"Just think what a bunch of determined merchants can accomplish if you give them a few tens of thousands of years..."
The top manager walking beside him stumbled on flat ground when he realized the client had stopped a good two meters back and was now staring intently through the massive panoramic window at the technological vista before him.
"Impressive, sir, isn't it?" With a hint of pride at being part of something great, the manager drew level with the client.
"It's been a while since I was here in person," Darth Ziilenlos agreed, continuing to study the magnificent, incomparable orbital rings of Kuat Drive Yards. "But... not much has changed over... the years."
Planet Kuat.
"Really?" the top manager asked in surprise. "We've had a major construction project going on after the events of the past few years. Perhaps you've heard — first the Zann Consortium attacked us, then Warlord Zsinj... destroyed some large sections of the yards, forcing us to turn down certain major contracts in favor of our own repairs."
"Can't say I noticed any traces of battle or destruction on the rings or other installations in the system," Ziilenlos admitted.
Kuat's Orbital Rings.
"We... conceal some things, sir," the top manager replied vaguely. "Not everything that happens on Kuat is known to visitors. Some things have to be covered with decorative shields and we pretend everything's fine and there's no cause for concern."
"And you're not afraid to tell a client that?" the ancient Sith asked, turning his head toward the man.
"I was assured you were familiar with the situation." The manager's eyes bulged, as if he'd just realized what a mistake he'd made.
"More than you can imagine," Darth Ziilenlos assured him, returning his gaze to the slowly gliding, almost creeping, behemoth.
Even though it was on the other side of the viewport, hundreds of kilometers from where he stood, the vessel still inspired awe with its sheer size and military might.
"Oh, sir, I don't mean to brag, but few people know more about Kuat than I do," the top manager rattled off some gibberish to impress the client with his intellect and showcase his own importance.
A pompous fool who could do nothing but fawn over a buyer in search of great favor.
Which was expressed exclusively in the generosity of tips.
This galaxy was rotten to the core.
In this day and age, even Mandalorians were starting to forget what military and masculine honor meant.
Not all of them, but most.
As if, over four thousand years, the spines had been pulled out of every single one of them, leaving Ziilenlos with nothing more than soft clay to mold.
Only a handful deserved any attention at all.
"What do you know of the Ten?" Ziilenlos asked.
"The Ten, sir?" The manager blinked. "Well... that's... a numeral..."
"He can't even parse his own speech," Ziilenlos noted. "How could he possibly know Kuat's history."
"The Ten are the founders of Kuat Drive Yards," the ancient Sith said.
"I beg your pardon," the manager said, putting on a politely bored expression. "But the Corporation was founded by House Kuat..."
"Incorrect," Ziilenlos cut him off. "Ten human aristocratic families united in the early years of the Galactic Republic with the intention of creating the galaxy's largest and most efficient shipyard. They chose the planet Kuat as their headquarters, hired terraformers who turned it into a blooming garden, a paradise world that lured specialists with its luxury and frequency. While the planet was being turned into a showpiece, what would eventually become the orbital rings you see every day was being built in orbit."
"Sir, forgive me, but I know Kuat's history and..."
"What is the Emancipation from Inheritance?" Ziilenlos asked, beginning to grow irritated with his companion's stupidity.
A shame he couldn't kill him.
Unfortunately.
"It's a foundational document that allows House Kuat to manage the yards by choosing a new head of the corporation from among its family members and..."
"And why would House Kuat create such a document for themselves if they already live by the rules of aristocracy — whoever is head of the family controls all the property?" Ziilenlos asked.
"Well... internal squabbles... problems." Apparently, the top manager was already regretting that he'd volunteered to pass the time with an influential client to earn some extra money from the advertised product.
"The Emancipation from Inheritance is an agreement between the ten founding families that gives House Kuat the very right you're so timidly trying to explain to me," the ancient Sith explained. "Each family focused on the part of their duties and the profitable business they understood better than the others. Division of responsibility zones, elimination of internal conflicts, strategy formulation — that's what this document was created for. But not within House Kuat — within the Ten."
"I suppose... I've gotten something mixed up, sir... corporate history was taught quite a while ago and..."
"You are pathetic and ridiculous," Darth Ziilenlos said. "Just like your entire corporation. From magnificent shipbuilders who knew their worth, every one of you — from worker to director — has turned into flunkies who sell yourselves more than your products. You have no spark left, the one that sustained Kuat for millennia. No fire of the pioneers, no drive for leadership. Your descendants sat you on a throne and claimed the crown of the galaxy's best shipbuilders. And you sit there, swinging your legs like children. You grovel instead of dictating terms. It's obvious that after Kuat Drive Yards absorbed Core Galaxy Systems in the distant past and firmly established itself as the galactic leader in shipbuilding, you felt completely untouchable. That's why you get your noses rubbed in your own piles of bantha poodoo time and again.
Ignoring the man's green-tinged face, Darth Ziilenlos sank into recollection.
He knew Kuat's history very well.
And he even had an idea why the top manager didn't know such basic historical truths.
Millennia pass, and with each new generation, House Kuat drifts further from the provisions of the Emancipation from Inheritance.
Power goes to the head.
Discipline and strategic thinking become diluted from generation to generation; the absence of worthy competition turns a sentient into a complacent animal.
A predator dulls its claws and fangs.
It grows lazy and careless.
And then its end comes.
That was what happened to the Core Galaxy Systems corporation, which, alongside Corellia StarDrive and Hoersch-Kessel, had once been the titans of shipbuilding many thousands of years ago.
Kuat set its sights on joining that group and entered into fierce competition with Core Galaxy Systems.
Through price wars, industrial espionage, and more insidious tactics, Core Galaxy Systems suffered severe losses and was forced to sell its assets.
A little over five hundred years before the present, Kuat bought Core Galaxy Systems lock, stock, and barrel, anathematized their name, and took their place as the leading shipbuilder in the Old Republic.
Soon they were joined by the Corellian Engineering Corporation, which bought out Corellia StarDrive when the older company lost its entire senior design team in a shuttle accident.
Deliberate, of course.
Now, Kuat is an empire.
With its own territories, controlled at the level of industrial vassalage.
They have a massive army, their own fleet — numerous and superbly armed.
A magnificent safety margin.
Only the devastating destruction they suffered several years earlier from the interference of Tyber Zann and Warlord Zsinj, the flight of their leading scientists, and other minor misfortunes instantly sobered the Kuatis.
And they remembered that beyond all that, it would be a good idea to maintain their primacy with an intact and functioning infrastructure as well.
Kuat is reinforcing its defenses and signing up for numerous expensive contracts.
They crave money, intending to use it to rebuild what was destroyed without dipping into their own reserves.
Stupidity — to elevate resource as the foremost goal of life.
You can't take money with you to the grave.
You can't buy immortality with it — for the most part.
The Ten have now been mostly anathematized.
Only a few of them are still alive.
Despite the Emancipation from Inheritance, the Houses have repeatedly tried to repeal it, to turn the situation in their favor.
They destroyed each other, even though they were useful to the common cause and to one another.
Houses Culvult and Knylenn lost the power struggle in recent years and are now on the brink of extinction.
They've been removed from affairs; their assets have long since been extracted and are used to help disgraced aristocrats hide from the army of hired assassins sent by Kuat.
They will run for a long time yet, but the outcome is predictable.
House Depon and House Andrim decided to put sticks in each other's wheels during the testing of the latest weaponry for the experimental Burning Vengeance-class Star Destroyer series.
Because of their behind-the-scenes games, the promising developments never went into production, and two experimental ships remained prototypes in the service of Kuat's defense fleet.
As for the families themselves... Kuat destroyed the competitors.
And it's hard to blame them.
He protects his power and eliminates those who interfere with business.
From a certain point of view, he's within his rights.
House Purkis... they too decided to play their own games, but were destroyed by House Andrim a little before fate caught up with the latter.
Five families met their end in just the last century.
Three more — much earlier.
Even their surnames haven't survived, only archival sources hidden deep in family data vaults.
And for almost four thousand years now, no one has heard of House de Vide, which once helped the Jedi Revan procure advanced technology and ships from Kuat for his fleet.
The de Vides were also destroyed.
Almost entirely.
But they are the only ones, besides Kuat, who still haven't given up their claims to control over Kuat.
In fact, as soon as House Kuat finishes off the last representatives of the Ten's side branches, they will remain the sole rulers of Kuat Drive Yards.
No wonder they still haven't seen the abyss toward which the stellar wind is carrying them.
Kuat is blinded by the desire to preserve its power, and the version of history the top manager recited only proves the thoroughness of the approach House Kuat uses.
They don't just destroy their opponents.
They erase them from history.
And they spend billions of credits every week doing it.
No wonder they're blinded by the lust for profit.
It's strange that anyone even thought to solve the problems of the destruction that's been going on for several years.
Obviously, it has something to do with that huge starfighter production order Kuat received recently.
Just imagine... they don't even ask about the client's identity.
Their eyes never rise above the bottom line of profit.
Kuat doesn't see how they are preparing their own yards to be occupied by Darth Sidious and his army with their own hands.
Cunning worthy of a true Sith Lord — make the enemy think only of profit, spend their own resources to prepare a magnificent beachhead, construction and repair base for the Empire.
Including docks for enormous vessels like Super Star Destroyers or Star Dreadnoughts.
Darth Ziilenlos saw what Palpatine was doing.
Very soon, Kuat and all its might would become puppets in the hands of a mad Sith.
The work of millennia would be lost and subjugated to an idiot.
And that idiot would rule Kuat as his own fiefdom.
The work of the Ten would end in a grand collapse, leaving only pitiful scraps.
"Commanders report the ships are ready for inspection," the top manager said, touching his earpiece. "If I were you, I'd see to delivering the crews here... it will take hundreds of thousands of sentients, Lord Luf de Vide."
"That's no problem for me."
It was strange, after millennia, to hear his real name and surname.
Perhaps it would even be dangerous to use them for such a risky deal.
But Darth Ziilenlos had calculated everything.
In the four thousand years he'd been gone, the name of his House had been utterly forgotten and buried in the archives of Kuat Drive Yards.
No one even remembered them.
Not even when the Kuatis were selling off their primary military strength.
"Our corporation is ready to offer you a good discount on the work of refitting and re-equipping the ships," the top manager began the old song about his profit.
"I'm not interested," Darth Ziilenlos cut him off.
He truly had no interest in spending more money on Kuat than was required to buy their best available means of warfare from the reserves of Kuat Drive Yards.
He had paid billions in bribes, erased the wills of hundreds of sentients to achieve his goal.
By the time the Kuat family started investigating what was happening, trying to figure out where everything had gone, he would be long gone.
He and the best of what Kuat currently had.
Funnily enough, he'd paid three times what each ship was worth.
The Kuatis, each gifted with multi-million-credit bribes, bowed to his will and the Force, and grudgingly agreed to the deal.
Of course — he'd convinced them there was nothing left to fear and no reason to keep these slowpokes in service.
It had been difficult.
It had taken several years to achieve his goal.
But he had done it.
Ironically, with each new generation, the number of ships of this class had decreased.
Four ships of the first generation, three of the second, two of the third.
But he took them all.
And now, when Palpatine came here with his pack, not one would fall into his hands, and not one would fall in his idiotic war.
When the time came, Darth Ziilenlos would conquer Kuat and make this sector the jewel of his Empire.
Sith power would once again reign over the galaxy.
True Sith, not that pathetic Baneite construct that had existed for the last thousand years.
"Arrange for my cargo ships to be docked to the vessels," he ordered. "I want the Kuat crews off my ships by that time."
"But... we're supposed to train your people in operation. After all, this is rather complex machinery."
"They'll manage," Ziilenlos cut him off. "Arrange it!"
"Yes, of course," the top manager stammered, beginning to dictate the client's order to the ships. "Yes, the client's crews will handle the merchandise themselves. Yes, disembark immediately. Yes. Over."
Even as he spoke affirmatively, he didn't believe in the reliability of the crews Darth Ziilenlos intended to replace the Kuat rejects with on his ships' decks.
Of course they'd manage.
Devastator-class droids as the basis of the crew — why wouldn't they manage?
They already had all the necessary databases for operating these ships — he'd had to shell out, but it was worth it.
In the last year, Kuat had sold too much from its archives — both officially and unofficially.
The aristocratic war, fulfillment of Palpatine's new orders — for which the full price would never be paid — the destruction that still hadn't been repaired — all of it had pushed Kuat down the slippery slope of selling patents and blueprints.
As well as expensive-to-maintain starships.
They were getting rid of the "unnecessary."
Idiots.
They had just sold what could have saved them.
"Is there anything else I can help you with, my lord?" the top manager fawned, trying to meet the ancient Sith's eyes.
"You can," the Sith replied, burning out the annoying flunky's mind with the Force. "Your death, distant relative of the head of House Kuat, will be the first on the path of my wrath and the extermination of your bloodline."
He didn't give a command — two Acolytes simply appeared from thin air behind him, having shed their cloak of stealth, and took over the task of disposing of the body.
Darth Ziilenlos himself watched.
He watched as hundreds and thousands of sentients left his ships through the transfer tunnels.
Just half an hour — and the vessels were empty, and the clatter of battle droid footsteps echoed through their corridors.
Darth Ziilenlos headed for the nearest transfer tunnel, leading him aboard the Akuleus.
One of the two twelve-kilometer Mandator-III-class Star Dreadnoughts he had designated as his flagship.
Three of the second generation and four of the first generation would obediently follow, to join the fleet he had pulled out from under Silri's nose just before the trap in the Karthakk system snapped shut.
Mandator-III-class Star Dreadnought.
Now he had everything he needed to begin his campaign.