave him a look through his long violet hair. “Well, we don’t have R2-D7 with us.”

“Something is coming,” interrupted Kneero, leaning forward.

Both brothers stopped talking to look at him with expecting eyes.

“Something like what?” asked Gess, which got a slap on the shoulder from his sibling.

“You know that’s not how it works.”

“Check the screens,” ordered Kneero.

Both of them turned around in their seats to do so. At first there was nothing, but within a few seconds the monitors and warning lights on the control board began to flash and sound the alarm for an approaching object.

“Ships coming out of hyperspace,” explained Gess, his tone anxious. “Three of them.”

“Do we have their make yet?” asked his brother, the tone of his voice the same.

“They’re coming out now.”

“How soon can we make the jump to hyperspace?” demanded Kneero, his head-tails swaying nervously.
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Setting himself on another pole, he allowed the Force to guide his blade to meet with every bolt that came from the drones before him, the third now having reoriented itself by now. With the slightest motion of his wrist or the flex of his fingers, the jade blade blocked every bolt with not a single one getting past his defense. Breathing in, he now opened his mind to the Force. Reaching out, he felt the incoming stun bolts sailing almost lazily through the air. Instead of striking him with a painful stun, they would only kiss his blade in an electrifying sizzle. He touched the beaten surface of the drones, hearing and feeling the hiss of the air pumps that would push it to a different direction and the heat of the shock ray emitters as they charged another bolt that seemed to take seconds. Despite Master Marsh’s teaching to keep his mind focused on the task at hand, Havardor couldn’t help but reach out even further than the probes to the life around him. Both plants and animals had always been the easiest for him to connect to even before his Jedi training. The pests of his home he had turned to pets for his siblings, and there was even one time he had sent away a roving pack of rabid Truskan dogs that threatened the slum village of his home. So once he had been brought to the Temple and learned on how to properly connect to animals and plants of various mentalities, it quickly became second nature for him. Such acts had certainly helped in studying the flora and fauna of both Onio Prime and M’uuka’lanek.