Centerpoint Station

Centerpoint Station, known to the Killiks as Qolaraloq or the World Puller, and referred to by members of the Executive Secretariat as C-point, was an ancient space station that was capable of moving entire planets with its tractor beams. It was created by the Thuruht hive c. 100,000 BBY, making it perhaps one of the oldest artifacts known to the Jedi in the Yuuzhan Vong War era.
==Description==
With a width of 100 kilometers and length of 350 kilometers, it was larger than the first Death Star. From a distance, it appeared as a huge partially translucent sphere with two small cylindrical poles facing Talus and Tralus. The exact center consisted of a hollowed area 60 kilometers wide that contained the station's tractor beam projector and power source; a large, ball of energy floating in midair, called the Glowpoint. Because the station was built before the invention of artificial gravity, it rotated to simulate it.
Outwards from the tractor beam projector chamber were 20 kilometers of decks, about 2000 of them total. Decks with a ceiling higher than 20 meters were known as shells. The station's exterior was covered in boxy-shaped buildings, along with cables, tubes, pipes, parabolic antennae, and conical shapes. Amid these were airlocks, one of which, on the base of the north cylinder, was big enough to dock several Bakura-class destroyers. A turbolift ride from this hanger to the center took only five minutes, due to how fast the cars would accelerate.
Centerpoint Station contained within its colossal bulk an extremely intricate collection of ultra-high energy systems capable of generating huge amounts of nuclear, magnetic, electric, tractor beam, and hyperspace power for use in a type of "hyperspace tractor beam", which could be projected through a hyperspace path at any target. It was capable of 'gripping' an objects as large as planets, stars, and even black holes, and then moving the target object anywhere within its considerable operational range. The station could also harness this power for the actual destruction of stars and planets, collapsing their cores through massive gravitational fluxes. The powerful hyperspace tractor beam arrays consisted of huge conelike structures within the station's central chamber, surrounded by six smaller cones. During the system's operation, this specifically designed geometric array acted as the source of the beam's power, taking its energy from the Glowpoint.
==History==
===Origins and construction===
Centerpoint Station was built around the year 100,000 BBY by the Thuruht Killik hive on orders from the two Celestials known as the Son and the Daughter, who the Killiks knew as the Architects. By joining the hive mind, the siblings gave the Killiks the strength in the Force to construct the station. Using the Force, the Killiks extracted and smelted ore from asteroids, as well as moved themselves throughout space without any other means of propulsion. The Son and the Daughter had become Joiners in order to direct the construction, and to give the Killiks the Force abilities necessary to create it. Once their task was complete, the Ones left the hivemind and took their power in the Force with them.
The Celestials proceeded to use the station to create entire star systems, such as the Corellian system, with the help from Planetary repulsors buried deep within the planets' surfaces. It was also used to construct a black hole cluster known as the Maw, to contain their "Mother", the being known as Abeloth—whom the Killiks would come to call the Bringer of Chaos. After this, the station remained at a lagrangian point between the double worlds, Talus and Tralus, in the Corellian system.Ambush at Corellia
===Colonization===
After the Celestials disappeared and the subsequent Infinite Empire fell in 25,200 BBY, slaves in the Corellian system who had revolted began colonizing Centerpoint Station.The New Essential Chronology Not knowing what it was, some settlers took refuge in the tractor beam projector chamber, calling it Hollowtown and using the environment provided by the Glowpoint to grow more than enough food for the station. Two sets of cones; each consisting of one large cone surrounded by six smaller cones, which had been part of the tractor beam mechanism became known as the North and South Conical Mountains, respectively, and were often attempted to be scaled.
For generations, Centerpoint Station's tractor beam sat dormant and the residents of the station lived comfortably. Occasionally, the residents expanded on the exterior, such as when a spaceship crashed into the station and it became welded to the side as someone's living space. They never fully understood the station or who had originally built it; only accepting it how it was and making-do with it. The best minds in the galaxy studied, mapped, and pondered the workings of the mechanical leviathan for ages, but there were still gaping holes in the understanding of its key processes by the time of the Post-Imperial era, though it was correctly speculated that the station had some role to play in the Corellian system's construction and that it had the potential to be used as a weapon able to destroy entire planets. At one point, the station's spin was researched to see if it could possibly be stopped and artificial gravity installed, but it was found to be too difficult and costly, along with the fact that not much was known about how the station would react if it stopped spinning.
In 500 BBY, Talus and Tralus founded the Federation of the Double Worlds, a government independent from the central authority on Corellia. This government came to control Centerpoint Station, which was became ruled directly by a group called the Executive Secretariat, itself being headed by the Chief Executive. In the later years of the Galactic Republic and during the rule of its successor state, the Galactic Empire, the entire Corellian Sector had fallen under control of the Corellian-based central government, ruled by a Diktat, and later a Governor-General when the New Republic took power. Despite this, Centerpoint was still administered by the Executive Secretariat.
===The First Galactic Civil War===
Sometime following the Battle of Yavin in 0 BBY, the librarian at the Theed library on Naboo asked a spacer a number of questions, and Centerpoint Station was the subject of one of them. Around this time, the Galactic Empire also stole a Rebel blockade runner, packed it with explosives, and set it on a collision course with Centerpoint Station. In doing so, they hoped the Rebel Alliance would be viewed as both foolish and dangerous, and that it would force the hands of Rebel sympathizers. However, Rebel spies learned of the plan, and Master Sergeant Crowley oversaw a group of Rebel agents who successfully destroyed the corvette before it could reach its destination.
===The Corellian Crisis===
In 18 ABY, the Sacorrian Triad, the government of the planet Sacorria in the Corellian sector wanted the entire sector to break away from the New Republic and form an independent state. Their scientists researched Centerpoint Station and learned how to control the tractor beam and weaponize it. Deciding to use the station as a way to negotiate their independence, they tested the weapon on the star TD-10036-EM-1271, causing it to explode. When the tractor beam was used, the Glowpoint flared several thousand degrees hotter, incinerating Hollowtown and killing everyone inside the tractor beam projector chamber. Believing it was a terrorist attack, the civilian population and the Executive Secretariat left, leaving only Chief Operations Officer Jenica Sonsen behind.
When the Triad launched their insurrection, they used the tractor beam again to destroy Thanta Zilbra and nearly Bovo Yagen, though the station was knocked out of the way and the tractor beam missed when Anakin Solo shot Drall's planetary repulsor at it. Additionally, Centerpoint Station was able to generate a massive interdiction field and communications jamming that covered the entire sector. Eventually, the Triad was defeated and both the interdiction field and communications jamming were lowered.
===Yuuzhan Vong War===
A few years later during the Yuuzhan Vong War, Anakin Solo refused to use Centerpoint Station to destroy an entire Yuuzhan Vong fleet in the Battle of Fondor, so Thrackan Sal-Solo did instead. His aim was off, however, resulting in the destruction of not only half of the Yuuzhan Vong fleet, but nearly three quarters of the allied Hapan fleet as well.
===The Second Galactic Civil War===
In 40 ABY, Centerpoint Station was once again used as a weapon, but this time it was the Corellian people who took up arms within its massive walls. But their way would not be easy, as the station was controlled by a droid that Thrackan Sal-Solo had programmed to make itself believe it was Anakin Solo. Ben Skywalker was able to disable the station by making the droid, who then referred to itself as "Anakin Sal-Solo," realize the truth of its existence. It was damaged by Galactic Alliance forces at the end of the Blockade of Corellia, giving hope that this weapon would never again be used to obliterate neighboring worlds.
Despite the desire for peace, images of Centerpoint Station would be displayed on clothing items worn by Corellians to show their dedication to their homeworld's cause.
It took little time for Centerpoint to be again operational after being damaged by the Galactic Alliance. The weapon was fired under Five World Prime Minister Sadras Koyan's initiative in order to wipe out Jacen Solo and the Galactic Alliance Second Fleet. Solo managed to survive the assault, although the Second Fleet was not to be so fortunate. He later returned to Centerpoint at the head of a task force to capture the station for use against the Confederation.
Seeing that the balance of power would tip greatly in favor of anyone who possessed its enormous destructive force, Grand Master Luke Skywalker and the New Jedi Order carried out a raid upon the station in order to finally destroy it. Jedi Master Kyp Durron led the raid, with Toval Seyah, a Galactic Alliance scientist and former spy who had worked on the station in the past.
During the pitched battle between Confederation and Galactic Alliance forces, a technician named Rikel, who had lost his wife on the galactic capital of Coruscant to the Galactic Alliance Guard, was left in charge of the station's fire-control chamber. Intent on destroying Coruscant, he set the targeting coordinates to [0, 0, 0]. Unbeknownst to Rikel, Toval Seyah had reprogrammed the station to replace all galactic coordinates (beginning with Coruscant) with its own; when fired, Centerpoint targeted itself. The resulting gravitic pulse detonated the station, wiping all traces of the enigmatic structure from the system, killing all on board, and destroying countless vessels in its blast radius.
===Later history===
In the year 44 ABY, the Jedi Raynar Thul, Lowbacca, and Tekli met with the Thuruht Killik hive. Thuruht allowed them to see the hive's Histories, including when they built Centerpoint—which they called "Qolaraloq"—under the instruction of the Celestials. This revelation disproved the previous speculation by many species that the Killiks had simply absorbed one of Centerpoint's designers into their collective mind and brought the memory of the creation of Centerpoint into the fold of the hive-minded species.
As a result of Centerpoint's destruction, Sinkhole Station, a space station inside the Maw Cluster that was identical in design to Centerpoint Station, but a bit smaller, began to malfunction. The station had been used to help maintain the black hole cluster and keep Abeloth inside, but when it malfunctioned, it caused the shell of black holes that composed the Maw to begin to slide apart, creating a "crack" in the otherwise complete shell of black holes. This then allowed Abeloth to reach out from the Maw, which seemed to have blocked her influence when it was intact (as Abeloth was previously only able to influence those within the Maw, such as the Jedi younglings at Shelter). According to Thuruht, the destruction of Centerpoint was a direct result of Jacen Solo's attempt to change what he saw in his vision at the Pool of Knowledge. By trying to change the future, Jacen apparently altered the Current of the Force and unleashed Abeloth—the Celestial embodiment of Chaos.
==Appearances==
==Sources==
==Notes and references==
Category:Celestial culture
Category:Corellian system space stations
Category:Pre-Republic
Category:Space station superweapons