Chapter Text
The Before Time…
“What the hell are you talking about?” said the ghost of Makas Goroc. He was in his living room (heh) standing/floating next to his still cooling corpse, having died maybe a minute or so ago.
“Something Ja’hal first tried to tell you almost fifty years ago.” Barla Von, Anda Siv’s husband and father to her three daughters, all in this room, said. “You’re not alone. You were never alone. Maybe a couple of people you had a strained relationship with, but the rest of us tried to stay in touch with you and you know what, we succeeded.”
“I noticed that we were exchanging letters.” Makas said, glancing at them askance.
Ja’hal Von was Barla and Anda’s eldest daughter, and the most dignified of the three almost identical women in the room. “I don’t think you did.” she said.
“I signed them and everything.”
“That’s not what I mean.” Ja’hal stopped, closed her eyes, and inhaled deeply. Then she opened her eyes and tried again. “You left what you thought of as your family when you first became a knight. You changed the way you thought about yourself to be nothing but Jedi. It helped you focus on getting better and better at the job, but it cost you the rest of your life. I don’t think you noticed that being family was what we were doing for you.”
“You said it often enough.”
“I don’t think you really believed us. Your whole life has been nothing but being a Jedi, isolating yourself from everyone else.”
“What have I been doing the last seven years?” Makas said, gesturing at Marki and Fingers.
“Not opening up to anyone. When were you going to tell us you were working with the duskwalkers to drive the gangs out?” Marki said.
“What?” said Tamma, Barla and Anda’s second daughter.
Fingers spoke up, “About three years back the various mafia gangs moved out of the sector, along with the cops. This sector is governed by an alliance of duskwalkers, thieves, and con artists.”
“And Makas helped with that?” asked Nidi, Barla and Anda’s third daughter.
“I offered them some advice. Told them how to source weapons, root out spies, negotiate with powerful people. I didn’t mention it because it wasn’t important.” Makas admitted.
“You engineered a revolution and you didn’t think it was important?” Nidi asked.
“I wouldn’t go that far.”
“I would.” Ja’hal said. “Uncle, when are you going to realize that you are part of what happens and not just some instrument of the council and the light side?”
Anda Siv walked into her small office in the light side Jedi compound on Ossus. The party for the elevation of her last student to the light side council was still going on several floors below her but she was feeling uncharacteristically unsociable. And there were always things for the grand master of the light side Jedi to do. She had just settled down to some paperwork when there was a rapping on her door frame and a lean young man leaned in.
“Excuse me, I’m looking for Grandmaster Anda?” he said, uncertainly.
Anda was certain. “You’ve found her.”
The young man looked up and down the corridor he was in. “Don’t you have, like, guards or something?”
“I’m a fully qualified Jedi.” Anda pointed out.
“Yeah, but you’re also, like, the most valuable person on the light side.”
“Hardly.” Anda laughed. “There’s a young man downstairs right now who is totally going to eclipse me. Now, if you’re here to assassinate me, shoot your shot so I can get back to my paperwork. Otherwise, take a seat and tell me what you want.”
The young man looked sheepish and sat down. “My name is Desoros Kimvale.” he said.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you Desoros, but that’s hardly a request.”
The man inhaled, closed his eyes, exhaled, and then opened his eyes and went for it. “I want to write a book. About you. Not just you, also Mistress Mikkel, your teacher, and Jedi Goroc. Between the three of you you’ve been the most influential Jedi of your generation.”
“That’s what the Tree said would happen.” Anda said, “And I suppose you want to pick my brain for memories?”
“And those of your friends and associates, yes.”
“Hmmm.” Anda said. “I guess we should start at the beginning.”
From The Three Students of Kunal Lin by Desoros Kimvale:
Anda Siv had arrived on Ossus with an entourage befitting a child of her stature as a scion of the ruling family of her home planet. A quartet of guards, two servants and a food taster stood behind her as she stepped into the small meeting room in the light side compound on Ossus. This was her big day, when she stepped aside from her cadet branch of the house Siv of Cafasis and started on her journey to become a great Jedi master.
“I am going to be the greatest Jedi ever.” Anda declared to no one in particular.
“You will indeed, my lady.” Said the older servant, who was having a slightly hard time containing her emotions just then. Anda did not notice.
“No, you won’t.” said a gangly red-haired girl who walked into the meeting room from the other side. Like Anda, she was about five years old and unlike Anda, she sported an easy to move in shorts and shirt combination, boasting two skinned knees. “I am.”
“No, you won’t.” Anda retorted. “I’m a Siv.”
“Is that a disease?” the red-head asked.
“No. I’m a member of the ruling house of Cafasis.”
“Definitely a disease. Besides you’re a normie. I’m Engineered. I have better genes than you. I’m stronger, faster, I can jump higher and I can throw a rock and hit a bullseye at thirty yards!”
“Now who has a disease?” Anda said. (A sentiment that turned out to be prophetic, Anda related to Desoros as she was telling the story, a century later)
“Ah, you’re both here,” said a voice. It belonged to a tall, aquiline man with dark hair who strode into the room as if he was trying to set the very air in motion. “Anda Siv, Mikkel Ansa. You’ll both be studying under me, my name is Kunal Lin. Oh, along with this young gentleman, he just got to Ossus too. Say hi, Makas.”
“Hi.” Said a little boy, also five years old, who half stood behind Kunal Lin’s robes.
“Talk about a disease” whispered Anda.
Kunal Lin knelt down until he was eye level with Anda Siv. “Anda, that was mean. You’re a light side Jedi now and lightsiders do not do things just to be mean. I want you to look into yourself and promise yourself you will never do that again.”
Anda solemnly closed her eyes, took a deep breath, opened them, and said, “I promise.”
“Good. Now, it’s time to say goodbye to your followers. They can’t come with you, from now on you’re a Jedi.”
Anda took another deep breath, then went to each member of her entourage, shook their hand solemnly and thanked them graciously. The last one was the old servant, who broke ranks, knelt down, and swept Anda up in a hug. “Oh, my little peach fuzz.” She said, rocking the young girl back and forth and burying her face in Anda’s hair. She squeezed a couple more times and then backed up and looked at Anda at arm’s length. The servant’s eyes were brimming with tears and they were leaking unheeded down her face. “You are going to be a great hero. I love you so much.”
“I love you too.” said Anda, gently taking the servant’s hand. “I have to go now. I’ll see you again soon. Be safe and happy until then.”
The servant cupped Anda’s face tenderly, then wordlessly stood up and all of them trucked out of the room. Anda stood and watched them go, then stood perfectly still, staring at the doorway for a long time, then she shivered as the emotion started to overcome her.
Anda felt arms wrapping around her, and looked up to see the red-head, Mikkel, wrapping her in a hug. “I was sad too.” Mikkel said, “When my family said goodbye.”
A thousand years ago…
Lord Anko Iv got out of the ground vehicle and started striding purposefully to the clearing where the other Sith lords were already assembling. He roughly peeled his cloak off his shoulders and flipped it behind him, listening with some satisfaction as his body slave scrambled to catch it before it hit the ground. He heard a small scuff in the dirt and a dismayed moan from the slave. Good, something to punish the slave for when this was all done. Maybe it would be a good demonstration of his new powers.
The score of Sith standing around the clearing eyed each other suspiciously. They were only one of about three hundred such gatherings scattered around the surface of Medrias, part of a great ritual to channel all the Sith power that had been lost in the Republic debacle a few years ago. The idea was simple if difficult: all the Sith on the planet would conduct a ritual simultaneously that turned the entire planet into a giant lens of dark side energy. The souls of all those Sith killed in the war that had just ended would be caught by the lens, shredded into their component energies, and then those energies distributed among the Sith that were making up the lens. If it was distributed equally, each of the six thousand Sith lords participating would about treble in power, but Anko Iv had no intention of letting the distribution be equal.
The hologram in the middle of the clearing lit up with the image of Lord Vitiate’s secretary, who bowed to the assembled Sith and said, “my lords, it is time to begin. Please start your meditations.” Then winked out. Anko watched as the other Sith assembled themselves into various meditative poses and started to mentally enter the great energy field of the force. Another Sith snapped at Anko to pull his weight, and with a sigh he sat down in the grass, connected his hands in the meditation gesture, and felt his consciousness float up to join the others.
It was amazing. Anko could feel the energy field surrounding the entire planet and reveled in the sensation of it increasing in both intensity and velocity, whirling around the planet and sweeping up any stray energy in the area. It was intoxicating, like projecting the biggest, longest blast of lighting at a hated foe, only more so.
One of the Sith, in a different pod somewhere on the southern continent, couldn’t handle the intensity of the force and his soul shredded, the component energy feeding into the great swirling maelstrom around the planet. This was expected. Vitiate had warned the Sith when he had explained the ritual the previous night that it would require extraordinary strength of character and anyone who was weak would be better off staying out of the ritual lest it kill them.
Another soul came apart in the whirling torrent of force energy. Weak. No matter, every soul that came apart just added its energy to the maelstrom. Vitiate had mentioned that too. A third soul shredded itself.
The energy was really getting vicious now and the members of Anko’s pod strained to keep it contained within the bounds of its orbit. One of the members of the pod broke under the strain and Anko watched as Lord Votus’s soul dissolved in the swirling cyclone that was the force around the planet of Medrias now. The energies bucked and heaved and the remaining members of the pod had to put forth their full effort to keep them in their proper places.
Souls were dissolving fairly regularly now and the entire structure of meditating Sith bucked and heaved with the effort to contain the energies when suddenly an entire pod just disappeared. The twenty or so Sith about five hundred miles to the east of Anko must have agreed amongst themselves that the ritual was too dangerous and dropped their meditation. The added strain forced the remaining Sith, already taxed to their capacity, to heave even harder on the energies swirling around the planet. More Sith pods dropped out of the meditation and the remaining consciousnesses desperately tried anything they could to contain the hurricane energies washing through the force but by then it was too late. The energies broke out of their containment and Anko had a few seconds of blind terror before the energy hit him and he felt himself dissolve into nothingness. The rest of the Sith in the ritual followed him shortly.
Freed of their confines, the energies turned on the living things of the planet of Medrias. The Sith that had dropped out of the ritual only saved their lives for about half a minute as the energy cyclone descended upon their souls and ripped them clean out of their bodies, then did the same to every living thing on the planet: grass, trees, insects, people, animals. In about half an hour it was over, everything on Medrias was dead.
Except one thing. Tenebrae, Lord Vitiate, looked around him from his position in the meditation chamber of his palace as governor of Medrias and watched as his devoted, loyal staff screamed or cried or exploded or simply died with a small, sad sigh. When it was over he reached into the swirl of energy around the planet and…stopped it. The whirling maw of energy suddenly stopped flowing and docilely turned to Tenebrae, and then at a gesture from him began an orderly flow of force energy into his soul.
There was too much, no one living thing’s soul could hold this much energy. But Tenebrae had expected that, and he felt his identity swell and swell as the energy poured into it, and then it simply burst. The remaining energy attached itself as best it could to the bits that had already been incorporated into Tenebrae, but Tenebrae was no longer just one thing, and never would be again. Tenebrae spent some timeless time marveling at his new existence. He was still Tenebrae, the body of the only living thing on Medrias, but he was also in a sense the force itself. He could see across the galaxy, into the future and into the past. He could sense the many branching pathways of his very being and flex his might, now more powerful than any living thing had ever been or (if he had anything to say about it) ever would be.
The body of Tenebrae walked over to the comm unit and called his personal yacht, positioned a safe distance away on the edge of the solar system. “Come in and pick me up.” he said.
“My lord,” said the captain of the ship, “we saw what happened on the surface. We’re so sorry the ritual didn’t work, my lord.”
“The ritual worked perfectly. Exactly as I intended.” Tenebrae replied. Then, part of his awareness reflected to another part that that wasn’t entirely true. He was definitely powerful. More powerful than anyone else, he was absolutely sure. But not powerful enough. There were still things that could defeat him. The force itself, for one.
Two Hundred Seventy-Five years ago…
Valkorion the Mighty, conqueror of all Zakuul and vanquisher of the alien space fleet that had suddenly come back after centuries of absence looked down at the device his technician Katal had built. It was a metal box a couple feet on a side and about half a foot high and it was, basically, a transmitter. The alien fleet used a hyperwave signal for command and control and Katal had used the box to hijack the signal, take over the command codes and order the fleet to…do whatever Valkorion wanted. What he had wanted was to subdue the remaining holdouts of people who hadn’t sworn loyalty to Valkorion’s army, and now that this was accomplished Valkorion, Katal and Valkorion’s chief lieutenant, Hav Kindal were discussing what to do next. Valkorion was staring at the device and was just on the point of explaining his plan to make a backup then store it in a vault when he suddenly lost all contact with his body.
Valkorion found himself in a featureless black nowhere, which would have been bad enough but he also had the distinct sensation that someone…no, something else was in there with him. It studied him much as one might study a seed pod for the best place to break it open, and then spiritual claws dug into Valkorion’s consciousness, flexed, and pinned him to nothingness. Valkorion pulled and strained and finally got a hazy image of what his body was doing, but he couldn’t make it move.
Externally, Valkorion flinched and shuddered but when Katal asked if he was okay, he got a grip on himself and said, “I’m fine.” Hav Kindal asked what they should do with the box and Valkorion said, “Turn it…yes, turn it into a throne. Then we’ll install it in one of the highest rooms in the spire.”
“A throne, General?” Hav Kindal asked.
“Yes. We’ve forged an Empire. I’m going to be its Emperor.” Valkorion said.
Eight months ago…
Prince Thexan of Zakuul stepped off the transport and nodded to his twin. The two of them looked around them, surveying the strike force that had landed in the transports around them, watching it assemble itself, orient, and march off. Years of training had paid off, Thexan and Arcann were in charge, but neither of them had given so much as a command yet. The troops knew what needed to be done and they did it.
The world was one of the Sith ones, and Zakuul was raiding it for supplies, in this case a warehouse complex of hypermatter that sat just beyond the ridge they were climbing. There would be defenders, there always were, but they would not be enough.
Defenders manifested in a trio of the force users that called themselves “Sith,” and two companies of their troops, including a pair of emplaced heavy blasters. It was Arcann’s turn to issue the commands, and he held up a hand to indicate a halt, then looked over the troops arrayed in front of him, looking for tricks or traps or honestly any sort of tactical novelty.
There was none. Arcann growled “plan seventeen” to his communicator and the troops reacted automatically. The knights brought up their shields and activated their pikes then charged up the middle while the droid skytroopers activated their jetpacks and jumped to the flanks, opening fire and starting to encircle the Sith troopers. For his part, Thexan pulled out his lightsaber and charged at his brother’s side. Arcann drew two of the force users, Thexan fought the third. The force user was a human of indeterminate age. Her body was that of a young woman and she moved that way, but her face and hair reflected an age and decay appropriate to a much older woman.
She didn’t fight like an older woman, though. She fought like someone who had just reached adulthood and hadn’t found her source of power yet. She was aggressive to the point of madness and didn’t know how to cover her vulnerabilities. Thexan killed her in seconds. Arcann took only a little more time for his two force users, and between the knights and the skytroopers, the rest of the Sith troops didn’t last a whole lot longer. Thexan pulled out his datapad and began documenting casualties and any novel tactical ideas the enemy had had (there weren’t any) while Arcann directed a skytrooper to open one of the nearby warehouses so they could begin loading the contents of the warehouse into the landing cargo transporters.
As it turned out, the enemy did have a tactical innovation, in the form of a booby trap. It activated when the skytrooper opened the door and sliced him into a pile of component parts immediately. Unfortunately for the Sith, the innovation part was not providing an explosive large enough to activate the hypermatter back in the warehouse and that was almost as far as the explosion went. It junked another skytrooper and damaged two more that were further away to the point that they would just be self-destructed and left on the planet, but the real damage it did was to Arcann.
Thexan’s twin took the edge of the blast, shrapnel slicing his left arm off and turning half his face into a bloody mess. Arcann pitched backwards in silence and lay, blinking at the sky as the medical team rushed up. Thexan growled into his own communicator that the remaining inhabitants of the warehouse complex were to all be exterminated and dashed over to his brother.
The lead medic finished his assessment quickly. He turned to Thexan’s brother and said, “Prince Arcann, your arm is unsalvageable and you are bleeding out. We have to attach the prosthetic anchor now, while the nerves are still active.”
“Do it.” Arcann, who knew what this meant, said.
“This will hurt.” said the medic.
“Do it!” Arcann spat. Thexan knelt down by his brother’s good side and grasped him in their secret handshake, forearm to forearm. He couldn’t take his brother’s pain, but he could be there for him and he stared in his brother’s eyes as Arcann started to jerk and twitch with the pain of what they were doing to his other side. Thexan didn’t blink or turn away, he would never, ever abandon his brother.
Two months ago…
Prince Thexan of Zakuul stepped off the elevator, and in lockstep with his brother marched the length of the throne room. The Emperor stared at them dispassionately as they both reached the appointed spot, simultaneously knelt, and unrolled their prizes. Thexan had attacked an imperial planet, while Arcann had attacked a republic one. They each unrolled the flags of their respective victims and revealed, wrapped in the cloth, the lightsabers of those force users they had killed.
The Emperor looked down, didn’t change his expression, and turned away.
Thexan felt Arcann’s anger boiling inside him. This was not new. Impressing their father in the slightest degree had been next to impossible for as long as the brothers could remember. To Thexan, this had been as it should be. Their father was the emperor. They were princes. More was supposed to be expected of them, so if (say) a minister could win an imperial compliment with mere excellence, it was fitting that they were held to a higher standard. There was a way to impress their father, Thexan and Arcann just had to keep working and find it.
Arcann felt differently. To Arcann, their father’s coldness towards everyone and everything was a sign of his selfishness, and he was never going to put forth the caring and consideration both his empire and his own family needed unless he was forced to see the error of his ways. The studied insult in the throne room was just the latest in a long line of manipulative indifference designed to break Thexan and Arcann and turn them into his slaves. The two brothers had discussed their differences many times and, up until now, Thexan had always talked Arcann around. The argument that worked the most was the idea that if the Emperor owed a duty to their family and their empire, well, so did Arcann and Thexan, and their first duty was to obey their father.
So it was a surprise to Thexan when Arcann’s anger hit a new crescendo inside him and he stood up, lit his lightsaber and dashed towards his father and then leapt the last thirty feat in a gigantic, mathematically perfect arc. It suddenly occurred to Thexan that his first duty towards his father was not obedience but protection from assassination, and he stood, reached out into the force, and pulled his brother back. Arcann turned on his brother in a rage and brought his lightsaber down in an irate slash that Thexan barely blocked with his own weapon. Still, if anyone knew how Arcann of Zakuul fought it was Thexan of Zakuul, and he knew he only had to block a few strikes before Arcann would back off, look at what he was doing, and stop.
What Thexan hadn’t counted on was Arcann’s anger. Not at Thexan, but the residual rage that filled Arcann’s being hadn’t had time to cool off and the extra speed that rage gave him got Arcann’s third strike past Thexan’s defenses and his lightsaber sliced into his brother’s stomach, going almost all the way through him.
Arcann backed off and looked at what he had done. He saw his brother’s look of surprise, and then he turned off his lightsaber and gently started to fall forward. Arcann deactivated his own weapon and dashed forward to catch Thexan and lower him gently to the ground. Maybe there was a chance to save him.
No. Lightsaber wounds tend to cauterize and most of the time a cut from a lightsaber does not bleed, but if you get a big enough blood vessel the pressure will burst through and the person will bleed out. Arcann’s cut through Thexan’s torso had severed the aorta. He was bleeding out internally and had seconds to live. Arcann stared in horror as his brother reached out to him, grabbed his forearm in their secret handshake, then turned pale and fell to the floor. His spirit left his body and blew away in the force.
Mind still reeling from the shock of what had just happened, Arcann felt something looming over him and looked up to see his father staring down with that carefully blank expression. The Emperor took one hand from behind his back and reached out to Arcann. “Come with me, son.” he said.
Arcann had found the way to impress his father.
Now…
Empty space isn’t.
Space always has stuff in it. There are idle particles of gas, and bits of rocky debris from collisions long ago and far away, and various frequencies of electromagnetic waves on their lonely journeys to mark out the relationship between space and time.
On other levels of abstraction, space is entirely full. For example, it’s full of coordinate systems. A computer somewhere might decide that the distance of an otherwise unremarkable stretch of nowhere from some arbitrary point along equally arbitrary axes of direction might add up to another arbitrary set of round numbers and suddenly that unremarkable stretch of nowhere might suddenly become remarkable, at least to the carbon-based lifeforms that used the computer.
Which is why, in an otherwise unremarkable stretch of nowhere on the borders of wild space and at least a dozen light years from the nearest star system, there sat a fleet of warships. This battlefleet was somewhat unusual in that it contained ships and personnel from two different star nations, which had up until quite recently been at war with each other. It was waiting for reinforcements.
Three of those reinforcements warped into the staging area in the form of two Jedi corvettes and a Sith interceptor. After some communication with each other and with the fleet at large, all three ships rendezvoused with the fleet flagship and, cozying up to sequential docking tubes, latched on. Each of the ships disgorged two people.
Stepping off the first ship were an average sized human man and woman. The man had short, jet black hair and appeared to be in his early to mid twenties. He sported a gigantic cross shaped scar on his face and, if you looked carefully, other scars on whatever bits of his skin were exposed. He carried himself in a carefully neutral, balanced way. As if he didn’t want to impose his preconceptions upon the universe or waste any motion, but he did want to be able to go any direction at any speed and at any time. The woman, slightly shorter and younger than the man, only sported a small, delicate scar on her left cheek. Her auburn hair was longer than his, attractively framing an oval face that seemed to be bubbling with irony and was debating whether it wanted to contain it or to point out the incongruity of the universe itself. She carried herself with an energy born of youthful enthusiasm. Both wore loose but not baggy clothes mostly in brown with some blue trim. Things you could move around in. Lightsabers hung at their hips. The man was Jedi Master Makas Goroc, battlemaster of the Jedi order, and the woman was Jedi Knight Kira Carsen, who had earned the right to direct her own journeys but had decided to stay with the man who, depending on who you asked, either was or was not her teacher.
From the second ship emerged a small woman and a tallish but not overly tall man. She was delicate and thin, with short blonde hair that seemed to be styled to stay out of the way while providing dignity, declaring that this was a woman to take seriously. She moved with the calm serenity that stereotypes the Jedi but they frequently fail to live up to. She also had a loose but not baggy outfit on, in white and pastel green this time, and a lightsaber hung at her hip. The man was tall and dark, with short curly brown hair. He wore Republic trooper armor and carried himself like a combat veteran. The military precision was there, definitely, but it was underneath a sort of practical expediency born of the merciless lessons life had given him. The woman was Jedi Master Anda Siv, member of the Jedi council and Barsen’thor, or protector, of the Jedi order. (A title both Anda and Makas Goroc found irrepressibly funny, for reasons that weren’t immediately apparent to anyone else.) The man was Lieutenant Felix Iresso, Republic Army, currently assigned to Master Anda’s entourage.
The third ship, the Sith interceptor, disgorged two women, a tall human and a smaller Twi’lek. The human woman was the tallest of the six of them, powerfully muscular with a mane of flaming red hair and a somewhat angular face that seemed to be built for intensity. She wore a black and red suit, somewhat more form fitting than the others had worn but with light armor plates across the chest and legs. Another lightsaber hung at her hip and she carried herself with the powerful stride of those who are convinced that whatever they are doing is more important than anything else going on around them. The Twi’lek was a deep blue with black markings across her face and down her lekku. She carried herself like an ordinary person, but there was a slight hint of the idea that at any time, for any reason or no reason, she might just disappear. She wore a utilitarian red jacket, matching black pants and shoes, and carried a pair of blasters on her hips. The human woman was Lady Mikkel Ansa, Wrath of the Sith Empire, meaning the Empire’s executioner and rooter out of problems. The Twi’lek was named Ce’na, but almost nobody knew that and (with one exception) everyone called her Vette.
The six of them were there because Anda, Mikkel and Makas knew each other. A hundred and ninety-seven centuries ago they had all trained in the Jedi arts under the same master, had grown to become important people in the makeup of the galaxy at the time, and then had died only to be brought back by the force in this time. Or at least that’s what they claimed. Most right-thinking people didn’t believe them.
The six people met in a sort of anteroom near the docking umbilicals. Kira immediately went over to Vette and gave her a hug, and the two of them started chatting animatedly about what had happened since they last saw each other. The other four gathered in a more somber circle.
“So, they found him.” Mikkel said.
“Marr seems to think so.” observed Makas.
“What do you think?” Mikkel asked.
Makas cast his gaze out the transparisteel window in an attempt to look out at the entire universe and put on a doubting expression. “Maybe?” he said. “It doesn’t seem likely but on the other hand, it’s the only hint we’ve had since Ziost.”
“Regardless, Marr is sure he’s pinpointed the source of those raids on both imperial and republic territory that have been going on since before the war ended.” Anda pointed out, “That in itself makes this expedition worthwhile.”
“Yeah, I just don’t want to be out of position when he makes his move.” Makas said, still staring out the window and trying to convince the universe to disgorge all its secrets. The universe refused.
“It’s the only lead we have, and after Ziost the Emperor gained enough energy to wipe out all life in the galaxy.” Iresso said, “You said so yourself. Besides, there’s no way this is a feint. Whoever these people are, they’re committing way too many resources for it to be a feint. I think they’re going to invade.”
An ordinary lieutenant has no business advocating strategy to two senior members of the Jedi order and a Sith equal to the dark council itself. But Felix Iresso was no ordinary lieutenant and the other three took him seriously.
Mikkel Ansa rubbed her chin in thought. “I think you’re right.” she said. “Shall we go see Darth Marr?”
“I think we should do that but also be ready for anything.” Anda said. “Felix, would you please make sure the ship is restocked and pick up any extra bits you think we might need.”
“Feels weird to be bumming fuel off the imperials, but I’ll get it done.” Iresso said. Makas and Mikkel had similar conversations with Kira and Vette, respectively, and the three of them turned to go up to the bridge.
The bridge of the flagship Merciless was a long, thin room with a giant window at the front looking over the forepart of the ship and the surrounding starfield. The three of them first encountered the ship’s captain, named Fora, who escorted them the length of the bridge to a tall figure clad head to toe in red and black armor with two-foot spikes coming out of the shoulders. This was Darth Marr, de facto leader of the Dark Council of the Sith and one of the chief hunters of the Sith Emperor ever since the disaster on Ziost. He was standing in the center of the forebridge, staring out the window into the emptiness of the fleet assembly area.
“Darth Marr.” Makas said as the three of them stood beside him.
“We got your message,” Anda said, “Now that I’m standing here on the bridge, I think I feel it too.”
“We grow closer every moment. Our former Emperor is out there.” Marr said.
“What’s he doing?” asked Makas. “Why this? Why here?”
“Agreed.” said Marr, “Why travel so far? Why consume every living thing on Ziost, then turn and flee to the depths of wild space?”
“Why bother with military attacks at all?” agreed Makas.
“For all his shows of power he must have weaknesses. Maybe he isn’t as strong as we think he is.” Mikkel said.
“He ate an entire planet.” Makas pointed out.
“If the legends are correct, he’s done that before.” said Anda, “Maybe that doesn’t give him enough power to do what he wants, so he has to take it the hard way, with troops.”
“That would be reassuring, wouldn’t it.” Marr said. “If we do locate him, I believe I can press the Dark Council into line, but what about the Republic? I’m beginning to doubt they’ll make any serious contributions. Their assistance here has been useful, but limited.” He looked at Makas and Anda.
Makas looked grim. Anda got that shade of Jedi serenity that meant she had bad news. “The Jedi are behind you.” she said, “but we can’t make promises for the Supreme Chancellor. Members of the council are trying to bring her around but it’s taking a lot of time and effort. To be honest, stopping the war cost us a lot of our leverage over Supreme Chancellor Saresh.”
One of the sensor officers interrupted, “My lord, sensor contact. Fifteen clicks, small, no life form readings, some kind of probe?”
The four of them contemplated this briefly and Makas said, “kill it.”
“It could be one of theirs, we could capture it and learn something about it.” Mikkel said.
“Readings are identical to the scans from the unknown force that attacked the Imperial colony on Ratal.” said another sensor tech.
“Too late.” Said Anda.
“It only would have revealed itself after it had transmitted our location.” Makas mused.
“Raise shields. Pursue and destroy!” barked Darth Marr.
“Marr, it’s a trap. We need to get the fleet out of here.” Mikkel said.
“It certainly will become one if we allow this probe to escape.” Marr said.
“No, you don’t get it. It’s—” Mikkel said, then stopped. In the forward window, ships dropped out of hyperspace. Tall, cathedral-like objects that arranged themselves in vertical and horizontal lines that suggested a network of squares without actually having any.
To his credit, Marr wasted no time on exclamations of either disbelief, anger, or blame. “Evasive maneuvers, come about 180 degrees!” he snapped at both the helm and the communications officer. The fleet started to turn around, but not before objects flew off the closest enemy ships and spiraled towards the flagship they were on.
“Missiles?” Mikkel said.
“Too slow.” Makas replied, “Breaching pods.” The ship suddenly shuddered under a series of impacts.
“We’ve been boarded!” said the sensor officer. “All decks report hostile forces!”
“Set deflectors to double aft. Divert weapon power to the engines.” Marr said, then turned around to find only Mikkel and Anda standing on the bridge with him. “Where?” he asked.
Mikkel pointed down the length of the bridge, where the figure of Makas Goroc was running at a full pelt. He leapt the last few dozen feet of the bridge, bounced off one of the walls, and disappeared down a corridor on the opposite side.
Makas focused on the force as he dashed down the corridor to the nearest breaching pod. He sensed…nothing. Well, that wasn’t true. He sensed a lot. He sensed the spikes of fear and adrenaline in the crew of the flagship as they turned from their stations to find themselves being boarded, and he sensed the other ships and their crews’ own spikes of activity as they dealt with their own problems. He sensed the future, flickering and changing and branching out and branches falling away as people moved and acted and fought. What he didn’t sense was the enemy. A closer look as he rounded a corner and saw one told him why.
They were shaped like people in armor, but they were droids. This was both an advantage and a disadvantage. In the force, droids were essentially rocks. Unlike living things, you couldn’t commune with droids. You couldn’t sense their thoughts and emotions because they didn’t have any. (Makas was unsure about that last part. He’d been close friends with a droid ever since he emerged in this time and while he’d never directly sensed it, he was absolutely certain that T7-01 had thoughts and emotions. It was a subject of some speculation he’d only been able to get one other Jedi to talk about, and her theories were crazier than his.) On the other hand, droids were programmed. Unlike living things, their ability to respond and change with changing circumstances was limited and could only go in certain pre-defined directions. For a Jedi, this meant that droids were harder to sense, but easier to destroy when found.
Makas didn’t consciously think about any of this. He had noticed, thought about, and recognized the differences between dealing with droids and dealing with living beings early on in his new life and his new expectations slid into place in his mind with the ease of long practice. Makas didn’t even break stride but reached down, grabbed his lightsaber, lit it, and ran right up behind the quartet of Imperial and Republic troops holding the bend in the corridor and threw the turquoise blade right into the chest of the nearest droid. It sparked and fell over. The lightsaber went flying through the air and landed in Makas’s hand with a meaty smack. He looked at the troopers around him.
“Tell the others I’m coming.” He said, then dashed down the corridor at a second droid. He neatly beheaded it, blocked a pair of blaster shots from a nearby third droid, beheaded that, then dashed over to a fourth droid, sliced off its legs at the knee and its arms at the elbows and listened to it clatter as it hit the ground. Then he sprinted down the corridor and didn’t look back.
Makas carved a big hole in the invading droids as he pushed his way aft down the port side of the Merciless, liberating shield generators, point defense cannons, life support installments, and anything else he came across. Eventually he came to an open storage area where the far door was blocked by a ray shield and which contained an Imperial sergeant and Republican corporal, arguing.
“Get this blast door shut, the shield won’t hold forever!” the sergeant said.
“We can’t just leave them in there, we have to help!” the corporal objected, pointing out the members of both the Imperial and Republic military just across the ray shield, engaged in combat with more of those droids.
“We have to hold this ground. We have our job, they have theirs.” the sergeant replied, trying to be kindly.
“Drop the shield and let me through. I can handle this.” said Makas, jogging up. He extended his senses into the area beyond the shield: a short corridor followed by a medium-largeish room. Breaching pods, droids, people -- some injured and some not.
“Right away!” Said the corporal, coming to attention, then turning to the ray shield controls on the side of the door.
Makas tuned the cold, blank expression of a Jedi in battle mode on the sergeant, who if he had been planning to object thought better of it and said, “we’ll cover the exit and make sure no stragglers sneak out past you.”
“Thank you.” said Makas, then the ray shield dropped and he charged in. He sliced the two ordinary droids immediately, but the more advanced model pointed its weapon at the ground and set the floor on fire, providing a thick barrier right where it was standing. Makas reached into the force, grabbed a piece of debris across the room, and slammed it into the back of the advanced droid, knocking him forward and right into Makas’s lightsaber. Makas turned to the living people and told them to get out of the area and fall back to the storage room.
“You did it!” said the corporal as Makas emerged, last from the besieged room. “I’ve never seen anything like that….”
Makas flipped up his datapad and consulted a map of the ship he had downloaded in one of the life support bays. “Take the others and regroup here. Auxilliary control. We can’t lose control of the ship.” he said.
“Right away, thank you.” said the sergeant. The two noncoms immediately turned to the other survivors and began chivvying them into some form of organization. Makas was consulting his datapad when he got a comm call from Darth Marr.
“The enemy has breached the engineering deck, they’re after the primary generator. I’m on my way now. Meet me there.” he said.
“Will do.” said Makas. He consulted his datapad a little more, looked around the room to orient himself, and then took off for the nearest companionway down.
Mikkel Ansa and Anda Siv pounded up the corridor towards the foyer where their ships were docked, rounded a corner, and came to an abrupt halt. The foyer was fine, but the corridor to the docking tubes to each of their ships was blocked with debris. That was on fire.
“Well, shit.” Mikkel said as the two of them rapidly ran through the calculus of the situation. Could they move the debris? Where would they put it? Would the corridor still be on fire?
Anda finished the calculations first. She pulled out her holocomm and called the three ships. “This is Anda. Mikkel is here with me. You guys are still locked by the faulty docking system?”
“Yes.” said Felix Iresso. “We’re working out a plan to go EVA.”
“Don’t.” Anda replied. “We’ll disconnect you from here. Then I need you all to undock and warp out immediately. We’ll meet you at the Republic base on Tavim.”
“Are you sure?” said Vette. “Let me talk to Lady Mikkel.”
Mikkel walked up to the holocomm and said, “What are you doing, Anda?”
“Feel what’s going on out there.” Anda said, “This battle is lost. All our three ships can do is die gloriously making no impact whatsoever on that fleet. The docking tubes are cut off so we can’t get to them. We need to get them to safety and find another way to get there.”
Mikkel looked out the window with a similar speculative/skeptical expression to the one Makas had had when they first got there. Finally, she spoke into the communicator, “She’s right. Vette, take the ship and get out. I’ll meet you at the rendezvous spot.”
“I won’t leave you, mistress!” said Mikkel’s apprentice, Jaesa, over the comm.
“Yes, you will, apprentice.” Mikkel said, sternly. “What have I told you about losing battles?”
“’Never stay in a battle you’re about to lose, unless you can turn the loss into a win.’” Jaesa quoted.
“Meditate on that. After you leave.” Mikkel said.
Anda reached up into the walls with the force, found a solenoid that had been stuck, and unstuck it. The three ships detached from their docking umbilicals and floated free.
“What about the shuttle bays?” said Iresso over the comm. “We could pick you up there.”
“They’re overrun already.” Anda said. “They were the first places to fall. By the time we clear them you would have spent too much time dodging that fleet out there.”
“Master?” came the voice of Anda’s student, Nadia Grell. “Weren’t you always…” she trailed off for a few seconds, then spoke up again, “Good luck master. I’ll miss you.”
“I won’t be long.” Anda smiled.
The comm sang out with the goodbyes from the rest of Anda’s crew. “Good luck!” from Theran. “I believe in you!” from the holographic life form Holiday. “Herald is brave. Will see Herald soon.” From the Trandoshian Qyzen Fess. A final, “Are you sure?” from Zenith.
Two of the three ships undocked, flew off a little, then disappeared into hyperspace. The third did not.
“Kira?” Anda said. “Kira, you have to go.”
“I’m a full Jedi just as much as you are, and I say the Defender stays right here. I am not leaving without Master Makas. Don’t threaten me with drumming me out of the order, you can drum me out if you want but we’re staying right here.”
“Kira, the docking bay is on fire.” Mikkel said, gentling her voice as if talking to a child, or a scared adult. “We can’t get to you. We can’t get to the shuttlebay either and right now Makas is dashing down to the engine room to keep the ship from blowing up. Every second you spend here is a second our shields might fail and your ship gets blown to smithereens for nothing.”
“Search your feelings, Kira.” Anda said, “You know we’re right.”
There was silence on the other end of the call for about half a minute, then Kira said, “Okay, you win. We’ll meet at the rendezvous spot. Just…Just tell him…”
“We’ll tell him.” said Anda. “He cares deeply about you too. All of you.”
The last Jedi starship detached from the flank of the fleet flagship, flipped over, and disappeared into hyperspace.
A squad of trooper droids occupied the auxiliary equipment control room. They weren’t doing anything in particular, merely standing in the positions indicated by their tactical programs, refreshing their scanners every few seconds, and waiting for something to happen.
The “something to happen” came in the shape of Darth Marr. Marr was a tall, powerfully built person (like many Sith lords of his stature, Marr did not appear in public in less than full armor including face shield, which meant that the number of people who knew his species for sure was limited. The most common guess was that he was human) who moved with speed and precision, and he dashed into the auxiliary equipment control room, sliced the first droid, threw his lightsaber at a second, used the force to slam a third into the wall and then reached out and slowly crushed a fourth. Marr sensed a knot of light side energy coming towards him and turned from crushing the last droid to see Makas Goroc sprint through the door and come to a stop, blue-green lightsaber lit and at the ready. He stopped and stared at Marr, saying nothing. The force flew Marr’s red lightsaber back into his hand and he growled “let’s go,” then turned to move into the next room without looking back.
Makas Goroc and Darth Marr had fought side by side against Revan, sometimes called Darth Revan, in the climactic battle to stop Revan’s attempt to resurrect the Emperor on Yavin IV. It had been one of the most intense battles of the modern era, and each of them saw the other perform at a high enough level to be sure they knew most of each other’s tricks and preferences. It was because of that familiarity that the two fighters did not utter a single word as they sliced their way through the corridor and into the main engineering chamber. When they got there, they split up. Marr smashed the droids on his side of the cavernous chamber with the full energy and brutality of an enraged Sith while Makas worked through his side with a kind of minimalist precision.
After each had trashed all the droid troopers on their side of the chamber, they confronted a large battle droid positioned in front of the main engineering console. Makas went high, leaping into a brilliant arc designed to bring him and his lightsaber directly at the droid’s sensor cluster and while the droid was tracking Makas and lining up its shot, Marr dashed in behind it and stabbed it in the central processing unit. The droid sparked in surprise and shut down. The two force users dashed to the engineering console.
“Power core is strained to the breaking point. We can reinforce the shields, but they won’t last long.” Makas said.
“The hyperdrive has been completely burnt out.” Marr said.
Just then the holocomm in the console lit up and the image of Captain Fora came up. She was kneeling and apparently taking cover behind something. The sounds of blaster fire and lightsabers echoed in the background. “Enemies on the bridge. Repeat, enemies on—” she said. The transmission winked out. Makas and Marr looked at each other.
“There are rudimentary backup controls here, but the enemy ships have us surrounded. There are few options left.” Marr said.
“The ship is lost.” Makas agreed. “We need to save what we can save.” He walked over to the holocomm in the console and pushed the buttons for shipwide transmission. “Attention. Shields are failing and the enemy has us surrounded. Abandon ship now. Repeat, abandon ship now.” Makas imagined the pattern of shudders that ran through the ship changed, as if the impacts of turbolasers from the enemy fleet was now mixed with the launching of escape pods. Makas punched in a new set of commands into the holocomm, “Kira, I can’t get there in time. Undock and go. I’ll meet with you later!”
There was a few seconds pause and then the holovolume lit up with not a person but a staticky amorphous blob. “…left already!” Kira’s voice said, “…told us to go.”
“Good.” Makas said. “Kira, listen. Take care of the others until I get back. I’m trusting you to help them.”
The holocomm replied with something, but neither Makas nor Marr could make out what. A little sadly, Makas closed the circuit on the holocomm, then he looked around. “We’re not going to make it to an escape pod in time.” he said. He reached towards a cabinet in the wall near the console, which opened itself and two emergency breather masks flew out and into his hand. “Does your suit contain vacuum support? If not, put this on.” he said, tossing one of the breathers to Marr.
“My armor is fully functional.” Marr said.
“There’s a joke in there somewhere about ‘how fully.’” Makas said, “but now isn’t the time. Come over here.” He walked to a spot off to the side of the main chamber that seemed otherwise unremarkable. A girder in the ceiling split itself off and crashed to the floor near where he was standing. “When the time comes, leap right…there. The hull will protect us from the bombardment. Then it’s a matter of finding somewhere to be before the air runs out.” Makas put on his own breather mask, looked at the place he had indicated and narrowed his eyes in concentration.
Marr came over to stand by the Jedi’s side and drew a deep, cleansing breath. “So be it.” he said.
Makas didn’t think that was a particularly encouraging thing to say, but they were out of time. “Now!” he shouted, and the two of them used the force to leap themselves to just behind a particular spot on the second story of the engineering chamber wall.
Just then, turbolaser bolts from several score of the cathedral-like enemy ships smashed into the hull of the Merciless, blowing it to flinders.
Mikkel Ansa woke on an unfamiliar bed in a small, unfamiliar room. The room itself contained four beds, two to a bunk, a toilet, a sink and an entire wall missing but covered by a ray shield. A cell. In good news, she was fully clothed and in the clothes she had been in on the flagship. In less good news, she had none of her usual equipment and seemed to be fettered at the wrists and forearms with two large, heavy manacles, joined by both a short chain and some sort of electronic wiring. She saw one of the trooper droids across the hallway, staring dispassionately into her cell, walked up to it, waved her hand and said, “release me and go get my things.” The droid just stood there.
“I already tried that.” said the voice of Anda Siv. It seemed to be coming from another cell off to her left, though she couldn’t see.
“You woke up before me? Never going to live that down.” said Mikkel.
“It wasn’t that long. You want the run down?” Anda replied.
“Sure, what have we got?” Mikkel said, starting to explore her cell.
“Darth Marr, Makas, you and me.” Anda said. “We’re in a row of what seems to be the only four cells in this hallway. I think it’s for the VIP prisoners.”
“I’m flattered.” said Mikkel, feeling under the mattresses on the bunk beds.
“Toilet has possibilities, but I didn’t find anything else useful for an escape.” Anda continued. “I haven’t seen another person since I woke up, although as you can sense there are plenty on this ship, and plenty of force users too. I think we’ve just dropped out of hyperspace, though it’s hard to tell with these newfangled engines.”
“Tell me about it.” Mikkel said. Then, looking around the cell, “I wish Vette were here. Makas, you’ve been characteristically quiet.”
“I’m strapped to a table.” said Makas.
“Seriously!?” Mikkel boggled.
“Yes, seriously. I’m getting quite acquainted with the ceiling light. I haven’t tried undoing the straps yet.”
Mikkel laughed out loud while, in the force, Makas radiated irritation and Anda radiated concentration. Darth Marr, however, was coming to a slow boil.
“This is not an occasion for amusement.” he said.
“It absolutely is.” said Mikkel. Then, thinking that needed more elaboration, “I should probably construct some sort of argument about how laughing at Makas is good for our morale and therefore will help us spot our opportunity to escape.”
“Cease prattling, someone is coming.” Marr said.
Mikkel forwent the chance to declare that she wasn’t prattling and dashed to the front of her cell. Sure enough, the door to the corridor that intersected theirs like the vertical line of a T opened and some people stepped in.
The leader was a human man of medium height, slightly taller than Makas. He was bald, with a crown of fuzz that looked like it might be a shade of red if it tried hard enough. He wasn’t husky, but was solid and muscular in a way that belied a lifetime of martial arts practice. Save for a black mask along the left half of his face and a black artificial left arm, he was clad entirely in various shades of white, a cloth suit that seemed equally suitable to a battlefield and a boardroom. A lightsaber hung at his hip and he was a powerful force user: deeply, deeply dark side.
Behind him were half a dozen humanoids, clad head to toe in bronze armor, carrying force pikes and shields. They were also force users, though less powerful than their leader.
“You’ve awakened, I trust you can walk.” Said the leader, punching a sequence into a console on the wall and bringing down the ray shield in front of Mikkel’s cell. Mikkel stepped out and looked to her left to see Anda and Darth Marr doing the same.
“Unlock these shackles, and I’ll show you exactly what I’m capable of.” Mikkel said, locking eyes with Anda in the hopes of silent communication. Anda nodded.
The leader of the captors didn’t seem to notice. “You are in the heart of the empire, now. I assure you, escape is impossible, even if you could make it past me. Come along.” Mikkel watched as Makas floated out of his cell, strapped to some sort of board. As she watched a device lowered itself over his head and clamped over his nose and mouth. Makas looked inconvenienced. Mikkel didn’t have to suppress a giggle, now that they were moving, it wasn’t funny.
Marr towered over the new leader and used that height now, walking up and invading his space. “What empire have we entered?” he asked.
The leader didn’t budge an inch. “The Eternal Empire. Zakuul.” Then he walked away to give himself some conversational space. “You didn’t even know who’s territory you were invading?”
“We didn’t invade anything. We were looking for someone.” said Anda, playing her part.
“In an armed warship?”
“We weren’t looking for a friend.” said Mikkel.
“What do you hope to achieve by taking us prisoner?” asked Marr.
“I have questions. You will provide the answers.” their captor said.
Anda was about to say ‘there’s a good chance the answers can just be had for the asking’ but Marr beat her to it. He said, “We will tell you nothing.”
“You won’t have to speak to give the answers I need.” the captor said, which forced Mikkel to re-evaluate his intelligence. Maybe he was quite a bit smarter than the impression he made. He gestured down the hallway he had just come up and started walking, the four prisoners falling in behind him, flanked and followed by the people in armor.
They marched down the hallway, into a shuttle bay and into a shuttle, which after some necessary preparations took off. The four captives looked at what they could see out of the windows and noticed they were leaving a warship about half again as long as the Merciless and were flying to what looked like the detached lower end of a skyhook. Or at least a building that reached up to suborbital heights. There seemed to be other buildings almost but not quite as tall in the surrounding area, giving the impression of skyscrapers in a large city. They docked at a windowed corridor shortly below a large transparent sphere and marched down the hallway towards what looked like an elevator, more of the armored soldiers standing at attention at regular intervals along the corridor.
The captor seemed disposed to make small talk. “We recovered the records from your ship’s computers. Or what was left of them. Fascinating reading. Jedi? Sith? Quite formidable. To alter the course of history on that scale, quite impressive.”
Anda was distracted looking at the bindings that were holding Makas to his board and Mikkel said, “I sense your connection to the force. You have great strength, but do you know how to use it?” Mikkel was pretty sure he did but figured the dig would keep the captor’s attention on her and not on Anda.
“You are not here to educate.” The lead captor said.
“I thought you were going to ask me questions.” Mikkel said.
Just then a small, wiry man came up, slightly grey of hair and dressed in workable but not overly showy robes. He bowed to the head captor and said, “Prince Arcann.”
Prince Arcann was unimpressed. “Heskal. Still waiting for the catastrophe that you and your scions foretold?”
“You may close your ears to the whispers of fate, my prince, but they cannot be silenced.” Heskal replied.
“I wonder if silencing you might suffice.” Arcann said, his tone turning actively hostile. “Take your superstitions elsewhere Heskal, you are not needed here.”
“Your friend was just trying to warn you.” Mikkel said. “Bringing us here won’t end well for you.”
Arcann did not turn his attention off Heskal. “Nonsense repeated does not become truth.”
Mikkel spotted a weakness in Arcann and was digesting it while Darth Marr said, “Is this why you brought us here, to hear you bicker with soothsayers?!”
Arcann had reached his limit and said, “Come along.”
“You’re taking us to your master.” Marr taunted.
“I’m taking you to my father. Valkorion. The Immortal Emperor of Zakuul.” Arcann said. That got Anda’s attention and she looked up from what she was doing to exchange a glance with Mikkel.
“An Emperor.” Marr said, “Just what we were searching for.”
“You will not find what you wanted here.” Said Arcann. Then he marched on down the corridor, the others following. Heskal let his gaze roam over the prisoners, then suppressed a start of shock when he saw Anda Siv. This caused Anda to look directly at him and their eyes bored into each other until Anda couldn’t walk further and still watch him without turning around, and she brought her attention back forward. Heskal felt a chill deep in his nervous system, shivered involuntarily, and continued down the corridor.
For the rest of the trip to the elevator, Anda Siv started manipulating the future. She was pretty sure she could open Makas’s bindings, so she presented that as a possibility to the universe. Makas and Mikkel picked up on it, and both sided with a future where that didn’t happen just yet, though both enthusiastically embraced the idea, presenting various futures where that might turn to a tactical advantage, proposing refinements and, while keeping their options open, basically having a conversation in the force about what to do next.
What happened next was they all got on the elevator, went up about two stories, and came out in the giant transparent sphere. Along the middle latitude of the sphere was a giant bridge sticking out over nothingness and ending in a platform suspended on nothing and upon which, two levels up, sat a large metallic throne. The throne was occupied by a human man, dignified in late middle age and wearing a white armored suit. The bridge and the platform at the end were lined with the warriors in bronze armor, and standing about halfway along the bridge was a young woman clad in a long black dress and hood that did not hide her face.
Darth Marr was strong in the force. Arcann and Mikkel were stronger and Anda was stronger still, blazing out as a beacon of the light side when she let herself go. This woman blazed as fiercely as Anda did, a towering beacon of dark side energy that in any other room but this one would have easily been mistaken for as powerful as a force entity can be.
Any other room but this one, because of the man sitting on the throne. If Anda and the young woman were beacons, he was a thundercloud. In fact, his force presence projected beyond his body, extending outward in space and deeper into the more arcane aspects of the force. It was as if a demigod had deigned to descend to them and converse through the instrument of this man.
Anda Siv had seen the Sith Emperor when he escaped imprisonment on Yavin 4. Mikkel Ansa had met him on Voss and watched his body die so he could go occupy a new one. Makas had fought the Sith Emperor several times, both winning and losing. Darth Marr had worked on his supreme council for decades.
All four recognized the Emperor when they saw him.
They followed Arcann across the bridge, the young lady peeling off after they had passed and bringing up the rear. Arcann got to the base of the first set of stairs leading up to the throne and said, “His glorious majesty, Immortal Emperor and Protector of Zakuul: Emperor Valkorion.” Then he knelt in obeisance.
“Welcome.” Said the Emperor.
The three students of Kunal Lin were rapidly shifting the future back and forth, debating on whether to acknowledge that they knew him or not when Darth Marr took the decision out of their hands.
“A new face, a new name… these are not enough to hide from us.” he said. Anda, spotting a new future, turned a shocked expression to Marr and whispered, “what are you doing?”
“The Sith Emperor.” Mikkel said, rolling with it. “Your presence is unmistakable.”
“Oh, I think a mistake has been made. But by whom?” the Emperor said.
Mikkel turned to address the assembled guards and hangers on. “This…thing you call Emperor is nothing but a murderer. He will kill every last one of you to fuel his supposed immortality, he’s already tried once.”
Marr remained focused on his target. “Your constant silence across our history, this was your distraction!?”
“This was my focus.” the Emperor said. “Everything else... the means to an end. You claim to have come all this way to find me. Now you have found me, what do you want?”
“Mmmmph.” Makas said. Then, looking at Marr, “mmmph?”
“We’ve come to destroy you. Once and for all.” Mikkel said. The three of them began tossing the future around again, looking for a workable plan. Where would weapons come from? How would they get free? Who would do what?
The emperor chuckled, stood, and began descending the stairs. Arcann got up and out of the way. “You say you know me. If that is true, then you know the depths of my power. Whatever you hoped to achieve here you know, deep inside, that you cannot succeed. But you do not have to stand against me. Instead, you can kneel.” He waved his hands and Darth Marr’s restraints fell off.
Mikkel suddenly turned to Marr in surprise as he marched up towards the emperor and yelled “I will never again kneel to you!”
Arcann stood up from his kneeling position and moved to do something about this display of disrespect, but the emperor held up a hand and said, “you would sooner die than acknowledge my superiority?”
Anda said, “Marr?” but Darth Marr ignored her. Instead, he said, “It is you who fears death, ‘Valkorion.’ I do not. I will not kneel!” He suddenly spun and force shoved one of the warriors off his position, grabbed the guard’s lightspear with the force and flew it towards him, the tip still blazing in a blue glow. Marr threw the spear at one of the guards charging him and stabbed the guard in the chest, he went down. A force push from Marr and the other guards flew backwards and crashed down the bridgeway. A guard charged in from the side and again Marr shoved him with the force, this time off the bridgeway to fall an untold distance to the surface of the planet.
The Emperor ended the small rebellion on his platform. He stretched out his arm and a gigantic lightning bolt streaked down the stairway and slammed into Darth Marr. Marr was flung down, rolled a short way down the bridgeway and came to rest, smoking and sparking a little. For his part, Marr felt his soul leave his body and begin dissolving into everything when he was spiritually tackled by Anda Siv. What happened didn’t exactly have a physical analog, but it felt to Marr almost as if her soul was hugging his tightly while it frantically reached out to grab bits of him and stuff them into where most of his identity was.
I don’t have time to teach you how to be a force ghost. Anda thought at Marr. Here, some copies of some memories will have to do. Listen. Listen to me! Spiritually, she shook Marr into paying attention. You are the backup plan if the three of us fail. You and Satele. Go find her, help each other out. No time to explain more, if you stay here, you’ll get dissolved. Go! Spiritually, Marr felt himself be gathered up and then flung into the depths of space, escaping the system they were in and finding himself…nowhere.
Back in reality, a few seconds had passed and the woman in black came to stand over Marr’s corpse, which was still smoking. She looked down at it, then up at Anda Siv. “What did you do?” she said.
“Wouldn’t you like to know.” said Anda.
“Clear the room, everyone out!” Yelled the woman, and the assembled guards filed out.
Mikkel turned from looking at Marr’s corpse back to the Emperor and marched towards him, anger boiling up inside her. “Marr gave the Empire leadership while you used us for your own gain. You are nothing compared to him.”
“He was narrow minded. Bound by irrelevant ancient dogma. But I think you are different.” the Emperor said. “In all my centuries, you three alone have merited my full attention. You leave your mark on the galaxy wherever you act, just as I do. Look around you. Zakuul is poised to become the greatest civilization in the history of the galaxy. I have forged this empire to surmount all my previous works. To span eternity. The Eternal Throne commands a fleet vaster than any ever built. It has the power to reshape the galaxy into any image that I choose. That we choose. I will share all of this with you, if you will only kneel.”
“Mph.” Makas said, the negative being clear even if the words were not.
“Share?” said Mikkel. “You don’t share anything. You enslave. You devour. He will never be part of that, and neither will either of us.”
The emperor gave Mikkel a long look, then said, “So be it.” He looked at his son and said, “kill them all,” then strode to the edge of the platform to contemplate eternity. Prince Arcann marched over to stand in front of Mikkel, took a combat stance and lit his lightsaber. Then he said, “You came here to defeat him, this is your chance!” He reached out with one hand and suddenly disengaged the manacles holding her wrists together. Mikkel spun like a dancer, grabbed the lightsaber hanging at the lady in black’s hip using the force, then flew it to her hand. It lit in midair and landed with a meaty thwack. Blade bright yellow, like Arcann’s.
Mikkel leapt across the platform to the Emperor, landing next to him and slamming her sword into what looked like an invisible shield. Valkorion didn’t change expression, even when Arcann came up to stand on his other side and do the same thing. He looked at Arcann and said, “First your brother, now your father?”
Meanwhile, the lady in black gasped in shock at having her lightsaber stolen and reached out her hand to take it in the force and grab it again. She found the lightsaber, gripped it tightly, and then had her force connection with it broken. She turned to see Anda Siv, having disengaged her own manacles in the woman’s second of surprise, standing in an open-handed combat crouch and staring at her. “No, you don’t.” Anda said.
“Does my ambition truly surprise you?” Arcann asked, slamming his lightsaber into his father’s force shield with a series of powerful blows that didn’t seem to harm the shield or the emperor at all. It did seem to affect Arcann, who for some reason had a harder and harder time recovering his stance every time he slammed the shield.
“You do not have ambition. Only jealousy. That is why you fail.” the emperor said, not changing the bored tone of voice he’d been using the whole combat. Meanwhile, he seemed to effortlessly block both Mikkel and Arcann.
“You’re forgetting something,” Mikkel said.
“What?” said the Emperor, picking up Prince Arcann with the force and bodily throwing him at Mikkel.
“ROUND FIVE!!!” Mikkel screamed, letting Arcann slam into her and knock her lightsaber out of her hand, for a split second, it floated in the air. Mikkel felt Arcann’s lightsaber enter her chest and just had time to wonder how bad it was.
Meanwhile, Anda and the woman in black had been circling each other like wary akk-rhinos, exchanging blows of pure force and mind power that each combatant deflected or blocked before it could affect her. Suddenly, just as Mikkel screamed, dropped her lightsaber, and was bowled over, Anda spun her attention away from the woman in black and towards Makas’s cage. The woman in black threw a full power force attack at Anda, and Anda slammed to the floor and slid several feet from the impact, completely unconscious.
What had happened was the three of them, shuffling the future around, had agreed on a plan. Anda would unlock Makas’s bindings. Mikkel would toss him her weapon, and Makas, by far the fastest and best fighter in the room would be waiting, having already used the force to increase his speed to the maximum. To everyone else there was a blink. To Makas, he stepped out of his bindings, grabbed the lightsaber hanging in midair, jumped clear over the Emperor, turned, and stabbed him in the back.
Time restarted with the emperor discovering a lightsaber sticking out of his chest where his heart should be. He looked down at the offending weapon, then turned his head to see Makas, pressed up against his back and with his head over the emperor’s shoulder.
Makas said nothing and stepped back, pulling the weapon out.
Valkorion said, “So be it,” then chuckled a little and exploded, a wave of dark side energy washing over everything, leaving the room a collection of unconscious bodies, two corpses, and an empty throne.