Despite the fact that the Jedi fighters and Oppo Rancisis's fleet were methodically destroying the Separatist ships, there was no real progress in routing the enemy.
I refused the offered Delta-7 and remained on the surface. Like Shaak Ti. Like the downed Obi-Wan. Like Skywalker, who had followed him.
The droids pressed forward without any tactics. With no field commanders, they clumsily buried Kamino under millions of chunks of wreckage that had once held value as droids designated B1 and B2.
Meanwhile, the Republic forces fell back. The CIS managed to seize all cargo platforms, the security perimeter, and even the central armory, which held millions of units of weapons and ammunition. In a couple of hours of incompetent command, the Republic forces had blown nearly half the facility.
"Shay, Vette," after tossing a squad of droids off the bridge connecting two platforms, I called my… companions on the encrypted channel. "Where are you?"
The Mandalorian and the Twi'lek arrived on Kamino at the same time as I did—except they were delivered by a cloaked Sith Fury piloted by a Lethan. Clamped to an Acclamator's hull, Millennium Falcon-style, my Hands lay low aboard an invisible ship near one of the cloning labs.
"Almost done," Vette replied. "The system is so convoluted I barely sorted out the security protocols…"
"Less talking, Twi'lek," the redhead snapped. "These droids just keep coming. A little more and I won't be able to hold them—they'll break through inside."
"My lord," the Lethan's voice sounded in my ear. "Permit me to join them. One Mandalorian won't hold back the advancing forces…"
"Denied," I said, using the Force to amplify my leap as I cleared another platform, plunging straight into the thick of the fighting. "I'm practically there already."
The droids had effectively surrounded a small group of clones. Kids—five years old, no more. They'd been cut off from the barracks farther down the ramp. The idea, obviously, was for the "children" to return to the barracks under the protection of older clones in gleaming white armor and remain under guard—but as usual, everything went wrong.
Right in front of the barracks, they ran into a droid detachment that had gotten there first. The tinheads oriented instantly and began hosing the clones down with blasterfire. And to make things worse, a B1 squad appeared behind them too. Fortunately, there was plenty of cover on the ramp—numerous human-height crates and containers marked with Rothana Heavy Engineering logos. The clones crouched behind them, weakly returning fire at the advancing enemy.
It so happened that I'd shifted my previous fight from the mid-level ramps to the sloped roof of the Kaminoans' dish-shaped structures. And when I saw droids pressing toward the "dish" where Vette and Vizla were digging through the Kaminoans' dirty laundry, I sprinted to meet them. I hadn't expected the delay of half a hundred children's heads protected by a dozen clones.
"General, sir," one of the soldiers dashed toward me. With the Force, I shoved him back. A good dozen blaster bolts stitched through the spot where the clone's body had appeared.
"Stay in cover!" I barked, launching myself toward the detachment of droids—thinned down, to the clones' credit—that stood between the clones and the barracks.
The calculation was simple. Trading fire with at least some cover in the barracks behind you was better than fighting on two fronts.
There were about ten droids in front of me. Slow, dim-witted droids. Easy.
I slid feet-first under the first pair in the center of the formation, sweeping them across the torso with my blade. Gliding all the way to the barracks doors, I ended up behind the droids. The clones were still separated from them by the same few crates, greedily soaking up shots like the forerunners of Imperial stormtroopers.
With a Force shove, I flung one droid off the ramp, drifting left by inertia toward the wall. Dropping out of the clones' sightline, I deflected blaster bolts with the saber in my right hand and released lightning with my left into four B1s ahead of me, instantly shorting their circuits. In the next moment, Force-lifted droids were already flying into their still-active brothers. A couple went off the ramp along with those struck by lightning.
Four opponents left.
Closing the distance with a leap, I appeared behind them and slashed the nearest on a diagonal. Without waiting for the pieces to hit the deck, I drove my boot into another's head. I reflected a shot back into the shooting droid, then swept the battlefield with my eyes and—without overthinking it—crumpled the last one with the Force and hurled it beyond the complex.
Stepping out from behind the crates, I waved the clones toward me.
"Move!"
The soldiers, rushing toward me one by one in short dashes while covering the younglings withdrawing under Separatist fire, redeployed into the barracks. Half the armed clone troopers stayed outside to keep the droids from storming the building.
"Thank you very much, General," one of the clones—olive rank markings on helmet and pauldrons—approached me. "If it weren't for you, we'd have been in trouble."
"It's fine, Sergeant," I said, clapping him on the shoulder as I looked over the small Fett copies. "Kids," I addressed them. "You all right?"
"Yes, sir," the boys—some clutching captured droid carbines, others holding rifles picked off bodies—didn't look scared.
"We were made for this, sir," a clone explained. "We do not know fear."
"Shame," I rolled my shoulder, where a scorched blaster mark marred my armor plate. "Fear helps you stay in cover and not stick your head out when there's a fight."
"Apologies, sir," another clone appeared at my side, this one without markings. "Since the battle began we haven't seen any Jedi, haven't received orders."
No time to answer. Explosions thundered on the ramp—grenades.
I shot outside and saw the splintered remnants of the droids from the squad that had been chasing my clones being finished off by three clones in armor different from the so-called Phase I worn in the first part of the Clone Wars by the Kamino-bred copies of Jango Fett.
ARCs! it hit me. Elite Republic commandos—clones created and trained specifically for "delicate" operations. Sabotage, insurrection, reconnaissance… They could handle anything. Especially the ones classified as Null. A half-dozen unhinged, independent clones who recognized no authority and could only be commanded by their trainer—a Mandalorian of Clan Skirata. But as far as I remembered, the Nulls hadn't taken part in the defense of Kamino.
So these were Alphas. A hundred commandos created after the Nulls. Unlike their predecessors, with the Alphas the Kaminoans decided not to experiment or add genetic enhancements. The result was a hundred near-unchanged clones of Jango Fett, trained by the Mandalorian himself, who had remained in stasis right up until the attack on Kamino.
"And who the hell is this?" one of the commandos muttered, jabbing his carbine at me.
"Hey, you—who are you? Drop your weapon," the second of the trio immediately dropped to one knee and aimed his blaster rifle when he saw me step toward them. "Or I'll fill you—"
"Lower your weapons," Shaak Ti commanded in a clear but strong voice as she approached. Looking at me, smiling at the sight of the clone younglings peeking out from the doorway, she dipped her head in a ceremonial nod.
"Knight Dougan," she greeted me.
"Master Ti," I returned the greeting. "What brings you here?"
"We're moving to the lab that holds the third generation of clones," the Master answered. "The direct route has collapsed—the bridge was blown by the Separatists—so we're taking the long way."
"Ossik!" one of the commandos—the one who'd stayed quiet on first contact—kicked the brother who'd knelt and barked, "Shabuir!" as he slapped the first one on the back of the helmet. "Jetii," he added, quieter now, jerking his chin in my direction.
"Please forgive the clones for their hotheadedness, Jedi Knight," a lanky Kaminoan said. Strangely, I hadn't noticed him at first. Lama Su, the planet's Prime Minister, in person. Together with Shaak Ti, he stepped behind the improvised barricade, leaving the ARCs at their backs on the other side of the crates. "The Alphas have only just awakened and have not yet—"
"Everyone in cover!" I snapped, igniting my saber on the move. With the Force I yanked all three clones toward me and tossed them over the obstacles, then surged forward up the ramp, straight toward a pair of droidekas rolling out from around the corner.
I didn't make it in time. The destroyer droids stopped instantly and unfolded into combat mode. As if in slow motion, I watched their shield generators charge, watched their rapid-fire blasters train on me…
The first droideka, thank the Force, I managed to slice as I slipped past it by millimeters. One limb fell away; it toppled onto its side, and its shield flickered out. Twisting mid-jump, I used the Force to sweep the damaged opponent off the ramp and landed on my feet.
My golden blade caught the first burst of scarlet bolts from the second droideka.
The first volley went into the deck, the second into the air, the third back into the droideka. The ricochet shot the ceiling and vanished. Then three ion grenades dropped at the droideka's feet, and the explosions tore the Separatist droid apart.
"Done!" Vette squealed cheerfully in my ear. "I've got the data!"
Covering my mouth with my hand as if wiping blood from a bitten lip, I snapped into the mic.
"Get out with the data to base. The Jedi are one passage away from the lab!"
"Drag your blue ass outside!" Shay roared back immediately. "I'm out of charges!"
"Stop yelling at me!" the blue-skinned Twi'lek protested, offended. "I'm moving as fast as I can."
"I can leave you alone with the droids!" the Mandalorian shouted back.
The channel crackled with interference and blasterfire.
"I'm at the extraction point," Darth Atroxa cut in. "Vette got out. Shay's pinned down by droids."
"Help them!" I swore, seeing three commandos and Master Ti hurry toward me.
"As you command," the red-skinned woman replied. In the very next second I felt the platform take several tremendously powerful hits from the Fury's heavy guns. The deck pitched; I dropped to one knee, using the Force to keep my balance. Good thing my saber shut off, or I would've cut something important off.
One of the clones went down flat on his back. Two others stayed up. The Master grabbed the nearest protruding piece of the complex wall and stayed on her feet.
"Was that an explosion?" Lama Su asked in his guttural voice, peering from behind a crate.
"Sounds like it," one of the commandos muttered.
"Shay and Vette are aboard," the Sith Lady reported. "We have the data. Departing for Odessen."
"Understood," I whispered, more for form's sake than anything. I pictured the Sith ship—cloaked by an invisibility field—tearing away from the far side of the complex and shooting upward. A moment later I felt Atroxa's aura, muted by Sith sorcery but familiar to me, fade away. The Fury jumped to hyperspace. The Kamino mission was over.
***
As comfortable as the Emperor's station was, it had been built to preserve secrets, not to organize a galaxy-scale rebellion.
The nebula that hampered hyperspace jumps would become a burden if evacuation ever became necessary.
So, after chopping the carbonite-freezing bay's equipment to bits, I and seven of my followers—quite satisfied with the beginning of our relationship, having shaken off the rust (in their case) and put Kun's vaunted fencing into practice (in mine)—gathered in the mess to discuss strategy for the near future over cups of instant caf and vile-tasting ration bars.
Sitting at the head of the table, I looked over my Hands. That was what I decided to call them. Hands. Special assistants—scouts, spies, saboteurs, warlords… Allies whose loyalty rested both on a desire for vengeance and on Sith sorcery that bound them to me.
At the table, there was obvious clustering by interest.
Kira and Nadia sat in the corner farthest from me, whispering to each other quietly.
Malgus, the Togruta, and the Lethan sat in a tight group to my right. Vette sat opposite them. And the Mandalorian demonstratively chose the seat across from me, repeatedly shooting me looks full of rage.
Of course, one man against seven trained Sith, Jedi, a Mandalorian, and a Twi'lek who could simply shoot straight—I wouldn't have lasted. Even if I had absorbed a dozen spirits. But I had honestly beaten Shay in a long, exhausting fight. Or rather—we'd separated in a draw. I deprived her of her flamethrower and jetpack; she knocked my lightsaber away. Basically, a stalemate would have remained a stalemate, if not for the Force. With it, I plowed the Mandalorian across almost all the carbonite slabs—which turned out to be quite fragile in practice. For dessert, after browning her with a couple of lightning bursts, I assigned her head cook duty for the next event. In my view, there's nothing more humiliating and disgusting for a warrior than having to cook.
Especially since she's a terrible cook.
"Even the caf is shit," Vette grimaced, demonstratively pouring the brown sludge into the waste. "After all those years you could've at least learned how to brew caf," she aimed the complaint at the Mandalorian. The redhead, rubbing a fat bruise over half her face (my fault—I didn't notice her helmet came off right before the last slab), swore dirty in her language.
"And how am I supposed to talk to her?" the Ryloth girl appealed to me.
"You could just close your mouth and stop pissing everyone off," Darth Atroxa suggested in a dark, calm voice. Her face held not a hint of emotion as she consumed tasteless rations like a droid and washed them down with equally disgusting caf. "The Master didn't wake us for nothing."
A short nod thanked the Lethan for emphasizing my silence.
"If you're done snapping at each other, I'll start," I leaned forward slightly. "My name is Rik Dougan. I am the apprentice and heir of Emperor Vitiate. And… a Jedi Knight."
"Jedi," the Jedi faction stared at me in bewilderment. Vette's huge eyes widened too. The Mandalorian rolled hers. Malgus snorted contemptuously. The Togruta and Darth Atroxa prudently kept silent. "But why?"
With a sigh, I briefly recounted the plan.
"We have to stop the production of clones," Kira declared. From everyone's looks, only Vette and Nadia supported her. Which made sense—the rest had fought on the Sith side.
"Otherwise the Order will be exterminated," Nadia backed her. "That cannot be allowed."
"And it won't be," I promised. "Both Sith and Jedi must cast aside their age-old contradictions and become something new. The Jedi must end," I said. And added, "As must the Sith."
"Once, we were one order studying the Force. Now, thousands of conflicts later, both Sith and Jedi have degenerated, rotted in their dogmas. And this conflict will continue for generations," I looked around the table. "History preserves many examples of adepts who used both sides of the Force and lived without fearing their emotions. We must achieve the same. If anyone has another opinion," I looked around again, "feel free to go back into carbonite."
No one volunteered.
"Good," I concluded. "Then to the practical."
We needed a full base. The Emperor's station was hidden reliably from prying eyes, but the nebula still created difficulties for hyperspace use. And solid ground under your feet was nicer than metal plates.
We had options. The Defender's nav computer could help. Planets tied to the galaxy's history had now been forgotten, their routes lost—or, as with Kamino, deliberately concealed. An ideal time and opportunity to establish a base.
I believed a world filled with the Force would be suitable. But the more we studied such worlds from the Defender's nav database, the more I doubted I'd find a suitable one.
And after a journey to Dromund Kaas, I made a decision.
In keeping with our slogan of balance, I insisted that our headquarters be placed where the Force was in balance. Dromund Kaas, Yavin 4, Lehon, Korriban, and Ziost—saturated with the dark side—as well as Telos IV and Ossus—saturated with the light—didn't suit us. Even though they had material infrastructure we could use easily. Because then that would give an advantage to whichever side of the Force dominated the planet.
So we had to look for a planet where the Force was in balance.
Tython, which came to mind immediately, had to be rejected—it was saturated with the dark side. The dark-siders couldn't help but enjoy that. The Jedi homeworld steeped in darkness. While Malgus threw out barbed remarks like, "Should've visited you here the way you did on Coruscant," Darth Atroxa and the Togruta Ashara filled me in: during the Second Galactic War, Tython suffered a major catastrophe that killed most living creatures and the world's biosphere. That was why Tython had become polluted by an excess of the dark side.
The slight dark-side tilt wasn't strongly noticeable, but it created an aura of a tainted world. And although Kira, Nadia, and Ashara argued for the ancestral homeworld of the Jedi, I had to deny them. The Jedi had left Tython, apparently moving on to Coruscant, where they rebuilt their Temple after Malgus's invasion.
Zakuul, which Vette wouldn't shut up about, greeted our reconnaissance group—Shay, Vette, and Atroxa—only with colossal devastation and harsh radiation levels. Even though one could salvage something interesting from the ruins of the fallen empire, nobody wanted to get irradiated.
The former capital of the Eternal Empire was destroyed. An unknown enemy had erased the traces of its former greatness down to the foundations. Watching the wrecked world on the station holoterminal, I couldn't even speak. It felt as if someone had turned personal revenge into genocide.
We saw a similar picture on Dromund Kaas. The Sith Empire's capital lay in ruins. And although dark-side adepts could still be felt on the planet, Valkorion rejected my proposal to contact them with furious irritation. Malgus's offhand suggestion to wipe them out also went unanswered. Maybe later…
All of us—me and my seven followers—stood on the corvette's bridge, watching the planet's total destruction. Though traces of Sith architecture remained in places, the dark-side-soaked world overgrown with impenetrable jungles and crawling with savage predators reminded me of Yavin 4. An ancient Sith world subjected to a devastating Jedi invasion…
"Looks like the Republic put a final period on Emperor Vitiate's legacy," Kira said. And though she wasn't smiling, her voice held a hard, grim triumph.
The seeming obedience she'd radiated since our first meeting evaporated. A spark of vindication flickered in her eyes. Valkorion—who had only joined our company during the search on Dromund Kaas—looked at the former infiltrator with icy indifference and dissolved into nothing without a word.
"You're not as hopeless as you look, Jedi girl," Malgus gurgled through his vocabulizer. "You'd make a good Sith," he noted. The Sith's irises glittered gold. "One day you'll need a teacher…"
Kira looked up at Malgus with irony. In her posture, her expression, her voice—there was challenge. Not just the challenge of an inexperienced Jedi to a hardened Sith, but the challenge of someone who understood exactly what his offer meant, from experience.
Kira's biography contained a chapter set in the Sith Empire. The girl was born among the Jedi's enemies, became one of the Children of the Emperor—his personal infiltrators. She fled to the Republic and became a Jedi. However strong Malgus was, if those two ever fought to the death, the bet would be on Carsen.
"Remind me," she said with a friendly, thin voice edged with venom, speaking to the Sith warlord, "where is your New Empire, Sith?"
Mentally, I slapped myself across the face.
Darth Malgus's eyes flared with a dangerous light. A lightsaber hilt appeared in his hand. Kira answered in kind, easily spinning her lightsaber pike in front of her. A heavy silence settled over the bridge. Two of my party members were preparing to kill each other.
"Enough," I said, nudging them apart slightly with the Force. "As if I need you tearing each other apart."
"That didn't stop you from fighting the mercenary," Nadia said quietly, calmly. In the corner of my eye I saw her take up a position just behind Carsen's left, unobtrusive but purposeful—so as not to hinder her lightsaber.
Both women kept their hands on their lightsaber pike grips with practiced composure. I'd seen Kira in action at least in the game and knew she was a serious opponent. Of Grell, I had only a superficial understanding. But for some reason it seemed that even outnumbered, the two Jedi women could seriously thin out their opponents from the other faction.
"I said—enough," I repeated as sharply as I could. "Once we find a base site, the first thing you'll do is set up a sparring space. But on my ship—no duels."
With grim faces, the servants—Jedi, Sith, Mandalorian, and smuggler—hurried off the bridge.
Only Darth Atroxa remained, carefully pretending the quarrel didn't interest her.
"What are your orders, my lord?" she asked.
"Set a course for Odessen," I ordered. "Let's hope at least things are fine there. Unlike in our little collective," I grimaced.
Seated at the ship's control panel on the left side of the central protruding console, the Lethan merely smirked. I sat opposite the galaxy hologram, leaning back wearily in my chair.
It's hard to manage even a small group of individuals who only obey you conditionally.
Over the time spent in the cramped world of the ship, I began to understand that I was not, by any means, an authority to them. Valkorion—that was their true master. Neither my victory over the Mandalorian, as I'd expected, nor the journey had brought us closer to one another. And now I had merely allowed them to be disappointed in me again.
Should've sent them scouting on separate ships, I thought. The station had three Sith Furies ready for use. Equipped with stealth systems like the Ghost squadron, those ships could have been used to search for a base more efficiently. I had even attempted it, sending Shay, Vette, and Atroxa to Zakuul while I checked Tython with the rest. But when we returned from our expeditions, something possessed me to investigate Dromund Kaas as a full group.
Tired. Too tired. Maybe Valkorion had been wrong about me, and I couldn't handle even seven—never mind a whole galaxy, like he wanted. I needed rest and a fresh look at the situation.
The crew needed rest too. A berthing compartment built for four couldn't accommodate everyone who wanted in.
Malgus settled in the cargo hold. He didn't really ask permission—he simply set up a sleeping space there.
Vette moved into the engineering compartment, where she spent her time with the astromech R3, serving as the ship's technical specialist.
Shay Vizla flat-out claimed the medbay. When I objected that the single cot should belong to a potential patient, the Mandalorian snorted contemptuously and said she hadn't yet encountered wounds that couldn't be treated while lying in the bacta tank installed back on the Emperor's station.
So it was amusing to realize that in the berthing compartment on the other side of the wall, the Force had reached balance—two Sith, two Jedi. No matter how the Togruta styled herself as a gray Jedi, her worldview still matched her former teacher.
"I'm going to my cabin," I said, realizing that even on a ship this small, the crew needed to know where their leader was. "How long to the jump?"
The red-skinned Twi'lek checked the instruments.
"Eight hours, my lord."
"Enough time to get real rest," I noted. Leaving the bridge in the Sith Lady's care, I trudged to my cabin.
Locking the door behind me, I shrugged off the Jedi cloak that had begun to annoy me. Scorch marks from my clash with Shay. A couple of blaster burns. Fit only for the trash. None of the companions had even said I was walking around in rags. Fantastic. Probably laughing behind my back too…
I was strongly tempted to sink into pettiness and seize their minds using Valkorion's conditioning. One phrase, and almost all of them would become devoted servants. Watching my mouth, striving to carry out every order as perfectly as possible…
And every time I drove those thoughts away.
If I couldn't earn the respect of seven—make them carry out my will because they consciously submitted to my influence and orders—then I was nothing, not a ruler. You can't subjugate every sentient in the galaxy with your will.
The cabin door panel beeped. At that moment I was wrestling with the clasp of my chestplate. Over the course of wandering the backwaters of the galaxy, the Jedi armor had grown pretty old. But again and again I dressed in it like a second skin.
The greaves and vambraces were already on the anatomical rack. All that remained was to drop the chestplate and backplate, then the undersuit, and I could slip under the blanket and forget myself in sleep… And now someone else had to show up.
In that moment I regretted that the ship didn't have a visual intercom. That way, without opening the door, you could talk and send away an uninvited intruder in peace. Now I had to open it. The moment the door slid aside, I saw Darth Atroxa standing opposite me.
"What do you nee—?"
"Do you want help, my lord?" There was a playful spark in the Lethan's eyes, and her long, slender fingers instantly found and unfastened the stubborn clasp on my armor. The chestplate and backplate dropped to the deck with a clang.
Her voice unsettled me. Previously submissive, it now carried flirtation, teasing. For some reason my mind painted the picture of a predator driving exhausted prey into a corner. And of course, the hunter wasn't me.
I took a step back so the heavy chestplate wouldn't crush my toes—and bumped my legs into the edge of the bed.
Thoughts spun in my head, and for some reason words stuck in my throat.
The Sith Lady stepped toward me. Behind her the door closed, breaking the silence in the cabin with a lock's click. Now, in the captain's quarters, there were only me, an insanely sexy red-skinned Lethan, and a bed that could easily fit not two, not three people.
With a touch of theatricality—but with the sensuality of her species—the Twi'lek shrugged off her Sith cloak and hood, her chest armor, leaving only tight trousers hugging her slender, graceful legs, and a broad top that left on display a gorgeous flat stomach with the relief of moderately toned muscles, her navel adorned with jewelry set with a small gemstone. I felt my male nature suddenly realize that in front of me stood not just a mortally dangerous Sith Lady, but a beautiful, sexy woman.
My mind calculated that dark-side charm was being aimed at me, and that it was the cause of the surge and riot of my hormones. Lazily, I absorbed her spell. I'd been in this universe for over a month. I was surrounded by quite cute, sexy women. What was wrong with one of them wanting to be more than just a subordinate? In the end, even in my own universe, bosses slept with subordinates. And I was, after all, the future ruler of my own Empire.
Atroxa bared a row of slightly pointed white teeth and ran her tongue across them. Like a snake ready to strike at its prey.
"We have eight hours, my lord, to ease your tension," she said, placing both hands invitingly on her belt, where the hilt of a lightsaber hung.
Why not, in the end? That's a kind of rest too, I thought, laying a hand on her belt. In the same moment it fell to the floor. The lightsaber hilt clinked softly.
The slender fingers of her graceful hand slowly—stoking my interest—slid the Twi'lek's tight trousers down to the floor, and she stepped out of them with a careless motion of her sexy legs. The Sith Lady knelt obediently before me.
I ran my fingertips along her lekku, idly recalling that besides part of a Twi'lek's brain, they also contain erogenous zones. Letting small portions of the Force flow through my fingers, I entirely unconsciously stimulated her nerve endings as well.
The Sith woman rolled her eyes in ecstasy and opened her mouth, which I sealed with a kiss. Her slender red fingers found the fasteners of my undersuit and began to strip me of excess clothing in a hurry.