Booster Terrik

"Booster versus Thrawn. Now there's a match I'd pay money to see."

- Corran Horn

Booster Terrik, an imposing gundark of a Human from Corellia, was a complicated man; depending on whom you asked, he was either a double-crossing, no-good swindler, or a noble, loyal-to-a-fault family man. What everyone could agree on, though, was that Terrik&mdash;the only civilian ever known to own and operate an entire Imperial-class Star Destroyer single-handedly&mdash;was anything but subtle.

Early career
"You want to dodge a couple squads of Imperial troopers...be my guest. Me, I'm going to stay right here."

- Booster Terrik to Llollulion

Little is known of Booster Terrik's childhood, but having been brought up on Corellia carried with it distinct impressions. As sure as young Booster was anything, he was independent&mdash;though his earliest work, honest or otherwise, involved piloting freighters for large corporations, he soon resolved to start his own shipping ventures, independent of anyone's authority but his own. The result was something less than outright success: more than one of his enterprises were quickly driven into the ground, and Terrik soon found himself burdened with enormous debts and no legal way to ensure his continued survival.

Running from a team of bounty hunters in the freighter Starwayman&mdash;which he'd been forced to steal to effect his getaway&mdash;Terrik ended up on the Outer Rim Territories planet Borlov, where he would experience the first of many odd turns of luck. He encountered an avian Borlovian noble, Llollulion, who was intrigued by stories of Terrik's haphazard lifestyle. Something of a rogue amongst his own introverted species, Llollulion longed to escape Borlov and see the Galaxy, and Terrik seemed to be the perfect means toward that end. He used his extensive fortune to pay off Terrik's debtors&mdash;and purchase Starwayman outright&mdash;on the condition that Terrik take him on as a copilot. Happy for the company, and grateful for the financial assistance, Terrik agreed. While the Separatist crisis was making headlines on the galactic scene, Terrik and Llollulion began a life of steady, if less-than-reputable, work as smugglers.



The law would eventually catch up to them, however, and Llollulion found himself locked up in the CoCo District Constabulary on Coruscant, held on various smuggling-related charges. Thanks to a daring escape alongside Human con men Achk Med-Beq and Dannl Faytonni, the Galactic Republic never got a chance to try the Borlovian, and with the Clone Wars breaking out in full scant days afterward, the government suddenly had more important things to worry about.

Though he was every bit as adventurous as Terrik, Llollulion would come to play the role of Terrik's conscience as the Clone Wars tore the galaxy in half. Starwayman soon found itself running supplies for early dissenters&mdash;presumably tied to the Separatists&mdash;throughout the Outer Rim, and though Terrik claimed to have only his business interests at heart, in truth he was no happier with the steady consolidation of power under Supreme Chancellor Palpatine than was his copilot.

Scarcely a week after the defeat of General Grievous and the declaration of the New Order, Terrik and Llollulion were making a supply run to insurgents on Kobbahn when they were ambushed by the Victory-class Star Destroyer Strikefast, under the command of Captain Voss Parck. Starwayman made a series of jumps into the edge of the Unknown Regions in the hopes of shaking the Imperials, but Parck, eager to be rid of what he saw as a tedious assignment, would not be shaken. As a desperate last-minute gamble, Terrik took his ship to ground on a nearby planet, hoping to hide amidst the unnamed world's dense jungle. Parck continued his pursuit, and would certainly have captured Starwayman were it not for the intervention of a mysterious alien who'd been marooned on the island years earlier. Viewing the alien's tactical genius as a far more important prize than a couple of two-bit smugglers, Parck packed up his forces and left without a second thought, leaving Terrik to wonder at his continued good fortune.

Family man
Over the next several years, Terrik would continue doing business for the rebels&mdash;and profiting heavily from it&mdash;but everything else in his life would soon change. Undoubtedly the biggest change was his marriage to a woman named Jysella and the subsequent birth of his daughter, Mirax. Now that he had a family to take care of, Terrik abandoned his nomadic ways and began using Corellia as his base of operations. Llollulion, however, was not done seeing the galaxy, and the two parted ways. It is possible that Llollulion took Starwayman with him upon his departure&mdash;the ship was legally his, after all&mdash;because around this time Terrik acquired a new ship, the Baudo-class star yacht Pulsar Skate; as well as a new copilot, the tentacled alien Polipe.



Just when things were leveling out for Terrik, however, his wife met a sudden end. Finding himself solely responsible for Mirax's welfare, Terrik had to rethink the way he conducted business; having a stationary base of operations already made it easier for the authorities to keep track of him, and the last thing Terrik wanted was CorSec showing up at his door and taking Mirax away while he was off on a job. Luckily, he had good friends in Jagged and Zena Antilles, the couple who operated Corellia's Gus Treta orbital refueling station. He often left Mirax in the Antilles's care during smuggling runs, though just as often, he would bring Mirax and the Antilles's son Wedge along for the ride. Spending many of their young years in each other's company, Mirax and Wedge would become good friends; Terrik and the Antilles began to regard each other's children as if they were their own. When Gus Treta was destroyed by careless pirates in a hurried escape from the system, Terrik loaned Wedge, who'd been onboard Pulsar Skate at the time, a Z-95 Headhunter, making no move to stop Wedge from exacting revenge for his parents' deaths.

Tragedies aside, business continued to go well; Terrik became an expert at staying one step ahead of the law, forming something of a nemesis in CorSec inspector Hal Horn. Though they hid it well, both Terrik and Horn grudgingly respected the other's tenacity, and it was an emotional day when, in 2 BBY, Terrik was finally caught and tried. Though happy to be doing his job well, Horn couldn't help but feel a certain measure of regret that their peculiar relationship had come to an end.

Kessel
"Pain I could handle and fight against, but boredom? It was the enemy, and it had me mashed flat."

- Booster Terrik

Terrik was sentenced to five years of hard labor in the Spice Mines of Kessel; not surprisingly, it would be the roughest five years of his life. The time affected him profoundly, both mentally and physically&mdash;always a large man, the constant hard work piled more and more muscle onto his frame and left him a true powerhouse of a Human being, able to lift another man clear off the ground by the scruff of his neck. Somewhere along the line he would lose his left eye, which was replaced by a large, conspicuous red prosthetic, further adding to his intimidation factor. The hardship, though, was not what troubled Terrik most of all. He was an adventurous soul, after all, and he found Kessel to be, more than anything else, profoundly boring. The only thing that kept him mentally sound during the tedium was his hatred for Hal Horn, whom he cursed with every breath. Unlike Horn himself, it would be some time before Terrik could put their feud behind him&mdash;a process made more difficult by the fact that Horn would be killed in the line of duty by the bounty hunter Bossk before Terrik's release.

A lower profile
"Most folks, when they retire, settle in one spot and relax." "Most folks aren't my father."

- Corran Horn and Mirax Terrik

Several months after the Battle of Hoth, Booster Terrik once again found himself a free man. He emerged, however, into a vastly different galaxy&mdash;Wedge had run off with the Rebellion, and Mirax had grown into a capable young woman, one who had personally held Terrik's smuggling operations together&mdash;at least, what remained of them after Jorj Car'das and Talon Karrde had finished picking them apart. At first, Terrik set out to pick up where he'd left off, but one trip in Pulsar Skate showed just how much he himself had changed. Hyperspace was suddenly too lonely; the confines of Skate too reminiscent of his time in the mines. Terrik also found that he had lost some of his appetite for adventure&mdash;though only some. He gave Skate to Mirax and her copilot, Liat Tsayv, to continue its usual operations, and started working primarily as an intermediary for his friends' businesses. This new lifestyle allowed Terrik a measure of security, not to mention keeping him mobile&mdash;even more so than could Skate&mdash;and in good company.

Keeping mobile, however, meant that he wouldn't get to see his daughter very often. As the years went on, and the galaxy continued to change around him, Terrik went through probably the most leisurely stretch of his life, and sure enough, he found himself longing once again for excitement. That excitement would come in 7 ABY, when he found himself reunited with Mirax on Tatooine in the home of Huff Darklighter, where he'd been bargaining for a cache of old weaponry from the Empire's Eidolon Base.

Terrik's joy at seeing his daughter again was blunted, however, by her companion&mdash;Corran Horn, the son of the man who'd sent him to Kessel. Horn barged into the negotiations and, not realizing who he was talking to, tried to scare Terrik off by pointing out&mdash;to Mirax's father&mdash;who Mirax's father was. Terrik didn't know whether to laugh or throttle the man, and finding out that he was not just Mirax's business partner, but her romantic interest, didn't help matters. Mirax quickly defused the situation, however, by pointing out that they were there on Wedge's behalf. Wedge, alongside Corran and the rest of Rogue Squadron, had resigned his commission in the New Republic military and taken up a personal campaign against former Director of Imperial Intelligence Ysanne Isard, who had set herself up at the head of a bacta cartel on the planet Thyferra. Terrik decided that whatever Wedge wanted, Wedge should get, and persuaded Darklighter to give the weapons to Mirax at a vastly reduced price&mdash;and only for that much because Mirax refused to take them for free.

Intrigued by his daughter's new crusade, Terrik accompanied her back to Yag'Dhul, where the Rogues had set up shop in the abandoned space station, Yag-prime. Wedge was thrilled to see Terrik again, and immediately set about finding him a role in their operation, and in the end, Terrik would settle for nothing less than running the entire station&mdash;Wedge had planned on using it as a base and little else; Terrik, on the other hand, convinced him to keep the place running as a supply depot, and began instituting expert&mdash;if occasionally draconian&mdash;measures for bringing in as much of a profit as possible.

Sure enough, under Terrik's management, the station flourished. The Rogues underwent a series of raids on Isard's bacta supplies on nearby worlds such as Qretu 5, aided by smuggler allies of Terrik's who were then allowed to keep the captured bacta, provided they spent the money they made on supplies from the Yag'Dhul station&mdash;everybody won, except, of course, for Isard. As his and Wedge's master plan for confronting Isard began to take shape, Terrik saw to the acquisition of a great deal of weaponry, both for the station itself and for the Rogues' small but growing armada. From Talon Karrde he obtained hundreds of torpedo sensor packages and launch tubes, and many thousands of projectiles; more than the station could possibly employ. He also acquired a large number of tractor beams, and an entire gravity well projector, which was mounted on the station itself.

As a slow buildup of materiel commenced on both sides of the Bacta War, another, more subtle battle was being fought&mdash;one of information. During a rendezvous with Karrde's people in the Alderaan system, one for which Terrik himself was present aboard Pulsar Skate, an Imperial force ambushed the Rogues with the help of the Immobilizer 418 cruiser Aggregator. Only the fortuitous arrival of the automated War Cruiser Valiant, believing Rogue pilot Tycho Celchu to be Another Chance due to his antiquated Alderaanian IFF code, saved the Rogues from certain doom. Aggregator fled, and the Rogues destroyed Isard's Corrupter before it could escape.

Fearing another engagement with the Interdictor, which Isard had leased from High Admiral Teradoc, Terrik began buying up maintenance parts for Interdictor cruisers with the intention of creating a rumor that the next time someone lent one to Isard, the Rogues planned on taking it. In the meantime, however, there was a more pressing matter&mdash;since no one but Terrik, Mirax and the Rogues had known where the Alderaan rendezvous was to take place, the ambush meant that there was a spy in Karrde's organization. Karrde quickly identified the culprit as his aide Melina Carniss, but before he could eliminate her, Terrik leveraged his purchase of the gravity well projector against her continued survival, with the aim of feeding her false information.

Eventually word reached the Rogues that Isard was forcing their hand&mdash;she began rounding up Thyferran Vratix civilians and threatened to kill them if resistance to her regime hadn't ceased in one month. Their location no longer worth keeping secret, the Rogues brought the next supply convoy&mdash;and thus, Melina Carniss&mdash;straight to Yag'Dhul. Carniss left a beacon in the system, and in no time at all, the Star Destroyers Virulence and Lusankya arrived in the system ready to pick the station clean. They were met by the sight of Rogue Squadron and its fleet of freighters seemingly fleeing the system, leaving the space station to be ground to dust.

Terrik had other plans, however; powering up a gravity well and locking Lusankya in place with the dozens of tractor beams he'd acquired. The ship's captain, Joak Drysso, was not amused. He made ready to obliterate the station and effect an escape, when Lusankya suddenly found itself the target of three hundred proton torpedoes&mdash;enough to blast his ship into oblivion. Just when his doom seemed imminent, however, Captain Lakwii Varrscha of Virulence selflessly moved her ship in front of Lusankya, freeing it from the tractor beams' grip. Drysso thanked Varrscha for her sacrifice and made a beeline out of the system and back to Thyferra. Terrik, aided by the fortuitous arrival of a New Republic flight group under the command of Pash Cracken, was able to convince Captain Varrscha to surrender Virulence without a fight, and Terrik immediately proceeded to load it up with his people and Cracken's fighters.

By the time Terrik and Cracken arrived at Thyferra, the battle was well under way. Captain Drysso could not believe his good luck when he saw Virulence emerge from hyperspace, but his enthusiasm was short-lived as the ship began pumping A-wings into space. Terrik's arrival, coupled with the recently-defected Sair Yonka's Freedom, and the Rogues' numerous freighters&mdash;loaded to the brim with the missiles and torpedoes that were not on Yag-prime station, made short work of Lusankya, and the battle was soon finished, with Isard apparently killed in the act of escaping.

The fighting over, New Republic General Airen Cracken arrived to do cleanup work, and from Terrik's point of view, to take credit for the whole operation. One point of contention on which Terrik was particularly stuck was the fate of Virulence&mdash;while it'd been surrendered to him personally, the arrival of Pash Cracken's unit had played enough of a role in Varrscha's decision that the government had at least a partial claim of ownership&mdash;besides which, Cracken wasn't about to leave a fully armed warship in the hands of a civilian. Luckily, Talon Karrde was on hand to broker a deal that, naturally, made everyone happy. Karrde would purchase the bulk of Virulence's weapons from Terrik, and sell them to Cracken; Terrik, in turn, would use the money he made off of the weapons to buy out the New Republic's share in the ship. Having finally found a sufficiently large base of operations, Terrik christened his new ship Errant Venture.

Life on Venture
"The Virulence is yours. Please change the name."

- Airen Cracken

Cracken returned to Coruscant to fend off a demotion attempt from Borsk Fey'lya, and Terrik set to work on turning Errant Venture into his new base of operations. The ship was left with a mere ten turbolaser batteries, but otherwise, she was in excellent condition&mdash;Terrik even managed to hang onto a portion of the ship's TIE fighter complement. Still every bit as thrifty as he'd been as the operator of Yag-prime station, he left the TIEs' ceiling racks in place to complement the usual docking space on the hangar bay's floor; adding customized suspension collars to a number of his smaller ships to ensure that no available corner of the bay went to waste.



The rest of Venture became one of the galaxy's largest mobile entertainment bazaars&mdash;the go-to location for thrill seekers, traders, and scoundrels alike. The ship was divided into three levels: Black, Blue, and Diamond. The Diamond Level was where all the "sophisticated" business went down&mdash;luxury suites, high-stakes gambling, and so on; Blue Level was for the more average visitors, and was most notable for Trader's Alley&mdash;a cash-only cornucopia of goods and services, taking up the largest single stretch of real estate on the ship. A large central courtyard linked the Blue and Diamond levels; in the center of the courtyard was an enormous holographic reenactment of the Bacta War played on loop&mdash;with Terrik's role slightly enhanced, of course. At the bottom of the ship was Black Level. Not much information was spread around about Black Level; probably because most of its clientele weren't in the business of idle chitchat. Suffice it to say, if you needed something under less-than-legitimate circumstances&mdash;and if you had the guts&mdash;Black was where you wanted to go.

Though Terrik could not have been more proud of his new home, managing an entire Imperial II-class Star Destroyer was an enormous feat, even for someone like him. As Talon Karrde would later tell him, anyone with experience working with Star Destroyers saw them as little more than "174,000 design flaws waiting to be exploited," and it was all Terrik could do to keep her from falling apart beneath his feet. The level of pressure Terrik was under during the first decade or so of Venture's operation was evident to anyone who'd had the opportunity to see his office&mdash;the large room was so filled with boxes, expense reports, loose cargo, and so on, that one could barely find a place to sit down, and the only personal effect Terrik had managed to squeeze in was a small repeating hologram of Mirax on his desk. As much as Terrik relished the chance to be busy again, his eagerness to indulge himself in the occasional distraction during this time period was quite apparent.

The first such distraction came during the campaign against Grand Admiral Thrawn; despite its condition, the New Republic had expressed interest in nationalizing Errant Venture to aid in the fight, and surprisingly, Terrik gave them permission&mdash;provided the deal came with an Admiral's commission for himself. The government quickly decided it could do without Venture after all.

Shortly afterward, Terrik would once again come to the aid of Rogue Squadron and their continued fight against Ysanne Isard&mdash;it had turned out that she wasn't quite dead after all. The trouble started when Booster and Mirax traveled to the planet Distna to assist in a raid on an Imperial facility believed to be housing the prisoners Isard had previously kept aboard Lusankya. They arrived to find the area strewn with the Rogues' remains; only Wes Janson and Asyr Sei'lar were recovered alive from the wreckage. Word eventually reached Terrik&mdash;via Wedge's and Corran's astromech droids&mdash;that the majority of the other Rogues were still alive, and being held by Isard in an attempt to use them against her rival, Prince-Admiral Delak Krennel of the Ciutric Hegemony. While the Rogues and a large portion of the local New Republic fleet were drawn into a massive attack on Ciutric, Isard made haste to the Bilbringi Shipyards, now all but stripped of defenses, and attempted to take back Lusankya&mdash;her true goal from the start.

Repairs on the Super Star Destroyer from the damage sustained at Thyferra were just being wrapped up, and the ship was effectively deserted when Isard arrived. She sent a team to take control of the bridge, and would have been successful if not for Terrik, who had figured out her plan upon realizing that none of Isard's long-term goals would be possible without first taking back her ship. Accompanied by Mirax and New Republic Intelligence agent Iella Wessiri, and speaking as "acting captain" of Lusankya, Terrik informed Isard that the jig was up, and Wessiri attempted to place her under arrest. Isard tried to fight her way out, however, and was shot and killed.

Upon returning to Venture, Terrik had one final order of business to attend to&mdash;Asyr Sei'lar, upon being picked up by Terrik from the wreckage at Distnal, had decided to keep her survival a secret. When word had reached Borsk Fey'lya that Asyr and fellow Rogue Gavin Darklighter planned on getting married and adopting a Bothan child, he, to say the least, had not been amused. Though it would mean breaking Gavin's heart, Asyr opted to assume a more undercover role in Bothan society and work to change the dirty politics Fey'lya had come to represent. Her "death" did not stop Fey'lya from trying to impose his politics on her, however, and upon hearing the news from Distna, Fey'lya traveled to Venture with the intention of bribing Terrik into obtaining a suitable replacement body&mdash;Asyr's purportedly having been destroyed in the battle&mdash;to be interred in a hero's monument on Bothawui. Terrik responded by roughing the Councilor up and throwing him off the ship.

Two years later, Terrik was reunited with Corran Horn, whom he'd fortuitously avoided during the Isard affair&mdash;and worse yet, forced to work with him&mdash;when Mirax was captured and held hostage by Moff Leonia Tavira, leader of the Invids, a rogue ex-Imperial pirate group. Terrik had not taken well to Mirax's relationship with Corran, and was even less pleased when the two were married at Thyferra aboard the freshly-captured Lusankya&mdash;without even telling him beforehand&mdash;so when Corran responded to her abduction by spending more than two months on Yavin IV training at Luke Skywalker's Jedi Praxeum, their meeting was considerably ugly.

While Terrik had in fact known about Mirax's capture from the beginning&mdash;she'd been working out of Venture at the time, using her father's resources to help Airen Cracken keep tabs on the Invids' activities&mdash;he augmented his anger over Corran not coming straight to him with the news by pretending to have only just found out. The entire confrontation was designed to test both Corran's commitment to his daughter and his willingness to stand up for his decisions in the face of Terrik's overwhelming force of personality, and Corran not only figured out Terrik's ruse, but passed the test on all accounts. He asserted his own devotion to Mirax as being just as legitimate as Terrik's, and assumed full responsibility for whatever happened to her as a result of his two months' absence.

Terrik was pleased with Corran's performance, and for the first time, began to respect Corran as his own man, and more importantly, worthy of his daughter's love. The two immediately went to work on locating the Invids and bringing Mirax home safely. Corran's first order of business was to get himself on and off Corellia to see his grandfather Rostek Horn about old CorSec&mdash;and personal&mdash;business; after conning a tourist couple aboard Venture into smuggling Corran down to the planet as a lark, Terrik began going through his information network, and those of his allies, for any and all data on the Invids' whereabouts.

His search eventually led him to his old friend Kina Margath, an entrepreneur based on Elshandruu Pica. There Venture was ambushed by the Eyttyrmin Batiiv pirates, allies of the Invids. The ambush was thwarted by the arrival of Corran, and proved to be a windfall for their search&mdash;Terrik tracked the Eyttyrmin Batiiv to the planet Courkrus, and from there Corran was led to the Invids' base on Susevfi. Arriving aboard the Venture, Corran fought his way into the pirates' compound, rescued Mirax, and when Tavira arrived on board her flagship Star Destroyer Invidious, ready to turn the lesser-armed Errant Venture to scrap, Corran used the Force to project an image of the Lusankya into Tavira's mind. To further tease her paranoia, he added an image of the recently-destroyed Sun Crusher into the mix, causing Tavira to flee the system. Terrik was now firmly convinced that Corran would be an acceptable son-in-law&mdash;though he wouldn't dare say so in his presence&mdash;and two years later, Corran and Mirax gave him the gift of a grandchild, a Force-sensitive boy named Valin.

The next several years were a mixed bag for Terrik and Venture. The ship would continue to make an impression on the galactic underworld&mdash;Mara Jade and Lando Calrissian briefly called her home during their search for Jorj Car'das, for example, and Talon Karrde frequently used her intimidating presence as a stress-under-fire test for new recruits. Behind the scenes, however, things were getting rough. Terrik eventually hired ex-Rogue Squadron member Nawara Ven to help out with the ship's daily operations, but even the extra help couldn't keep Venture from falling further and further into disrepair.

Turbolifts stopped working&mdash;or worked poorly, only half of her operating systems continued to function reliably, to say nothing of the ones that died altogether, and perhaps worst of all, her already low turbolaser complement continued getting smaller as weapons constantly underwent repairs, and were even cannibalized and/or sold for other more vital parts&mdash;by around 18 ABY, Venture was left with only three functioning turbolasers. Terrik finally decided that major overhauls would be necessary, and hired a team of two hundred Verpine techs to upgrade the ship's systems. As the Caamas Document Crisis flared up across the galaxy seven months later, however, the techs still had not finished their work. Things had gotten so bad that Talon Karrde eventually floated an offer to buy Venture from Terrik should she no longer be worth his trouble.

Karrde was aboard the ship ostensibly to find information on the Cavrilhu Pirates for Luke Skywalker, who'd recently chased them from a base in the Kauron asteroid belt. While in the system, Luke had been buzzed by a strange ship looking faintly like a TIE fighter, which had sent out a transmission in an alien language and then raced back into hyperspace toward the Unknown Regions. While Terrik, Karrde, Mara Jade and Corran Horn, who was also on the ship as part of an investigation into an Imperial resistance movement codenamed Vengeance, were discussing the recent events, the ship appeared once more and followed the same pattern with Venture that it had with Luke&mdash;sending out the same alien transmission while flying on what seemed like a suicide course toward the ship's bridge, then turning and vanishing once more into hyperspace. This time, however, Mara had picked a familiar word out of the transmission&mdash;Mitth'raw'nuruodo, Grand Admiral Thrawn's full name. Concerned about rumors of Thrawn's return to the Imperial Remnant, Luke and Mara headed off to the ship's origin point, triangulated from its two escape vectors&mdash;the planet Nirauan.

Meanwhile, the New Republic was in turmoil as numerous species used the controversy stirred up by the Caamas incident as an excuse to bring back old grudges; among these species were the Frezhlix and the Sif'kries. The former instituted a blockade of the latter's planet, supposedly as retribution for the planet's vote against a condemnation of the Bothan people for their role in Caamas's devastation. A New Republic task force including Generals Garm Bel Iblis and Wedge Antilles, unable to legally intervene in a local affair, managed to break up the blockade under the pretext of inspecting one of the blockaded ships&mdash;Hoopster's Prank, one of Booster Terrik's freighters. The mission was successful, but Terrik's Sif'krie smuggling contacts were angered over the suspension of their operations and banned him from future shipments.

Still fuming over the matter, it was with some reluctance that Terrik met with Bel Iblis shortly afterward concerning an operation the General had planned. Hoping to find a full copy of the Caamas Document, President Ponc Gavrisom had ordered an information raid on the Imperial Ubiqtorate base at Yaga Minor, and Bel Iblis needed Errant Venture to play the role of a damaged and vulnerable Imperial warship&mdash;all of the New Republic's captured Star Destroyers were too busy with their official duties to slip away unnoticed, and were too well-known besides. Only through the deft manipulation of Bel Iblis did Terrik agree, having been convinced that he was getting the better end of the deal.

Venture did, in fact, benefit greatly from renewed New Republic support, undergoing three weeks of extensive repairs, upgrades, and retrofits. Unbeknownst to Terrik, however, the exterior of the ship was torn apart to simulate severe battle damage; damage which Terrik later insisted Bel Iblis would pay for personally. Lastly, the usual skeleton crew was supplemented by thousands of New Republic personnel, bringing Venture up to a full military-grade crew complement for the first time since her service in the Empire. Though happy to see his ship finally getting the attention it needed, Terrik began to suspect that Bel Iblis had effectively conned him, a feeling that only got stronger the more he learned about the desperate nature of the mission.



Venture's codes were changed to identify it as Tyrannic, an Imperial ship that had not been seen for several weeks, under the assumption that no one at Yaga Minor would know better. With Terrik and Bel Iblis on board&mdash;Bel Iblis's presence being one of the minor details Terrik hadn't been briefed on in advance&mdash;"Tyrannic" appeared in the Yaga Minor system with a respectably-sized New Republic force hot on its heels. The plan was for the Republic ships to keep the base's defensive perimeter busy enough that the Imperials would fail to notice that the Star Destroyer was heading straight for one of their exterior interface stations, where a team would then blast its way through to the interface, steal a copy of the Caamas Document, and escape&mdash;or if escape became impossible, which Bel Iblis and Terrik believed deep down would be the case&mdash;beam the document to one of the other ships.

Unfortunately, also present at Yaga Minor was none other than Thrawn. The Grand Admiral was in actuality an impostor disguised as Thrawn and following the orders of Moff Disra and Major Grodin Tierce, but the Imperials nevertheless immediately saw through the ruse and pinned Errant Venture in place with fifty tractor beams. "Thrawn" threatened to destroy the ship if Bel Iblis and Terrik refused to surrender, but Bel Iblis, suspecting the Imperials would want him alive&mdash;not to mention an intact Star Destroyer&mdash;called their bluff. He ordered the Venture to pivot as far toward maximum firing position as the tractor beams allowed, then opened fire on the nearest beams. Once free, Bel Iblis intended to ram Thrawn's Relentless, taking what he believed to be the Imperial's most valuable asset out of the equation. The effort, of course, was for nothing; for every tractor beam Venture took out, two more took its place.

Just when it looked like Yaga Minor would indeed be Venture's last stop, Talon Karrde arrived in the system, came through the defensive perimeter&mdash;aided by high-level Imperial codes&mdash;and dropped Fleet Admiral Gilad Pellaeon off on Relentless, having furnished him with proof of Disra's and Tierce's deception. With the Thrawn pretender revealed as the con man Flim, Pellaeon assumed control of the Imperial forces, and ordered an immediate cease-fire. Soon afterward, the Bastion Accords were signed, and the Yaga Minor engagement would go down as the final significant military confrontation between the New Republic and the Imperial Remnant.

Stability and purpose
"See you on the other side, Karrde." "The other side of what?" "The nebula I'm about to make."

- Terrik and Talon Karrde, during the evacuation of Yavin IV

True to his word, General Bel Iblis had Errant Venture's exterior fully repaired, and even though most of the weaponry was once again removed, the innumerable repairs and upgrades were a financial windfall for Terrik&mdash;Bel Iblis had even acceded to his demand that the ship receive a new coat of paint; "something besides Star Destroyer White." Over the next several months, Venture added a new distinction to its repertoire: it was now the only Star Destroyer to be painted a screaming red from bow to stern. Though quite a thing to behold, the new paint job meant that no one would mistake her for an official warship ever again. His newfound economic security may have also prompted Terrik to splurge on a cloned left eye to replace his prosthetic, because he appeared at Luke and Mara's wedding soon after looking good as new. Any softening of his appearance was certainly well-timed&mdash;Mirax quickly put him to work keeping an eye on the large number of children attending the wedding; a role he'd revisit with some success in the future.



Another new interest Terrik acquired during this period was superweapons. He spent a large amount of money purchasing mysterious technology from the Hutts, purported to have its origins in Durga's failed Darksaber project, which he had installed along Venture's central spine straight through to the bow. Whether the end result could in fact be called a superlaser is debatable, but that it worked, and was quite powerful, was certain.

For several years, things finally seemed to be looking up; not only for Terrik, but for the galaxy at large. The peace would eventually be shattered, however, by the invasion of the Yuuzhan Vong. Terrik largely stayed out of the war in the beginning, which served Corran Horn well upon his self-imposed exile in the wake of the Battle of Ithor in 25 ABY; he subsequently spent around a year away from the New Jedi Order, traveling the galaxy aboard Errant Venture alongside Mirax. He contributed to the war effort by running guns for the Hutt underground, albeit at a profit.

Eventually, of course, the Jedi would come looking, though when they came it was Terrik and his ship they needed. Evidence of an imminent Yuuzhan Vong/Peace Brigade attack on the Jedi Praxeum had convinced Luke Skywalker to send Jacen and Jaina Solo out in search of Terrik to supplement the academy's defense; Anakin Solo and Tahiri Veila were already on Yavin 4, and Talon Karrde had agreed to lend a handful of ships, including his own Wild Karrde, to the evacuation effort, but the amount of firepower the enemy had brought to bear could only be countered by Errant Venture&mdash;especially since the New Republic government had recently taken steps to distance itself from the Jedi. Karrde's ships took a considerable beating in the ensuing battle, and just when all seemed lost, Venture appeared and blasted its way into the maelstrom. Furious over the threat to the students&mdash;his grandson Valin being among their number&mdash;Terrik unleashed his secret weapon, obliterating the Yuuzhan Vong force's flagship in a sudden flash of light. Almost before anyone knew what had happened, the battle was over.

The victory was only temporary, however; even Terrik could not secure Yavin IV indefinitely. The Jedi students&mdash;over thirty of them altogether&mdash;were brought aboard Venture, along with Anakin's team from the ground, and she fled into hyperspace to parts unknown. With no safe harbor for the Jedi yet in place, Venture became a mobile Jedi Academy, essentially a modern-day Chu'unthor. For the rest of the war, Booster Terrik was at last forced to put others' needs ahead of his own business interests; indeed, he now had one of the most significant responsibilities in the galaxy. He began jumping Venture randomly around the galaxy to keep the enemy from tracking it, going so far as to send out smaller ships to obtain supplies and fuel&mdash;and occasionally sending out Nawara Ven to assist endangered Jedi students on planets like Trogan. For months, the ship didn't go near a civilized system; the only beings who could find it were Jedi, thanks to a special proprietary homing beacon provided and installed by Karrde.



In the meantime, Skywalker sent Jedi Knights Kam and Tionne Solusar into the Deep Core to search for a new haven&mdash;one that would be impossible to locate without the Force. They eventually found the world that would become known as Eclipse, but not before an official arrest order was issued for the Skywalkers, forcing Luke and Mara to abandon entirely the tricky political situation on Coruscant and take refuge on Venture&mdash;just in time for Mara to give birth to their child. Ben Skywalker began his life in the Errant Venture's medbay, with Terrik, Jedi healer Cilghal and others waiting nearby. He was soon ushered away to The Maw, located at the opposite end of the Jedi's "Great River" of safe passage from Eclipse. A reliable network now in place, the rest of the Jedi soon left Venture as well, but things were too far gone for Terrik to turn his back on the war. Venture went on to play supporting roles in many of the war's key battles.

"That's treason. I like it."

- Booster Terrik on the formation of the Insiders

She helped cover the evacuation of Coruscant, then accompanied Wedge Antilles and his group to Borleias, where the New Republic government&mdash;what was left of it&mdash;promptly abandoned them. Acting-Chief of State Pwoe left them Lusankya with implicit orders to hold the Yuuzhan Vong off as long as possible while he and his people fled to Mon Calamari. Viewing the New Republic as essentially dead, Wedge proposed that the leaders of the group&mdash;himself, the Skywalkers and Solos, Terrik, and a handful of others&mdash;start fighting the war as a sort of new Rebellion, independent of anyone else's authority. Among other things, this new strategy meant that Terrik was free to arm his ship however he saw fit; over thirty turbolasers and ion cannons were promptly transferred from Lusankya to Errant Venture. The former was essentially stripped of all personnel and useful equipment, and was used as the "Emperor's Spear" in the forthcoming battle; sacrificing itself to destroy the Yuuzhan Vong force's command ship, and its leader, Czulkang Lah.

From there, Venture participated in the Battle of Ebaq 9 as part of a large Smuggler's Alliance fleet including Karrde and Lando Calrissian, and in the final battles of the war, at Caluula and Coruscant. At Caluula, Terrik was tasked with preventing the escape of any Yuuzhan Vong craft leaving the planet&mdash;on which the devastating Alpha Red virus has been unleashed&mdash;but one coralskipper managed to get through. The enemy intended to use the ship to poison the world of Zonama Sekot, but the planet's consciousness easily neutralized the contagion upon its arrival.

After lending a hand in the final war-ending battle at Coruscant, Terrik landed on Zonama Sekot for a celebratory gathering with the many other major players in the war. With Skywalker and the others off planning the future of the galaxy, Booster Terrik stepped aside for a brandy with Karrde, Calrissian, Crev Bombassa and Han Solo. Idly discussing the new landscape of the galaxy from their own, perhaps less-reputable point of view, Terrik and the others came to the conclusion that it was high time they moved away from their shadier dealings&mdash;spice values had plummeted since the decimation of Hutt Space, after all&mdash;and focus on legitimate business. With the war over, and all kinds of legal work to be done, the future was looking very profitable indeed.

Behind the scenes

 * Though popularized by Michael Stackpole's X-wing books, Booster Terrik's first appearance was in the short story Mist Encounter by Timothy Zahn, published in Star Wars Adventure Journal 7. Given the two authors' frequent collaboration, it is possible, though unverified, that Terrik was nevertheless Stackpole's creation, and Zahn included him in Mist Encounter as a setup for his later appearances.
 * The name of Terrik's wife has not yet been canonized as Jysella; officially, that is merely the name of his granddaughter, but it was Stackpole's intention that the child was named after Mirax's mother.
 * Though having long been established as having a prosthetic left eye due to his time on Kessel, Terrik appears a handful of times in the comic series Star Wars: Union, and later in The New Jedi Order Sourcebook, with two normal eyes. Though no official explanation has been given for the change, it is doubtful that such a thing would have happened so many times by accident; therefore, it must be inferred that he obtained a new eye&mdash;presumably through cloning&mdash;sometime prior to Union. This event's placement in the preceding article is conjectural, and subject to change.
 * It is unknown if he was related to Mod Terrik.

Appearances

 * Mist Encounter
 * Interlude at Darkknell
 * X-wing Rogue Squadron: The Phantom Affair
 * X-wing: Rogue Squadron
 * X-wing: The Bacta War
 * X-wing: Isard's Revenge
 * I, Jedi
 * Specter of the Past
 * Vision of the Future
 * Star Wars: Union
 * Survivor's Quest
 * Dark Tide I: Onslaught
 * Dark Tide II: Ruin
 * Edge of Victory I: Conquest
 * Edge of Victory II: Rebirth
 * Emissary of the Void Episode IV
 * Star by Star
 * Enemy Lines I: Rebel Dream
 * Enemy Lines II: Rebel Stand
 * Destiny's Way
 * The Unifying Force
 * Exile