TheWatchDog

Star Wars: The Aftermath (A post-Battle of Endor RP)

From the frying pan to the fire: Prelude to war

The Farghul retracted her saber and put it back on her belt, letting the Jedi make their plans. She was the wildcard in the situation. The order to not engage, she assumed, did not apply to her given her skill and knowledge. She looked to the gathered troops and Jedi. "If you see any of the enemy floundering around in a daze or something, that was probably me if they are still alive. I am skilled in illusion and invisibility. Otherwise, I plan to hunt prime targets, much like Jade here seems to intend. Cut the head off the snake and the body soon follows."

She then turned to Mara, feigning dismay and then teasing her. "What, you don't want to show off a bit to the girl giving you a nice ride?"

And then she finally honed in on Luke. "Mmmm, no plans to die there. It would take a lot to take me down in general given my battle armor alone, not even accounting for skill difference. Besides, my ghost would end up elsewhere, among my adopted family."

@Lotrix Molick

"The way you describe the afterlife of the force almost makes it tempting" Mara remarked after Luke departed. The redhead reached up to brush a strand of hair out of her left eye as she looked at the forces gathered here. -Don't attack the source of that assault unless it's with back up- she recalled Hamners order. That left whatever was coming along with it, whatever force user was miserable enough to rope themselves into service with that...thing

"There might be inquisitors with them, or dark Jedi. Tasaia, have fun with those but try and leave some for me" she winked at her new friend. Slapping an arm around the other woman's shoulders "And do me a favor, there's this tall one. Can't miss her, she's big pretty and kinda dumb..send her my way. One of her kids is at our temple and I wanna beat some sense into her and see if I can bring her home"

She had a soft spot for Aladar, even though the Emperor's hand seldom interacted with the Inquisitorios. The few times they had, it had been fun. She was a bruiser like Mara and their sparring sessions were among the few hours either woman could get away from all their rage and hatred and just have fun. Of course, if she was serving that, abomination maybe she was beyond saving? Still, if anyone was going to kill her it would be Mara. The redhead didn't want Tasaia doing the deed and needing to interact with her son after the fact. She realized, outsourcing that to someone who hadn't formally joined them left a bad taste in her mouth.

The blind Jedi Master had waited until the two women were aboard leading their group up the ramp, the force felt strained in the aftermath of the event and yet oddly energized. "We're at a crossroads here...Some of us may not make it back from Endor"

"Maybe" Hamner said "Maybe, but I don't intend to lead our knights to a slaughter."

Besides, he thought.

Dune was right, it would take at least a thousand Imperial Vessels to bust the planetary defense network and it's shields. And at least a hundred thousand men to invest it...

Unless something crazy happened any way.

“She’s not my ‘sexbot’... well... let’s just say she’s retired from that career field,” Dremmick corrected, “Sharp eye figuring out she was one though, spend a lot of time with them? Maybe even visited her specifically before?” Dremmick said with a chuckle, joining in the banter. “I’m Dremmick, and don’t worry, I’ll try to keep her from snooping around too much.”

Eira’s head tilted at the thought and looked to the female pilot, “User data not found, not in my old database anyway.” She said as she reminisced, looking for her not realizing Dremmick was just making a joke. “And just because I’m retired doesn’t mean I can’t work~,” she said with a wink and a small giggle. She gave a neat little bow with her hand clasped in front of her, “I am Eira, I can’t wait to fly with you again sometime. I love flying, it’s so much fun, Especially when I get to use the blasters!”

Dremmick could practically feel the eyes shift to him, “L-look, we only use them when needed, promise,” he said with a sheepish grin, “but she is a natural pilot, though it helps that she connects to it and practically becomes it.”

It was then that a strange creature approached one of the pilots, hopping up into his arms. “Oh! What is that? I have no records of this kind of creature… It looks so cute and soft!” Eira took a few steps towards it and bend forward slightly to get to eye level with it before giving it a friendly smile. “Hello there, do you like ear scratches by chance?” she cooed, asking but not expecting an answer and yet to lift a hand to do so.

“E-Eira, you have no idea what that is…,” Dremmick said cautiously. For how it acted though, it could be a pet for all he knew

@Jollan

"He is a Kushiban and he's force sensitive, in fact..I'd bet he's a Jedi" An amused voice, followed the rather sudden yet familiar roar of a speeder as it came to a halt. Luke's eyes danced with amusement at the long eared beast which was doing its best to mimic a house pet, kicking its little hind leg in the pilot's arms. It twisted its head, eyes flickering with almost..disappointment. Then he recalled the...assault of the force that he'd just felt and his ivory white fur turned a mottled salt and pepper color in distress. "Well, I suppose I can forgive you for ruining my fun!" It spoke and the embarrassed almost dropped the poor Rabbit like Jedi who leaped from his arms onto Luke's shoulder.

"S-sorry Master Skywalker I didn't realize he was one of yours"

"More like I'm one of his head, if I'm right..I mean you dohave seniority over me..don't you master?" Luke asked, an amused glint in his eyes. Yes, Luke thought, I can feel it now, your power, your wisdom and your age and the mirth in your eyes it reminds me so much of.

A voice gently touched his psyche -Yoda and yes we are brothers you and I, trained by the same master-. Luke gave a nod and reached up with a gloved hand to scratch below Ikrits chin. "We sensed your coming...You seem to be one touched by the force" Luke said addressing Dremmick now "But yet not able to wield it. I've met people like you before, the temple is open to you if you wish it"

"Though, for now I think this one has a different path"

Luke had to nod at that. "Why are you hear?" he asked Dremmick and his droid, though he suspected he knew the answer already. Luke's eyes darted to the Squadron of fighters "You, there's a ship leaving for Endor, Masters Jade and Kota and Hamner are on board, escort them"

The Lead pilot snapped a salute and gestured towards his men "Alright boys and girls you heard the master! Lets go visit the Ewoks!"

Star Wars: The Aftermath (A post-Battle of Endor RP)

Coruscant, Domus of the Pontifex Maximus

Gliding through the marbled floors and fine carpets of the Pontifex's domicile, Highsinger moves towards his master's quarters with both purpose and elegance, his near-silent servomotors and his carefully measured steps making the near 7-ft tall and several hunded kilo assassin droid an almost ghost-like manner in his movements, the security systems barely managing to catch glimpses of his presence. Eventually eaching her personal quarters, Highsinger pushes the intercom and doesn't even wait for his master to respond to him as she already knew what her servant had been coming.

"Master, General Veers and the 501st stand ready for deployment, They hunger for battle.” The droid remarked, with it’s usual inscrutable tone.

"Your courtesy protocols have been expanded upon my old friend" The doors had been opened to her private apartments and the servants knew well enough to give the murderous machine a wide berth. A female stood on a bent knee, her eyes twitched with fury, she was clearly being restrained there by the will of the Droid's master and her own. "An inquisitor who converted, or so she pretended too, thinking to deceive me. There's hope for her yet '' Miryia, the Empire’s Pontifex Invictus remarked in a casual tone as though she were describing something thoroughly mundane and remarkable. A former inquisitor was binding the Arkanian's waist with a Shimmersilk scarf, another of her followers was attending to her hair, braiding several threads and adorning them with armor and gemstones. Gemstones which would have borne a striking resemblance to the accessories she wore during the fall of Lothal in the early stages of the war. Though, not her war prizes, one relic did remain from her time, beyond her lightsaber. The femur of a Sithling, some six years old, finely polished and laced with aurodium inlays highlighting a flower pattern was bound to a slender braid that rested over her collar bone. "I took this from a museum, evidently, the Emperor did not think my legacy was worth purging" something flickered in her eyes, a mix of contempt and outrage, a look that caused the inquisitor who had finished tying her sash to back away slightly, knowing the danger she was in when the woman who killed so many of her comrades was in one of those states.

"Impudent heretic, if he only knew...if he only knew" she hissed, before laughing slightly. Ordinarily Janus wore a cuirass but little else in the way of armor, today they were adorning her in a full suit of armor in the vein of the Jedi of old, though more form fitting. But the bone in her hair was all Highsinger needed to see, to guess her intent at Endor.

The Invictus meant to make a particularly violent example of the heretical Nightsisters even if she had instructed the Imperials to treat the regular Republic rabble kindly.

More than that, she armored herself as though she were expecting Jedi,.

"Tell me, my master of murder, how does the Abomination's order of defectives measure up their immediate predecessors? And how do both measure up to what we were..long ago..what I was once" Too many would be tempted to lie to her to appease her and too many fools couldn't discern the nuances in power and discipline and knowledge, to these untrained ignorant masses all Jedi appeared the same, save for the greatest. Only in the Highsinger could she trust.

Highsinger's photoreceptors whirred as he focused upon the decorations on his master's form, his memory banks pulling up the archived footage of the last event he had seen his master in such panoply from thousands of years ago, back to the great wars against the Sith, back to when the title of Jedi actually meant something more, something worthy of praise and respect... And then comparing his catalogued memories to his most recent escapades, from the century leading up to and to the dramatic end of the Clone wars.

"They became corpulent upon their own self-righteousness, foolishly dedicating themselves to the ideals of peace with neither the strength nor the will to enforce it. Degenerating to the point of being little more than the custodians and minders of a Galactic Republic whose esteemed members spent more time squabbling over money and image than representing their people."

Inwardly Highsinger noted how the Republic hadn't really changed all that much, but without Jedi like his master to keep the ideals the Republic and the order was fonded upon alive... It resulted in the fiasco that was the Clone Wars and likes of Palpatine and Dooku seizing power that they were unworthy of wielding

She looked down, eyes flickering across her fitting room towards the miniature courtyard that stood between closets. Her jaw setting in her mouth "I slept for too long" she spoke through clenched teeth. "the collapse was supposed to be the end, but this..diminutive fool took up the mantle" her tone relaxed somewhat as she turned her attention to the kneeling apprentice. The woman wasn't in any pain from the hold, which was the point, Janus could keep you there, prostrate for as long as she needed without exerting enough pressure to cause anymore agony than the numbness and circulatory issues with being that position for so long. "How long have I held you in penitence"

"Seventeen hours mistress"

"Truly?" she asked as if she'd forgotten. The poor wretch nodded and with a gesture, her hold was released and she had to be carried out, unable to stand with her legs asleep and her muscles on fire. "And how..does this....Homunculus..Skywalker compare?" she queried, forgetting the idiot student for a moment. Aladar was likely going over battle plans, obsessing and preparing..dense..not dumb..not like that reprobate.

"They thirst for honor, Veers and the five hundred and first, more than battle I think..honor and redemption" She muttered, her eyes darting to the droid who was as lost in his own introspection as she was. Often causing her to wonder, if this butcher was the most soulful being she'd ever encountered, a kindred spirit. "I slept too long..this rot has flourished, the perversity of this infestation knows no bounds" she hissed. "Fungal in nature, it has proliferated across the stars yet again"

"Such goes a garden that laid untended."

Highsinger pauses as he looks up Luke Skywalker on the Holonet and Imperial archives. Surprisngly, Highsinger never had plans for him; at least ones that can be acted upon on short notice as the droid knew the risks of trying to assassinate a war hero surrounded by both security and paparazzi whenever he made a public appearance and the fact that if the rumors regarding his encounter with Jabba the Hutt had been true...

"Skywalker is young, left trying to recreate from what little remained of the degenerated Jedi Order after the late "Emperor" had spent the last two decades destroying every remnant of it. But underestimating him is folly, as somehow he and his allies were able to kill a powerful Hutt crime lord, doing what hundreds upon hundreds of assassins over nearly half a millennium could not."

The droid needed to say little else, his master would clearly realize the implications that this Skywalker was either strong in the force... Or simply blessed with infernal luck.

"Gardens?" The woman let out a melodic if slightly unhinged laugh. Her eyes flickering with amusement "Was it Gilad or Dericote that prompted you to pick up garden metaphors?" Her voice rang with amusement, truth be told she enjoyed both men for very different reasons and yet each were quite indispensable for her. Eivor Dericote for his methodical nature, his relentless devotion to order and preparation made him a most formidable enemy and if she'd had such a gifted virologist in the past, well. Gilad, he was Glorious a creature she could build a government and an army around, a bulwark. Her attendants were sliding her gloves on now and she pulled one hand away, dark black suede contorted around small armor patches as she rested the knuckle bones of her index and middle finger against a pale chin. His assessment of Skywalker lending credence to a suspicion she harbored about the nature of this Skywalker youth. "He searches for me, clumsily, like a child playing with his father's telescope for the first time, he's at Yavin, grasping and clutching at the stars using the amplification chambers built by that...apostate" she spat the word "Exar Kun" after a breath to compose herself regarding highsinger with calm eyes. "Do you remember that...Tinkerer, the Sith who set himself up in the old Jedi temple at Dantooine? The one whose grandchildren you pulled from his daughter's womb?" something flickered in her attendant’s eyes, the former Inquisitor being used to the cavalier sadism of the Sith, but there was something absolutely unsettling about how casual she was with the description. She took no pleasure in it, she did not enjoy describing the annihilation of a family, there was no hatred either really, only disgust and it was minor.

The coldness was unsettling..To the Invictus those who followed the legacy of Ragnos and Adas as she called it were simply a scourge of barely sentient vermin. To commit such atrocities as if one were an exterminator.

The woman breathed a sigh of relief as the Invictus dismissed her with a look, a look that sent the other servants scurrying. Alone she turned "He postulated that a force user sufficiently talented in alchemy could...push the force, to create life. It is a view the ancient Je'daii held as well, though they recognized the folly of it..the inherent dangers of pushing such a volatile power source, they feared it could create something akin to a matter anti-matter reaction. One of the Inquisitors I butchered when they woke me, he was a Jedi of some station in the old order, or what passed for one at least. As I tore through his mind, I stumbled upon memories of an Anakin Skywalker and the prophecy of the chosen one..and I wonder...Do you have access to biometrics from the....boy..." she queried "I would have them to study for the journey to Endor"

Highsinger showed no open reaction to the reminder of the Sith bloodline he ended other than a single click of his photoreceptors, as no matter how masterfully crafted as he was inside and out; he can't honestly be expected to remember every single life he took. There was simply not enough space in his memory banks.
"I'm afraid not master, Luke Skywalker was unregistered in the Imperial census. Fitting as his ISB file indicates that the Skywalker lineage was from Tatooine."
With the implications that the NR kept his dossier and data in their internal net

And that the Empire weren't exactly in control of the pirate port planet.

"Tatooine? Indeed? And the boy doesn't look like he's at least two decades older?" Her eyes narrowed, Tatooine was a ruined world where people aged faster than normal due to the harshness of the environment. "I shall have to find out for myself, but to share a secret with you. I believe this...boy...to be the continuation of something.." she turned and made to leave resting a hand on the droid's shoulder though it stood half a foot taller. "Come, I must address the men I am asking to go to war for the soul of this Galaxy" she waved a hand, the box of ornate wood which housed her lightsaber. The box opened and out it floated, fastening to her side, the final touch, Janus never allowed anyone near her blade, nor near her when she retrieved it, none save Highsinger and Aladar.

"Do you feel it? The tension? They know, the crossroads are upon them...At last, we can continue our great works old friend...At long last"

"I do, master. But it is not a bad feeling, it is something I first felt back during the great crusades against the Sith. Nostalgia I believe it is called."

At the term crusade the woman's eyes flickered with macabre laughter, recalling the horrified looks in the eyes of her fellow council members when the word had first been used. One even gasped, the overdramatic fool that he was, horrified at the mere thought of engaging in something that brought the order dangerously close to the Pias Dae of old. Fools, blind, myopic, weak and blasphemous fools. "Remember when I first used the word Crusade? During a speech over Malastare? The horrified looks on the faces of the council" she sneered as they made their way towards the grand entrance of the palace, the roar of the crowd gathered and the marching boots of the five hundred and first, of the infantry that would accompany them roaring through immense doors and great hallways.

"Fools, they fetishized the force, believing it to be something other than an energy source, the Sith..worst of all and both dying like Banthas herded off a cliff for that energy and not in something pure..something true" Miryia's voice resonated about the arches, strong and rich and yet, there was something serpentine in her voice, a slight rasp that betrayed the madness that lay below. "Civilization, justice, order..those are values worth servitude, peace is nebulous and one can have peace while destroying a plant and one can lie awake at night in a quiet galaxy unable to sleep for the conflict within..No.....Jedi...Sith..it is over..I have returned"

It always amused her, how the desperate and the damned walked hand in hand with the demoralized and the righteous. She could see it now, not even needing to look through the great doors of her palace, were she blind she could see it. She’d feel it, as she sensed it now, within the throngs of admirers, sycophants, devotees and the curious, amid the myriad of soldiers lined up in parade. The presence of the inquisitors, the surviving acolytes whom hadn’t undergone the spiritual revelation Shayne, Aladar and the others had, or who hadn’t fled to Jerec.

Those who had gone to ground, they cloaked themselves in the force and obscured their faces from the surveillance drones using cloaks or personal holoprojectors. They hid themselves well, at least by the standards of their so-called peers. She smiled venomous as the doors began to open, good she thought. Let them see, as the galaxy would soon see.

Her aides, most human, but the two Nautalan slaves she was gifted remained hidden, their heads bowed. Excellent, they learned after that one clutching low born trollop from the Imperial Bureau of public relations tried to sneak her way up behind the Invictus to be part of a press conference a week back. She’d shattered that one’s legs and threw her off the railings, allowing her fall far enough that the act of stopping her fall snapped the barnacle’s spine. The synthetic vertebrae that now allowed for her to walk upright and use the lavatories without assistance would be an eternal reminder to those who dared to cling to her as though she were some Kaminoan whale.

Doors opened, the onrush of cheers, the roar of voices was almost an act of violence in its intensity. Amusing as the massive throng of crowds were pushed back with enough room to allow for the Five Hundred and First and her regular army loyalists to assemble in formation, dressed not for parade but for war. On the steps of the great palace, stood General Veers, Grand General Cardinal, Admiral Karius, Supreme Commander Palleaon and Grand Admiral Sloane, her loyalists and the neutrals, she noticed Isard standing far across the promenade, no doubt attempting to make some grand gesture of opposition though she stood below her.

Highsinger remained where he always knew to remain but standing tall and proud to the left and the right of her a step lower, was the Bothan and prepared for war Aladar. She’d opted to dress alone, armor herself with minimal aid and did so in deference and solemn contemplation. It would be the first time she drew a lightsaber in battle in two decades for reasons other than hate. Descending the grand staircase were those Inquisitors and Dark acolytes, Jedi survivors who sought her out and those untrained whom she conscripted, each in a shining enabled armor of indigo and silver. Each had their lightsabers drawn and lowered. The serpent smiled as she stepped forward, no voice amplification device would be needed for this, merely her will alone and the power of the force.

Veers gazed at her with the look of a zealot who found a new calling in service to her ideals, Cardinal with hopeful eyes, the inscrutable madness of the Va’ash family filled the Bothan’s eyes and Slaone’s guttural envious glare meant little to her, only the studious eyes of Palleaon caught her attention. There, she thought was a man who could be one of her greatest allies, or greatest foes.

Karius was committing his usual mistake and confusing the power of ceremony with arrogant pomp, but she’d come to expect the amusingly anti-social Admiral to error when it came to reading her, fortunately when it came to war he was far more robust. His disinterest amused her and she almost, almost laughed. Instead, she folded her arms behind her back, the wind blowing her cloak about her tall form in a way that caused Sloane to wonder if she was less an Arkanian and more an Alsakan cobra. Purple eyes flickered with intensity and when she began to speak, her voice seemed to echo off the very walls and floors of Coruscant. “Three weeks ago I woke from a long, interminable sleep, dark were my dreams. Dark...That word has evolved a very different meaning for you all hasn’t it? Dark was the Emperor in his palace which he wrought from the bones of the Republic he strangled..Or so the band of terrorists and class traitors calling itself the New Republic would say.” she slowly shook her head.

“The death of the Republic began long before that, long before any of you were born. The death of the Republic came in it’s rebirth over Ruusan! When Sith and Jedi alike died until only one and two hundred remained of each! One Sith, two hundred Jedi and from that broken echo of what was, sprouted the failings of House Valorum! The failings of the Senate! The failings of the Jedi!” A hand slid from her back and she gestured forwards to the shadow of the immense personal palace of the Emperor “MANY OF YOU HAVE ASKED ME WHY I DID NOT TAKE THAT AS MY RESIDENCE?! After all, am I not indebted to the Empire? Have I not taken up arms to protect her citizenry? I have” she nodded her tone growing distant, melancholic. “I have, but I do not do so, with joy, for the Emperor was dark..The Emperor was rotten..And the Emperor designed his new order to fail without him”

The crowd went silent, save for gasps, soldiers looked on intensely, this was a truth many had come to realize but to hear it from her. “However! The treachery of the Sith does not absolve the New Republic of it’s evil!” She roared that out, her eyes ferocious and indignant. “NOR DOES IT ABSOLVE THE NEW JEDI ORDER OF ITS FAILURE TO CORRECT PAST SINS!” this last part came out with such vehemence many were shocked into focus, their murmurings silent.

“How many of you here in Coruscant have watched brother and sister, mother and father? Son and Daughter die? Butchered by anarchist filth who seek to restore a corrupt, morose and bloated system that trampled the rights of sentients, ignored the plight of the poor and buried the just! How many of your grandparents were ground to dust in planetary sieges by the likes of Jan Dodonna and General Yoda?!” she asked with a roar “And for what?! So the greedy could bleed the slothful? The Empire is flawed! But it is the flaws of iron! When placed in a crucible of righteousness! The imperfections are burned away and only steel remains! Galvanized and united! United by men and women of honor! Of Conviction! Of Justice! There is a higher will to the force! But it is not its own mystery but the echoing cries of a thousand, thousand generations of sentients denied their birthright! Today! We begin the process of rectifying this! Today we march! And I go to Endor for the same reason I refuse to set foot in that rotting fortress of damnation and Apostasy! Not to avenge the worthless soul of a dead heretic who promised you a better world solely to feed his own vanity...BUT TO DELIVER ON HIS PROMISES! TO MAKE THE FALSE TRUE! I GO TO ENDOR TO BLAZE THROUGH THE IMPERFECTIONS OF OUR IRON AND MAKE FROM IT A STEEL HAMMERED BY THE WILL OF THE EMPIRE! NOT ITS GRAND ADMIRALS AND IT’S BUREAUCRACY BUT IT’S PEOPLE!” her voice cracked like thunder and the crowd roared into a frenzy.

She turned towards the five hundred and first “Grand General Cardinal whose promotions were denied because he was too good a soldier watched as all of his brothers and sisters in battle perish in the flaming wreckage of the second Deathstar OR WERE ABANDONED BY THEIR COMMANDERS TO BE FEASTED UPON BY FOREST DWELLING BARBARIANS! I go where Cardinal goes to reclaim the world where the bones of his men lie! I go to pay honor to the warriors! The soldiers who fell in the name of civilization! I go to shatter an enemy who claims to embody the old order! AN ORDER I BURIED MY DAUGHTER TO DEFEND, AN ORDER I BATHED ENTIRE WORLDS IN RADIATION TO PROTECT! But..who failed its citizenry and drowned in its own iniquity in the end! I go because the old order, whom we are all told stood for liberty and freedom seeks to replace your hard earned rights with gilded chains! Where a bureaucrat dolls out subsidies and the citizenry grow into fat, complacent slaves! I go to carve redemption into the very soil of the world which stood as the last bastion of the new order and over which the honor of General Veers was stolen! Where sneering fools who insisted the empire would never allow Bothans like Raveem to rise...and where a so called Jedi master absconded with the children of my apprentice solely because he could not recognize a worthy heart below a black cloak!” she spat the words, the mere thought of that Skywalker golem disgusting her.

“I go to Endor not as a pompous sorceress hiding in my space fortress but as a Knight in the service of the New Order! And with my knights, I go to bleed in the name of the ideals of the New Order! I go to restore honor and I go…”

She paused, and a hundred thousand souls paused with her.

“I go to banish the true darkness, the darkness of corruption, of bureaucracy and the decay of democracy and if I must go alone...I go.”

Someone from the men arrayed in parade formation roared a loud no, he ran, pushing his fellow storm troopers, ripping off his mask and armor, revealing the withered form of an old clone trooper. “No! Invictus! I lived through the clone wars!” his eyes were wide and wild “I fought for the Jedi! And they betrayed me by apathy! And when the Emperor commanded we killed our commanders and we did! HE REWARDED US WITH REPLACEMENT! The Republic made us die for them and for what?! Mon Mothma cares so much about sentient rights BUT WHEN DID SHE EVER FIGHT FOR US! WHERE IS SHE AS HALF THE GALAXY IS REPLETE WITH SLAVERY!” he knelt “I am old..but I will fight with you.”

“And your name?” The woman asked. “Kagi, Captain Kagi.”

She smiled, something malevolent sparked in her eyes for the briefest seconds. “Captain Kagi comes with me...WHO WILL GO WITH US?!”

The entire Five Hundred and first moved in lock step and their voices roared “We will go!”

Soon the crowd joined them, rising like a throng, as a people who had known neglect and apathy from all those who ruled them ripped at their clothing or beat their hands into railing or cheered, wept or flung themselves forward, all affirming the same thing.

They too would go, perhaps not today and not to Endor but with her they would go.

“I will go with you master” Aladar spoke, rising on the steps to kneel beside her mistress, only to be stopped. “No child, your days of kneeling to me are ended…” Janus reached down, her fingers coiling about the taller woman’s wrist as she hefted it into the air. Her other hand gripping Raveem by the shoulder as others circled.

“The whole of Coruscant will go if you ask!” one shouted.

Yes, she thought.

Yes you would at that wouldn’t you?

She raised her hand, a prelate’s poise but an empress’s gesture. As if on cue troop transports began to ascend from the bowels of the city, others descended from the heavens.

“Then we go...We go to Endor, we will take it back..IN THE NAME OF THE RENEWED GALACTIC EMPIRE!”

“FOR THE EMPIRE RENEWED!”

“FOR THE EMPIRE RENEWED!”

“FOR THE EMPIRE RENEWED!”

Cries of “Janus wills it!” roared into the air.

And about them the force contracted.

Amidst the frenzy of the reawakened dragon that was the Imperial War Machine, Highsinger stood by, unmoved despite the combined voice of the assembled crowd being loud enough to rock the very palace walls with their cries. He paid them no heed as they were not his concern for the moment, rather it was his master that held all of his attention. Even though it was always his duty and his function to never leave her side, the centuries without her had caused him to grow beyond his original parameters as without Janus, he began to question his existence. Of what use was a droid without purpose?

And yet his directives of self-preservation kept him from going in an infinite loop, attempting to answer a question that even the most advanced processors and software of the time could not solve and thus he decided to find the solution in the galaxy that his master had sought to bring order to. While his storied and legendary career of bounty hunting brought a strange sense of fulfillment from proving his existence to the galaxy at large, it wasn’t enough to satisfy the question that paradoxically drove him onward and threatened to end him.

Even though he had kept his master’s memory and dreams alive, both as a function of programming and reasons he could not quite understand. It was the catalyst to the deeper emotions that had grown from his personality matrix that he couldn’t muster the will to rectify or even dampen. He felt that it was his greatest shame that he had not found a single being worthy of sharing his master’s vision with, as none had the stomach or the mindset to truly understand, not even that young Mandalorian that he had almost called “Son”. And yet at this very moment the murderous Droid found himself at a crossroads. He had no peers until her return, to share emotions with such..… Insignificant creatures and then to dwell on base introspection when history was unfolding before him. As his master once again kindled the fires of the hearts of billions.

But he denied himself the release of such emotion, for he was C-21 Highsinger, the first of his kind and its zenith. He knew his purpose, he knew why he was built and he knew that it was his place to lie waiting in darkness, in the shadow of his master as she illuminated the galaxy and the countless beings in it with her light, defending her from those who slipped under her gaze. Yet he would not have it any other way.

For he was that which he was.

That was the one truth his millennia-long existence had taught him.

@Honesty Crow @countlessinsect @Guy of Z

Star Wars: The Aftermath (A post-Battle of Endor RP)

Prelude: The winds presage a maelstrom.

It had been a good month, after Endor, when Gial Akbar determined the Alliance navy needed to be reorganized into a proper stellar armada for a proper Republic. It had been an honor for Admiral Nantz to receive command of the prestigious First fleet, the Home fleet. The fact that his fleet was ordered to reinforce General Solo at Endor and hold position there as though Endor was still the Republic Capital had been even better. Nantz hated, the Yavin system, the idea of running homeworld defense when Yavin was a proper capital filled with commerce, traffic and the relentless, city politics that were all too common amongst spacers that spent too much time patrolling a proper capital was not something he ever, ever would have enjoyed. But guarding the red herring? The symbolic capital? That wasn’t too bad, Endor was far outside Imperial reach, or at least it was believed and while he was close to Consortium territory and about two dozen warlords Nantz was still in command of a vacation fleet and the relative silence meant it gave him time to think. Time to plan, plan an event that was still several years away but an event Admiral Firmus Nantz knew in his bones he would command.

The liberation of the core.

It helped that General Solo was happy to spend 90% of his time drunk, lazing about the bungalows and tree houses. He was getting some much needed alone time, after he and Princess Leia spent the three weeks immediately following the battle of Endor jumping each other like dueling Krayt Dragons dying of thirst. That left him a lot of time to plan his great invasion and go hunting with Chewbacca and Kazak, he rather liked that and to his shock (and pleasant surprise) Chewbacca was a capable strategist who had some rather apt insight into how to properly invade the core. It turned out a century ago, he studied Republic fleet doctrine before deciding to go do something else with his long life. But what schooling he did possess seemed to remain and it was interesting to gain insight from a bygone era. All in all, it was a nice month.

And then the idiot militia princess, Amalyn Holdo, she of the many lectures, she of the world of tea guzzling, scarf wearing, sobbing, poets. The people he once heard General Dodanna refer to as “The only exception Screed and I ever considered making in regards to firing on a world after it surrenders”. Showed up, not only did her “Eminence” her “Virtuous, bought her commission, minor aristocratic posterior”(and a few things he dare not translate from Wookie), appear. But somehow she managed to violate all known laws of hyperspace travel for she managed to pull a chunk of a nebula with her, dumping an electromagnetic storm right into upper orbit where it all fell directly on top of his fleet, his defense systems and the command sat for the early warning system.

How she managed to do that, would be debated by hyperspace physicists for millennia to come, but Chewie postulated the most plausible theory. The arrogant teenager was simply so stupid, her idiocy altered the very fabric of reality. -This is nonsense- he thought, his eyes burning with hatred as he made his way to the command bridge of his MC80 Liberty, the “Imperial Pyre”.

His comms officer, a particularly nervous Twi’lik bit his lip (A disgusting habit) and all but withered under his Admirals gaze. “Get me Solo”

“Sir, Vice Admiral Holdo-”

“Can hang herself with her own scarf for all I care. She can wait her blasted turn. Get me Solo”

Beside him, the immense Wookie who looked as hung over as Dugg in a Corellian bordello let out a series of pained roars lamenting the fact that his RnR was interrupted by this...child.

“So wait...the little furballs here are having a Wedding and they want us to show, and they want you to preside over it?”

“Yes sir, they attribute much significance to my presence at Wicket's Wedding with Princess Kneesaa, despite their Shaman Logray’s dismissal they still put much significance in my presence.”

“They are still on that God stuff about you Goldenrod?” He still couldn't believe how easily fooled the woks were by Lukes levitation trick.

“I have conflicting information about it I seem to bear a resemblance to one of their gods, it may be related to an incident in my databanks-”

“Yeah yeah look I still have stuff to do so just get me the date it’s on and write it down, I’m a busy man and all.” Han couldn't be bothered with the Droids blathering he still wanted to get a good look at the terran, who knows maybe there was something actually useful on this mudball, or something terrible. Han remembered all the unusual stuff that lurked on Yavin in the early years, that Night Beast thing came to mind, that green freakshow almost drove the Rebels off the temple before the Empire could; Q-7N a droid constructed by the long dead Malagarrians, a race that had unintentionally committed suicide by turning their planet into a giant reactor was the second oddity.

Endor was no less unusual, some of the trees the Ewoks had gave off a strange feeling like they were glowing to start with. The “Golden God” told Han the Ewoks earliest encounter with the Empire was against this Imperial Scientist named Raygar. He apparently coveted this artifact, some big shiny rock called the Sunstar, which conveniently got destroyed in a fight with some monster the Empire unleashed when it began building the Shield Generator Bunker. Han of course thought this was just another fairy tail from a bunch of easily impressed backwaters but they insisted this was no legend. But again this is a species that believes his Girlfriends Protocol Droid is a god, whoever this Raygar guy or whatever was he must have been on one hell of a wild bantha chase.

Unfortunately the smuggler couldn't utterly dismiss the possibility of something supernatural or just plain unpleasant on this planet from sheer past experience, Alliance/Republic bases tended to house the most unusual things in general. Hoth? The kid crashes there and the first thing he meets are Human Replica droids, then afterwards Raskar the Last Pirate of Iridum takes him and Luke to a cave with a Dragon slug and a Kriff ton of Lumi Spice. Abra the planet of the Hoojibs? Chewie tells him this...thing calling itself the Darker mind controlled him and damn near made him kill Plif and 3PO.

Han didn't want to take it upon himself to look around, he really didn't want to waste his time but he was respectable now. A General no less he had to lead a military outfit now so he had to set an example, much to the dismay of a certain prune faced bothan ass kisser. So Han took a patrol and decided if there were Goraxes lurking or some of those shapeshifting witches the Ewoks spun stories about. It would have been relaxing if he didn't need the Droid to talk to his guides here.

Nearby the Smuggler turned General was the thundering of an Imperial Walker, thankfully he knew it was no enemy. Chewie had taken a liking to his war trophy from the Battle of Endor. After the Rebels stole it in the fight it was primarily used for cleanup with Renegade Squadron post Endor under Col Serra before Serra and the whole unit scattered back into the underworld. After that it went back to Chewie, his old friend insisted on keeping it around to tinker with if the two of them were just going to remain stranded planetside. Now he had some extra firepower in case a Gorax showed up, or a patrol of those Marauders. Han had to be sure to scout out any hazards in case the Imps tried to pull something on the ground if they struck again.

“General Solo! General Solo! Begging your pardon sir!” The panicky tone came from a burgundy colored C series protocol droid which damn near tripped over the legs of a Republic soldier, who was seated outside the main entrance to the main installation constructed on Endor. A bottle of some fermented substance in one hand and the other resting on a raised knee. “Oh..forgive me, forgive me” The Droid with the female voice hurriedly muttered as she skirted towards the eternally bored General and her eternally vexed colleague.

“Forgive me General Solo” The droid wisely called out, she had learned long ago, unlike the faulty (A problem with protocol droids who’d been memory wiped too often) and eccentric Threepio. The E-3PO had long ago learned that General Solo had little patience for being overburdened with information and preferred the straight truth. Female personalities were rare and she was content not to be blasted into a trillion pieces by the irate drug runner turned Republic war hero. Around them the trees swayed in an ominous breeze as if the powers sleeping at Endor sensed something immense coming..

“Admiral Naantz requests your presence on a shuttle..Evidently communications are down and holocall will be unavailable..you are needed on the Imperial Pyre” Above them the skies darkened slightly before they began to fill with a myriad of colors as clouds of gas and a powerful EM storm raged in orbit.

“Oh..that..would be why” she blinked.

Han’s face slowly shifted into dismay as he looked up.

“Well, you look at that.” He uttered the words sounding greatly irritated.

It was going to be a long day

“Y’know, I didn’t even know such a thing was possible and then I spoke with Chewie and General Solo both of whom have far more experience with oddities than I do and they assure me, that they too believed this was impossible” Nantz began, the moment Han had arrived the duo moved into a separate room for some conversation, specifically to figure how the kriff this happened and to discuss how long it would take to get the defensive systems back online.

What bothered him the most was that they didn’t even detect Holdo’s fleet until it was in orbit and most of those vessels lost communications when they passed through, whatever the hell that was that happened. At least, the repair crews assured them the ion storm had passed and their systems were now safe to work on, the down side was that they’d only have communications restored, that the defensive systems and interdictor tech wasn’t going to be online for another twenty hours.

Holdo didn’t even have the decency to look ashamed, she just gawked up at them both with indignant eyes. As though she’d done nothing wrong, something he found absolutely disgusting. “Chew wants to have you shot for dereliction of duty and Han thinks we should impanel a court martial…”

“Sir! I!”

“I’m not done” Naantz hissed, turning on the awkwardly tall seventeen year old, who’d bought her commission and was only still alive because that damn Bothan considered her a valued asset for some pathetic reason. “Sir! It’s improper to talk down to a fellow Admiral...And a female, we aren’t the Empire sir! It’s five ABY and you”

Nantz slammed his hand on the table starting the Vice Admiral. “”Listen to me you incompetent little idiot...Borsk may have his hooves all over your ascent but if you think that Moose and your damned Aquilin notions of social justice are going to carry more weight than my reputation and a dereliction of duty and mutiny charge you’re mistaken”

“Mutiny?!” she barked a mix of indignation and shock, this wasn’t supposed to happen! She wasn’t supposed to be treated like this, didn’t he understand? She was the future not him! She was the youngest Admiral in the Republic Navy! She was the one bringing much needed reform and he was just in the way! Why couldn’t they see that

“Yes M-U-T-I-N-Y” he sneered out the word, slowly abusing enunciation to hammer home his fury. “Or do you think that, seeing as you allowed a Sith asset and a clone trooper both who admitted ties to the old Emperor escape..then somehow dropped a kriffing ion storm onto the former Capital that I couldn’t have you up on charges of mutiny and collaboration if I wanted?”

“You’re Coresplaining” she responded falling back on script.

Chewie let out a series of noises, that Nantz wasn’t sure were some of the obscene words in the Wookie Language, or if he’d merely had a brain seizure at the volley of sheer idiocy that was unleashed upon them with those two words.

“Child, I will space you” Nantz hissed. “I should space you..instead...I’m placing you in line command”

Holdo blinked “sir?”

“Well, you are a vice Admiral. Go up there, get in the front line, if any of our enemies decide to blindside us while we’re down..you’ll be first to meet them” Nantz had a cruel smile on his face that made the girl almost pout. “I’m not…..But without orbital defenses..the fleet would be fighting alone..what if…Zsinj sends Rua and a fleet? Or Jerec decides to make his move? Or the Remnant”

“As I said..you’ll have the honor of being the first to meet them in battle Vice Admiral”

“That is of course, unless General Solo has some objections?”

“Good luck kid! Break a leg.” Han responded condescendingly.

<And every other bone hopefully> Chewbacca roared.

Holdo, who’d previously sat tall, taking full advantage of her heart and held her head high, chest puffed up to stand up to the elitist men who were going to do what they always did and condescend to her, suddenly found herself deflating. All the scenarios she played out in her head, where she listened to their stereotypical ranting, waited until they gassed themselves out and then she would have explained to them why they were merely internalizing their own bigotry and spewing their own ignorance. Once, she’d properly triumphed over them in the field of rhetoric, they’d be seated humiliated and poor Chewbacca who was relegated to a token would cheer for her and even the droids would cast off their dull, soulless gazes and pronounce her liberator of the cosmos.

Instead, she found herself faced with the real possibility of leading her fleet and the Endor defense fleet into battle with their backs to a defenseless planet.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to be!

This wasn’t fair!

Slowly, she moved her head, her rainbow colored hair falling from her brow as she looked up at the three men before her. A resigned Yessir left her lips in a voice she could scarce recognize as her own.

Choking back a sob she departed, as gracefully as she could.

It was all so problematic….

Star Wars: The Aftermath (A post-Battle of Endor RP)

Prelude to War.
@Lotrix Molick

"potentially worse than the war we just ended" Luke allowed himself to repeat those words, a look of concern flashing through his face. While he'd only been part of the Galactic Civil war for it's final years, the conflict in general had existed bubbling below the surface since the end of the Clone wars, going hot several times over the last fifteen years before finally boiling over into an all out war after the Death of Starkiller and the subsequent battle of Skariff. In many ways, they were both right, it felt like a reactor breach, but one that permeated the Galaxy, one that.

"Several billion people lost their lives during the last war, I'd rather avoid that...My Jedi are willing to fight and die for the Galaxy but"

"Rather they not have too" Jade nodded "I'll take master Kota and Sylas and a few others I think are half way decent fighters, Kenth here can supply the talking them down part"

Hamner nodded his tone grave, Mara couldn't tell if he was annoyed at the fact that he'd just been promoted at the drop of a hat without really having a chance to try and convince Luke as to why this was a bad idea. Or, as concerned as they were and it was moments like that which made Mara question the Corelian if only slightly. -He's loyal, but such a kriffing cynic-. Hamner had been the first to depart, to gather the blind Jedi Master and several of the others while Mara lingered long enough to watch the Farghul snap to action.

In some ways it was nerve wracking, heading into battle with an untested force user of known capability who'd just admitted to being a vigilante who went about offing people like her (Or rather who she used to be) as a form of devotion to her code. On the other, she liked the Farghul despite her best efforts to keep herself guarded, Tassaia had a carefree way about her, that she could do and live with bloody deeds and be confident that she never once took a life that didn't deserve it was..admirable.

It helped the woman seemed to share her and Luke's sense of humor.

"Well" she began.

"That leaves me with the duty of...oh?" she turned to see several Republic soldiers, all dressed in civilian attire, or in uniforms that were rather casually adorned and improperly attired. One of them was a short woman who looked like she was built from parts left over from an old Cold Wars At-Te, she was solid muscle with raven black hair and an E-Webs cannon was resting across her shoulders as though it weighed as light as a feather. She had an amused grin, beside her was a Republic soldier Mara knew because he was a sniper and a knife fighter who disemboweled nine of her Shadow Troopers and had supposedly fought Rua Skirata to a standstill in a brothel in Nar Shada once.

Mara didn't like him much, mostly because he had a propensity to shoot imperial troopers as they were surrendering. The girl who was a sexy tank with legs (To quote Han on the matter) was Cara Dune, she was not ordinarily a part of such a unit and Mara realized at once what had happened... Luke had requested some extra resources, which included troops. Naturally Borsk (Whom Luke had foolishly made the request too), had sent them a bunch of reprobates. Behind them was another twenty soldiers, most looking fresh out of the academy. "Followed you here" Sniper muttered, Mara had no desire to learn his name, kriff this guy. "Then, Hamner caught us on the way out, something about reinforcing Endor?"

"..With twenty five guys and about seven Jedi" Mara twitched.

Cara grinned "It's okay, we fight for about thirty a man, plus Han's got that place turned into a fortress, no way the empire can get to it without a considerable mobilization, which we'd have seen"

Yeah, Jade thought.

All true.

But you didn't feel the force get the weekend at Nar Shada treatment..

Luke who'd been watching, rolled his eyes "I'll try and get more to rendezvous with you on the planet, in the mean time may the force be with you"

other Jedi had begun to arrive, Hamner's forces were ready, the politician turned Jedi not having to look far for everything sensed what was coming.

"Light and airy before battle eh?" she laughed "you're even more eager than Luke here to see me half dressed" her teasing voice cracked the ice which seemed to building around everyone's throat. "We should as soon as the vessel is ready" she paused turning to eye Kenth "That is..if Master Hamner approves"

Hamner who'd been talking to Kota and Dune turned on her. His eyes blank for a second until it finally clicked on him that Luke had essentially placed him in charge. "Yes, as soon as possible" he muttered then wished he could use the forced to kick himself in his own ass at how incredibly lame that sounded. Thankfully Tassaia's lightsaber was ignited and more than a few young Jedi were too busy observing how amazing it looked to really catch how badly he flubbed his first response.

"We go into unknown danger, for all we know the planet may already be under attack..As to those of you who sensed..what it was that is coming..Do not engage..Let either Mara, Master Kale or Master Kota do that"

The blind Jedi Master nodded approvingly, an arrogant Jedi might have added "and myself" but Hamner knew his talent lay in strategy not in tactics and that any conflagration where he had to be involved would just jeopardize his allies. "I will call ahead to Endor when we're at the half way mark, but keep the stealth up...Until we've confirmed we're not undersiege"

Damn, Hamner thought.

He'd been in one planetary siege before that one was bad enough without the cannibalistic tree dwelling dwarves and the massive, man eating giants that could throw around imperial walkers like large toys and the weird witches in that castle and everything else on Endor.

"A clan of Dathomirian night sisters have taken up residence on Endor" Hamner warned causing Jade to shook him a particularly angry glare "And you neglected to mention this earlier why?!"

"Because before the council session could begin, I was summoned to the alliance council and Luke went off to talk to ghosts"

"...Fair enough...."

Luke shook his head before gripping Mara's wrist, no words needed to pass between them but he felt himself wishing her luck all the same. "You too Skywalker..Try not to get possessed or anything while I'm gone"

"perish the thought!" again Luke looked to the Farghul and bowed his head in thanks. "Bring them home..and yourself as well, there's always room in the temple for one more...and I'd hate to see your ghost get added to the menagerie here"

Star Wars: The Aftermath (A post-Battle of Endor RP)

Welcome to the Jungle!



@Jollan

-This is interesting, she looks organic and yet I'm unable to sense a life force?- The creature, which to prying eyes would have looked like a rather odd rabbit (Were there any eyes to pry) sat lazily on a tree branch, it took a rather lazy posture as it watched with growing interest in the two new creatures that had come and landed on the planet. Was that a droid? Slowly, it extended its awareness outward and indeed did sense a spark of life, the soulful nature of a creature that wasn't just sentient but truly aware. -Remarkable!- He thought, in the two hundred and ninety seven years of his self imposed exile on Yavin Four, he'd seen many sentients and their droids come and go. Mercenaries, pirates and even a few Republic Intelligence outfits had used the ancient temples and the mausoleums as centers of operations for a myriad of different clandestine things. Were the rebels more curious, they likely would find more than just ruins, there was even a hidden hangar with three old cruisers.

The creature blinked, allowing himself a moment to correct himself. They weren't revels anymore, but apparently they were calling themselves the "Restored Republic" or the "New Republic". The being had felt the shift in the force, the overwhelming darkness and even felt the death of his old master, a bittersweet passing but a rest well earned. He felt another great shift, as if a tidal wave of light had dispersed the dark and when his vision was unclouded for the first time in what must have been centuries the creature was finally aware of the extent of the manipulation. His entire reason for exile, the arrogance, the solution came to him one night as the new light began to settle and he finally freed those poor souls and wept bitterly.

"I was blinded by my own darkness as much as the darkness." That had been what stopped him when he felt the mistress of illusions (He'd been keenly interested in Tasaia, as a youth he'd been a keen student of all things arcane and dabbled in illusion work before he found his calling in matters of the soul. To see a true mistress of misdirection at work was a rare honor) and when he felt the burgeoning power of the Skywalker boy. What had ultimately changed his mind had been observing Luke spar with Mara and Kenth, a particular diagonal slash which had been a favorite of his old master. Had Yoda trained this youth as well? Reaching out with the force he'd gently probed the Boy's mind, subtly in a way he'd not been accustomed too and he could see the hours of frustration, exhaustion, awe, exhilaration and meditative contemplation associated with Yoda and the laugh.

Ah, then perhaps I belong with them and not in exile.

"Man, your sex bot is a chatty one" A female pilot remarked giving Eira a look over. She whistled then looked at the Twi'lik Commander "sophisticated this one, can pass for human most days. Guess your species is out of its number one profession huh sir?"

"That's okay, we make better fighter pilots than you humies do any way and with service models looking this sophisticated, your employment prospects are gonna sssuuuuuccckkk" The pair laughed before she turned and extended a hand to Dremmick "Call me hound, your Jedi escorts should be here shortly, in the meantime, try and behave yourself, you too missy"

It decided now was as good a time as any to approach, which was remarkably easy given that he was often identified as an animal. The tarmak of the ad hoc space port was annoyingly warm to the touch of his fur pads, but that resolved itself when one of the fighter pilots knelt and called him over.

Ikrit shrugged and hopped into his arms "Hah this is the friendliest local I've seen in awhile, everything seems spooked lately"

@Lotrix Molick



"I'm starting to realize the more I know about learn about the Sith in general the more the Emperor and his types seem like a bunch of crazed pretenders. This place, the temple, it feels like your helmet and armor in some ways I wonder how much the Jedi and Sith both lost in knowledge over the eons and if it isn't better for us to send people out to seek that knowledge out" If for any other reason, than for their own defense, Tasaia proved that when she spent several years here off and on doing whatever she pleased while only Luke was the wiser to her and only at the end.

As The Farghul took her helmet back Mara clapped the woman on her ribs in thanks, green eyes shifting towards Hamner who was giving her a look that said he wanted her to keep an eye on the Felinoid, not become a partner in crime. -Funny how he insists that he's a subordinate but he gives me orders-.

Amusingly she would have obeyed him in any other case, because while he kept acting like he wasn't a master, he knew more about the Jedi than anyone of them, at least of their history. -If he was more confident in his skills in the force I think he'd be Luke's number two instead of me-. There was a cynical part of her that couldn't help but wonder if it wasn't genuine humility. Hamner was a genius at the game after all and she was used to a very different sort of force user while Luke was, sometimes naive.

The trio began to move Mara stopped suddenly and reached out for the nearest solid object to grab on, she caught Hamner's elbow in a vice like grip and he turned to see the redheads face pale as a Hoth wasteland. She was cold to the touch, Jade's eyes burned though, blazing with consternation and confusion. Kenth moved to question her when he suddenly felt it as well, the light had shifted, it twisted and caught ablaze and it was a sickening heat. Roaring in a way that filled him with cold, as if..yes! It was like gazing into an open reactor during a meltdown! That was exactly it, the force had never felt like this before to him and he realized there was a howl of agony as if something had been torn.

"It's burning, the dark side" Mara murmured "The light is being..Force, I didn't even know this was possible"

"What is this?" Hamner asked alarmed. "No idea, it's as if something ripped open the heart of the force and gathered up the living force and used it as an ignition source to shoot lightside into the dark..I'm not describing this right"

"I know the feeling" Hamner murmured "Like a reactor breach in a planetary powergrid" He muttered grimly, that was one of his earliest memories from his childhood on Coru. Seeing the dead, the rad damage and the poisoned ash rising into the sky, creating a deathly pale snow of carbon, plasteel and synthcrete. She nodded "it's localized around someone, a person..a female" her eyes narrowed looking to Tasai, deferring to the one who likely had the most experience with other force using sects "Something big is coming isn't it?"

"Yes" though the answer came from Luke who'd ventured out from the temple, his eyes grim something Jade had seldom seen. "But not here, it's coming to Endor. Kenth, Mara I've sent Kale and Lahana ahead to Endor. I want you to take some of our Jedi and whatever members of the Republic army that can be ready in half an hour. You must go"

Hamner blinked "Endor?! But there's no way...What's there for?"

"I don't know.." Luke answered honesty in his tone. "But I have been searching for two beings who had concealed themselves in the force. I think one of them has just revealed itself to me"

"This thing..It's perverse"

Luke nodded before turning to tasaia, eying the Farghul with some of his usual optimism returning. "I cannot command you, I wouldn't presume too either, but if you could accompany my Jedi. If you could help them, if you could lend your brand of justice to meeting this oncoming storm. I would be in your debt and you would gain a friend for life"

"a couple of them" Mara murmured, rising to her full heat, finally shaking off the assault to her senses. "What about you Luke?"

The Jedi shook his head, sandy blond hair swaying in the humid breeze as he did. "No, there's another force user here who is calling to me and the force surrounds the crew of the Nexu. I'm needed here"

He paused then allowed a knowing smirk to come over his face "And Kenth, you're in command"

"I'm not a Jedi Master"

"That's just been changed" As Hamner made a move to object Luke cut him off. "no, you think you can protect me by remaining a Jedi Knight, so when you have to do something sneaky and Huttlike to force an issue before the Alliance council I can say you acted on your own. I'm not a fan of self sacrifice Kenth. At least not like that, I won't let you expose yourself to that kind of underhanded nonsense while giving you no official recognition. You cannot be a shield and a lightsaber at once. Besides" he reached up and slapped the other man's shoulder. "You've earned it"

"Hah! You're one of us now" Mara grinned "Which means now you're really screwed"

Turning she gave Tasaia a feral grin "So, playing interrogator would have been fun, but beating up Blasphemers sound more fun? Whad'ya say Panther..you down for some good ol'fashion carnage prevention?"

-I might have made a mistake- Luke thought with an amused smile -those two are going to run wild over Endor and I'm going to end up stuck with the bill-

Guild News: May 2020

Well, that's interesting.

Star Wars: The Aftermath (A post-Battle of Endor RP)

Yavin IV

Interludes, examinations and new guests.

"We Keep the peace, sometimes at the end of a lightsaber, most of the time with the power of our word, for it is like law to the uninitiated"-Jorus C'boath 44 BBY

@Jollan



As the Nexu began to approach the atmosphere a group of A Wing fighters began to flank it, with one buzzing over the top, its pilot, a Twi'lik female in her mid twenties rotated the fighter so that cockpit was "pressed" to the viewing port of the Nexu before giving their guest a salute, but also a look that said -try any funny business and you'll be kissing atmosphere as space trash- before she accelerated ahead. "Nexu, this is Commander Shay'aera Chan; Orange Wing, we'll escorting you to a military port some klicks away from the main settlement and facilities, where you're to hold position inside your vessel until a pair of Jedi arrive to vet you. No offense, but there's been a lot of craziness in the galaxy lately and the Admiralty ain't taking any chances"

"Sit tight, once you're cleared we'll be able to welcome you to Yavin. Orange One out"

Though graffiti and call signs were customary for pilots to decorate their vessels with. Most of these having rather amusingly juvenile (But par for the course for space jockeys), things like a half naked Twi'lik and the words "lady killer" below, a drunken Gammorian face deep in a barrel of ale and "Porkin's revenge" and other such things. One pilot called her ship "the spiced out hutt" and her call sign was "Hound", each one bore several badges that were universal amongst the fighters. One signifying sector patrol, but the others? The Battle of Yavin, the Battle of Endor and one from the Clone Wars.

The Battle of Malastare.

Their history might have been eclipsed by Rogue and Gold Squadrons, but they were no less proud in their tradition.

@Lotrix Molick



What amused Kenth Hamner about tasaia more than anything, was that the animal life around the temple was starting to react to her presence as if she had only just arrived. He could sense it in the force, observe it in how the birds, which had grown accustomed to the presence of the Jedi (And occasionally came down to sing with Hamner when he played his flute, or trained the youngest initiates when Master Luke or Jade were too busy). But they tended to regard the Republic soldier's as guests in their domain and not as part of the environment. Their reaction to the Farghul was fascinating in that it seemed as though they'd accepted her presence as mere background noise and yet, were just now becoming aware that they had.

As though, her illusory abilities were sophisticated enough to semi hypnotise the world around her, to convince it she had always been there and was thus not worthy of remark. -If she had come here to assassinate any one of us- he thought bitterly.

Only Mara and Luke had sniffed her out, but she could have killed anyone else she wanted. He prayed others of her order didn't decide the New Republic was as bad as the old one had been, a war with an enemy that can convince you they're just a lamp, or air, or empty space was a more daunting prospect then a blow out with Jerec.

As they approached the exterior obelisks in the water gardens Straka placed her helm onto Mara Jade's head and Hamner had to stop himself from laughing. Mara was going to regret breaking into the Farghuls personal space earlier, with how cavalier she'd been in return. Then again, Mara seemed to actually like the force using vigilante, which was odd, she was usually the more paranoid and protective of the two, with Hamner being more observant and slow to mistrust, but slower still to trust. Here, it seemed like she found a kindred spirit or something -Maybe I should be more worried about that, then if she wanted to kill the woman- he thought.

For her part Jade eyed the interior of the helm, and took in a breath of fresh air "untainted" by jungle heat and humidity and she grinned. "You did an amazing job mixing alchemy with technology here Straka, the Sith kept trying to do both but it was a clusterkriff of epic proportions. We had a Prophet who ended up irradiating himself trying what you've achieved so easily" she was impressed, both by the comfort inside, the efficiency of the systems and how it didn't feel like armor, as if it was just part of her skin.

"Do you mind showing me some of the forging techniques?" she muttered, she wasn't exactly skilled with force alchemy, much as Hamner pretended he wasn't a peer, much as he insisted he was still just a learner, he possessed the aptitude for that stuff, whereas she was much more of a fighter. Still, it wouldn't hurt to start learning and maybe she could convince the modest moron to join in. As Tasaia answered them about her familiarity or lack thereof with spirits Mara Jade nodded her head, removing the helm and handing it back. "Really? I admit, its starting to creep me out now, as its starting to become more obvious to me what it is"

"Funny how that works, we're sitting around afraid of ghosts" Hamner moved to take a seat on the steps of one of the obelisk like monuments, resting against marble that always seemed to be cold, no matter how hot the day became. "See, wh" he stopped as both his and Mara Jade's com devices rang out. "This is Knight Hamner, is there a problem?"

"Kenth! It's me"

"Shay! all well?"

"Yeah, just bored flying sector patrol, we're escorting a POI to a space port near the falls, this one was weird, came in odd, almost rammed a recusant"

"Holdo's?" Mara asked with a look in her eyes that was almost hopeful.

"Negative Master Jade"

Blast it all.

"Is the Captain dangerous?"

"Command doesn't think so, just a guy whose been in space too long, Ship's called the Nexu, ever heard of it?"

Hamner shook his head, it wasn't one of his relic hunters. "No, want us to play interrogator?"

"Command asks, we relay" the voice on the comm said adopting her best Twi'lik servant girl voice which caused Hamner to roll his eyes. "We'll be on the way"

"Well so much for an easy day thinking about ghosts" he muttered.

Jade smirked "Come on Farghul, ride with us. We're supposed to be keeping an eye on you..I mean showing you around any way, wanna play detective with us as well? Or do y'wanna go back into the temple and talk to ghosts".

From beyond the gardens, their voices carried through the wind, their scents and the aura in the force to a pair of large eyes that watched, lazily. Perhaps, it thought...perhaps it was time for its exile to end at last.

Star Wars: The Aftermath (A post-Battle of Endor RP)

Yavin IV: Master's Council, filtration of realpolitik.

As Kale walked through the temple with his padawan he noticed a change in her demeanor, one he saw often. "Something interesting about the floor, Lahana?" He said. She blinked and looked at him.

"Huh? Oh, sorry. I was just thinking, we really are about to go to war, aren't we?" She asked. "I guess there's nothing we can do to stop it."

"I'd like to say we can but... That's right. The pieces falling into place are too obvious. But we'll get through this." Kale said as he entered the reception chamber. There was Luke waiting for him, as he said. "Master Luke. He greeted with a slight head nod. "I trust you have felt it as well? An ominous premonition if there ever was one."

The Skywalker Youth sat in the center, his eyes were closed but his vision spanned the length of the chamber. He was starting to come here so often Mara joked that he should move in, but it made the ability to sense things over vast distances easier. And it took every ounce of focus he even amplified by the chamber to crack the veil of one of the two "blind spots" in the force. He'd cracked it ever so lightly when Kale and Lahana entered. Their talk about war, grounding him and shaking him out of his drive to see that which made no sense to him. "We've been at war for a while haven't?" Luke asked, his tone chiding them. Jedi weren't supposed to look for a fight, only finish them. Though it seemed as if his reprimanding tone wasn't directed at Master nor apprentice but at the alliance itself. "I'm not a big student of history, which is embarrassing, I really should be given what we're trying to do" he admitted, life on Tatooine was life spent focusing on farming, if your education wasn't in useful things then you were either water rich or wasting your time. "But the Republic was founded twenty five thousand years ago, it took almost eleven thousand years for it to unite much of the inner rim and core and another nine thousand to unite the rest of the galaxy. At least that's what I remember, we may be pursuing Galactic unity wrong. You're right, war is coming, something feral harnessed the light in a way I didn't think was possible and then there's Jerec whose power is now as great as my father's" Luke admitted that, it meant any confrontation between him and the blind former Darksider was going to be a toss up on the best of days. "Everyone wants to focus on the Remnant, but the danger I sense is other territories, it's a mistake to pursue our traditional enemy now when we have so many newer, smarter enemies"

Of course, the choice was not theirs to make.
"Welcome back from your journey Lahana, Kale, I trust it was productive if you're coming here in a bad mood" He offered a smile, but the light shimmered eerily over the runes and Luke thought he could hear a whisper in the dark. Tasaia was right, the spirits here were reacting to the storm in the force, feeding off it.

Kale let out a tired huff of air. "Yeah, I'll just cut to the chase. The holocron we're after is Sith. Rouge Squadron just confirmed it. On top of that fanatical imperials attacked that Star Destroyer turned entertainment district, disabling it's primary weapon. But honestly, the holocron has me worried. The right hands, the wrong hands, whoever has it, nothing good will come of it."

"You sure it was fanatical imperials?" Luke asked with a frown, though his eyes didn't reveal any skepticism. He agreed, but Republic intel was making a lot of noise about it being the handiwork of Tyber Zaan while the smuggler King Talon Karrde and the ships Captain seemed to think the New Republic itself did it. Which all smacked of a frame job, so he didn't doubt it. Especially when some claimed General Veers had been on the Venture. The confirmation that it was indeed a genuine Sith holocron made him raise an eyebrow, the voices hissing throughout the room seemed to grow in intensity. "So we were right, what I sent Aren to retrieve" the man shook his head. "Do you know anything else about the nature of this relic? More importantly, where our errant Padawan is?"

There were other things to discuss, Kale was right, war was coming whether they wished for it or not.

"Aren..." It was difficult to bring himself to say what he had to, as if speaking it would will it to be. "I've heard he's somewhere in Zsinj's territory. Though with the knowledge that the holocron is Sith... There's a reason we haven't heard anything from him, why he isn't being used as a bargaining chip, why I can no longer feel his existence through the force. This is only conjecture, but whatever is inside that holocron, whoever, Aren may be used as a vessel for it."

Luke's eyes flickered around the room as the whispers came close to growing into mocking laughter before they were silenced just as swiftly. "I believe you, Kale the Sith of old were a different sort compared to the ones I faced. They're more primitive, true but far stronger and more savage. Palpatine was the product of a millennia learning to hide in the shadows to strike, the being that may be within the Holocron was used to be out in the sun. But I'm not willing to rule out Aren yet, we may not have completely lost our padawan" Here Luke reached out to lay his hand on the runes. "I had a vision of blood on the forest floor of Endor, of heads on pikes, of a lost sister returning to the light in the shadow of a great serpent. I saw a stag sneering while two old stones broke themselves." Luke let out a laugh "I really hate it when the force sends me allegory instead of cold hard fact...But I think you're right. We're heading to war and it will be soon"

"Yeah..." Kale narrowed his eyes and looked around the room. "We need to come up with a plan of... action- So are we ignoring the voices in this room?"

Lahana tilted her head and followed her master's eyes, she didn't hear anything.

"We are for the present" Luke said, offering him a sympathetic smile. "If I'm being honest, I've been hearing them for a month. They're not just in this room, they're everywhere. Thousands of them, but that one? The one you just heard, is the strongest. If I'm being honest with myself, the voice is an echo of a power I can't really put my head around..He..At least I think it was a he. Was probably stronger than the Emperor in life, Jedi forced him to commit suicide, he hates me for that. But he's also bound here" Luke didn't even think he could imagine a Jedi powerful enough to make a monster like the one he sensed behind the chains consider suicide as a better alternative. Though the name Sunrider kept popping into his head. "A force user from another sect offered to join us, she says she may have some idea on how to address the Spirits. But its a nerve wracking prospect, I don't even like trying to heal damaged minds I can't even imagine the risks involved in dealing with souls"

Luke grinned at Lahana "You've never been touched by the more ethereal aspects of the force have you?" he let out a good natured laugh, she was blessed in that sense. "They're not a threat to us directly, but they can make the wildlife here hostile, whatever storm is coming our way is causing them a lot of pain, but it's also allowing them more..I guess wiggle room around their chains is the right phrase?"

"I guess it's more like I can't. The uh, not so physical parts of the force are hard for me to get." Lahana said., still straining to hear the voices the two masters were talking about. The mention of wild beasts only made her realize that she was getting hungry. It was a shame she wasn't allowed to go hunting in the wild anymore.

Kale meanwhile rubbed his temples before rolling his shoulders and adjusting his focus. "There's a lot on our table then if malevolent spirits in the temple are the least of our worries. So, if Endor is to be where there will be bloodshed, how should we act? I don't very much enjoy the idea of acting as a simple soldier for the Republic, but what must be must be done."

"Our duty is as peacekeepers, the Jedi originally worked in tandem with the Judicial fleets in the old Republic. They commanded armies in wars only when those wars threatened to overrun the entire galaxy" Luke responded, his eyes narrowing in thought, it wasn't quite an answer but it had been the closest he could get to one. He too shared dislike at the idea of acting as part of the Republic military, yet when the enemies were malevolent force users. "The galaxy was already overrun before either of us were born, The Republic controls a few thousand systems on its better day and I honestly don't know if its our duty to help them expand beyond that. We should be minding the story, not looking to set up an expansion. But at the same time, if trouble comes to Endor it's a big deal" Endor was special, it had been where the Emperor fell, where his father died, where the alliance militia finally became a proper navy when it defeated the Imperial armada at Endor. To fail to properly respond there, might invite calamity. "But at the same time, what happens if we drop the ball at Endor?" he asked before eying Lahana. "Some force users are meant to draw the force inward, to use it as a source of strength. But for what its worth I'm glad you have trouble with it, I worry about these things influencing some of your peers if they manage to grow strong enough to get louder"

"What will happen? That's an interesting question." Kale turned to his padawan. "Lahana, do you know why we will be fighting for Endor?"

Lahana stopped trying to hear ghosts and looked to her master. She squinted her eyes and cupped her chin in thought. "That's the forest planet with the annoying furballs, right? Does the Empire need a lot of wood or something?" She glanced to Luke. "You said it's a big deal, I'm guessing there's something important there?"

"Not something exactly, but an important event." Kale said. Lahana nodded, listening. "The death of Darth Vader, of The Emperor." Lahana nodded. "It has a lot of meaning to the Rebel Alliance as a historic victory against tyranny."

"Okay?" Lahana nodded once more, waiting for the other shoe to drop. Kale looked to Luke.

"Perhaps you could enlighten her, it isn't the most intuitive reason."

Watching the education exchange between Lahana and her master Luke smiled, in many ways it reminded him of the glimpses he caught of Qui Gon Jin and Obiwan. Yoda had been a harsh task master, but Luke could hardly complain. Ben taught him by instruction, discussion and experience, Yoda by relentlessly drilling him and letting him figure out on his own why a thing worked after it had been hammered into his head long enough. Kale, seemed to be more in line with the style of the more gray Jin and his student. Lamplights flickered, something hissed and Luke smirked, it was being ignored now and it didn't like being ignored. Somehow that comforted him and made it seem more grounded in flesh and perhaps more petty and less abstract and omnipresent. "Endor doesn't have much strategic value, except that the hyperlanes around it, mean that if war with Zsinj or Tyber Zaan came tomorrow we could quickly turn that sector into a refueling, repair and rallying point. But militarily there are far better planets to do that with. Endor is important because symbolism matters, we lost Yavin after we destroyed the first Deathstar. The Empire hunted us relentlessly and our loss of the moon over which the power of the Empire met its end made it look like a fluke. Basically, we lost members, worlds that were once pro Republic showed us the door, militias that were supposed to reinforce us began to fight us just as viscously as they fought the Empire. Senator Iblis even threatened war with us when he ran his own faction of rebel systems." Luke paced the room, he imagined the loss of Yavin had done much of the same for the Sith cause, shattered them morally and spiritually more than it shattered them physically.

"The Alliance, well the New Republic now, is overextended. Thousands of systems have joined us, all of them expect mutual defense against warlords, pirates, gangsters and the major renegade powers. The Imperial remnant especially, but only a few hundred systems have actually pledged military support and out of them only one hundred are contributing anything except money to the Navy. The rest are just waiting it out, to see if they can extort us for more benefits, subsidies or protection, or they're waiting to see if we can deliver on our promise to bring peace. Losing Endor, would make us look like we're all talk." Turning to the pair Luke gestured to walls "They're thinking the same way these dad guys are..Basically"

At that he laughed. "Regardless, attacking Endor wouldn't be easy, The Imperial remnant stands the most to gain from making us look bad but Endor is way outside their supply lines. It would be a serious risk, whoever did it would have to rely on luck and they would need to commit something like a quarter of a million Storm Troopers and at least four times that number in regular army, it would need a fleet of hundreds of ships. It would be an undertaking that would open them up to attack from their own enemies...Unless" a gloved hand touched his chin.."Well..No..that isn't possible"

Taking the subject back to why a loss at Endor would be catastrophic Luke continued "So you see why Kale is so nervous Lahana? There are plenty of more logical targets..but logic sadly doesn't always apply to war or politics"

There was another aspect that Luke left out. One that he'd danced around in silent contemplation before sighing and added with a tired smile "Lord Vader was my father, he was a Jedi of the clone wars a hero even, named Anakin Skywalker. He fell..he..chose to become a servant of the Sith, eventually he began to regret it all. The Jedi, the Knight in him broke forth at the end. The Emperor he..He was torturing me to death because I refused to kill my own father. Sith Lightning is..terrible, its a power so dark its like being drowned in the darkside. I still have muscle spasms...The power of the Emperor was way more than I could have imagined, it was all I could do to hold on. My father..Knight Skywalker grabbed the Emperor, I beat him...I cut one one of his hands, for a second I hate him..." Luke's tone seemed filled with guilt...As if that moment's savagery still horrified him, even if Darth Vader was a mass murdering tyrant."I risked it all, the entire rebellion on the goodness in him that might not have existed anymore. If I had failed, The Emperor with his battle meditation would have ground the Rebellion to dust, but there was I lay helpless, spasming in agony , my father remembered who he was and with the last of his strength hurled the Emperor down a reactor shaft" Luke left out the part where the Emperor turned all of his terrible power on Vader, how his life support system began to fail as his father's lungs incinerated and his flesh crackled. How the backlash of darkside energies released when the Emperors burn incinerated ravaged both their bodies and Luke was still recovering from that.

"Endor is important to us too Lahana, the last Jedi of the Old Order died saving the first Jedi of the New in the skies above Endor. He died so that we could live"

"I see... So it means a lot to you specifically." Lahana pressed in her knuckles, Her joints popping as her expression turned sour. All of the reasons she'd been forced to fight as a slave surfaced in her mind. The people she'd killed for reasons she either didn't understand or refused to confront. She'd spent so long killing for the whims of people that apparently knew better than her.

"So, people are going to die just to satisfy a few's arbitrary emotions. The Republic's pride, the Empire's wrath and greed... Your lingering regret." She grit her teeth and moved her right hand to the scarred part of her face, under her hair. It stung, as if the memory of how it happened was enough to bring her back to the moment. "I'm sick of this..."

"My lingering regret?" Luke shook his head, even if he did feel regret about the outcome of Endor, he never would have allowed anyone to die because of it, much less tens of thousands of soldiers, most of which were people he'd known for years. The thought sickened him but he kept his outward features calm, Lahana hadn't meant to accuse him of being a murderer by proxy and if she had, she wasn't thinking straight. "you're reading my emotions without context, and so you are projecting your own trauma and doubt onto them. Center yourself and focus, I regret that I lost composure, that in a moment of panic and anger I beat on a broken man, but I don't regret what happened at Endor, no one should. I certainly wouldn't ask you to die to soothe my conscience if I did, apprentice." Luke paused, allowing himself to reach into the force, to let the cool waters of the light help him calm his mind.

"Consider this, if we lose Endor, whether a few prideful or predatory politicians are moving us into harms way or not, They're actions will effect half a trillion sentients Would you have me refuse to participate because of their short sightedness? The Jedi aren't vigilantes we don't walk around dictating policy, all we can do is serve the light and the people of the Galaxy. What do you think will happen if hundreds of systems leave the Republic? Or if Borsk Fey'lya calls for a recall election of Garm Bel Iblis or worse? Chief of State Mothma and the alliance council which is already being attacked for not heading the provisional senate decides they won't permit a recall due to the state of war? What do you think will happen then? What do you think Zsinj or Tyber Zaan will do when they see the Republic in the middle of internal strife? Or Jerec? Have you ever faced a Dark sider Lahana? I have, he could potentially bring dozens of them with him"
"What do you think he'll do to slaves? To the defenseless of the Republic while we're dispersed, spread thin across a territory too large for us to manage as we are now? Do you want to see your fellow apprentices die before their time? Kale and Mara will fight, are you prepared to lose him? Or yourself?" Luke shook his head. "I don't like this anymore than you do, but whether we like it or not, perception can sometimes trump reality. So here we are, preparing to respond to a what if...that may not come, because the alternative is worse, but neither is ideal and we're tearing each other apart. Because of that which we can't control" Luke laughed, four years ago he'd have rolled his eyes and called himself a fool, he agreed with her, this wasn't right but things were what they were.

"To be Jedi is to serve, sometimes that means doing things we find idiotic because not doing them will cause something even dumber and more destructive to happen, your fury is understandable, but try not to accuse me of being no better than a Sith lord huh? Last I checked, we're all a family here."

"I'm not blaming you, Master Luke. You aren't the one that wants to attack a planet just to prove a point. And you aren't some politician playing games with people's lives." She looked at her master for a moment before looking back to Luke. "I don't know why I thought things would be that much different here. No matter where you go all they care about is power." She shook her head and lowered her shoulders. "I understand. I'll fight. It's the only thing I'm good at anyway."

"About power?" It was an oddly cynical take for one so young, granted she'd been a slave, but it seemed to be a bit of projection. He couldn't disagree with her though, this was about perception and morale but those weren't necessarily bad things either. "There's no shame in dying for an idea, the Republic is the Galaxy's best chance for protracted peace, even if it means we make peace with the empire." It was hard to ignore the Bantha in the room, that even the peace at any price faction wanted to take the core. Something Luke didn't believe they would be ready for, not in a long time. Conversely the old Republic used commerce and stability to assimilate as much as it used war, it was entirely possible within a century the remnant would end up needing to join the Republic as a member state. Isolated as it would invariably become as the larger more expansive powers began to deny them vital resources the massively populated core needed. "The inner rim and the core may be the wealthiest regions in the known universe, but they're also the most resource hungry, they haven't been able to feed themselves in tens of thousands of years. Most of the agriworlds are in our hands or in the hands of Tyber Zaan. I think, after this storm passes it may be prudent to just sit here and wait them out. Even if it takes a generation, Bartoff Hissa and his Jedi can't hold seventy trillion sentients in bondage by hoping the Zaan Consortium is nice enough not to extort them for food and water" No one on the council would like that answer though.

"Things are different here" Luke decided setting his robotic hand on Lahana's shoulder "Because if your master and I are right, I won't let you fight out there alone. No, I'll be right beside you come what may. I will bleed with you Lahana, as long as you help me keep the very dumb from ruining this galaxy?" he offered with a confident smile

Lahana prepared to flinch as Luke set his metallic hand on her, but in spite of what she expected, she didn't. Maybe cold steel wasn't enough to set off her disinclination for physical touch. "You aren't the first to promise something like that. But you are the first Jedi master to promise it I guess."

"We can do much more after this war is over padawan. Until then, we must do all we can to prevent the Empire's rise." Kale said. Lahana simply nodded lethargically.

"Understood."

Star Wars: The Aftermath (A post-Battle of Endor RP)

Interlude

"I shall be the first man!" - Jedi Master Awdrysta Pina 24,500 BBY as recounted in "The Thirteenth knight"

-I can do this- The woman's green eyes flickered with a mix of nervousness and an emotional high that came from being told by the woman who'd been your savior (if a rather harsh teacher). Her mind wandered back to the moments of haze and hurt mixed with a profound sense of destiny and relief (That their army was indeed growing, for they'd taken in numerous force potentials but the Master had refused to teach any of them just yet). And then a feeling of shame at the realization that she'd felt as if her master, the Pontifex had betrayed her by taking another student and refusing to attend the war council to focus on the first lessons of her training. jealousy is beneath you apprentice and misplaced. It always struck her, how maternal Invictus Janus could sound, how disappointed yet lacked any of the vicious contempt she reserved for others. I do not need to explain myself to the Admiralty, nor to Hissa, when I have you to do that, from anyone else it would have sounded dismissive, as if she was fit merely to relay messages but Aladar caught the look in her eyes and the words spoken prior...misplaced jealousy, beneath me? A hand gripped her chin, Miryia was tall, she was nearing six feet but Aladar like Phasma was taller still and she felt her head pulled down to meet the eyes of a woman who'd terrified her mere months ago. -You are more than a member of my legions. This armless acrobat shall be the first of my legion..But you, shall stand by my side, you shall have a part in all that I plan, all that I do and all that I implement. Your destiny, is bound inexorably to mine. Together, we will bring the light of civilization back to these diseased stars. The Empire shall be our vehicle and Shoma our sister in arms, she shall fight beside you, she shall bleed beside you, but she is not your equal, nor...your replacement-

It was odd, how a woman in her thirties could feel like a child in that moment, one whose emotions were cut through to the center of the problem. -You have only ever abandoned yourself- that bit crushed her as much as it liberated her and then the ceremony began.

She was made to kneel in the water garden, Phasma and Shoma and the Highsinger stood witness.

She was made to kneel naked, something that would have shamed her due to the scars from suicide attempts, from beatings, from battles that were both victories and defeats, faded stretchmarks, memories of a body to small to bear life. But those had begun to fade, as had the few streaks of gray in her hair. Aladar felt ten years younger, she was growing stronger every day, her connection to the force..her..inner forge as the Pontifex said it.

Blazed.

She was made to recite an oath before her peers. To be a sword in the dark, to stand between barbarism and the light of civilization, to wield the force in service to that light. To be a slave of none, but shelter the weak who would be strong, to lay low heretics, traitors, thieves and usurpers. To punish the guilty and vindicate the innocent, to serve the Imperial throne and not the one seated upon it (That last bit had been inspired by one of the Bothan spymasters many manic rants about the proper truth of power being perception). In her heart she added one more verse, to serve Janus forever. A starburst pattern in the shame of their order was burned into her left bright, the pain was intense but it lacked any of the ravaging sensations of Sith lightning. "Let that be the brand you ever receive, let that be the last wound you take unanswered"

The end of the ceremony was a child of twelve being brought in on a litter, she was in the end stages of an organ ravages STD that was all too common in the Coruscanti underworld. One that could be easily cured in its early stages but was almost always fatal by this point, at least above ground. Down there, it was a death sentence, unless you knew someone or were willing to slowly replace every organ that failed with something artificial. Death houses were filled with discarded whores like this child, waiting for an end that was painful and sad.

A fat woman was brought in, she stunk of drugs, there was a familial resemblance, her grandmother perhaps?

The final moment of her initiation into Knighthood was a ritual even Jerec struggled to master, the rite of transference. To pull the life from one and imbue it into another, to restore, revitalize. She'd been learning this but was still nervous, Aladar couldn't be that strong, she'd experienced it. Her master had used the ability to return to her the eye she'd lost and she felt it kickstart an inner awareness that gradually allowed her cells to begin to rejuvenate and repair themselves. Had she learned it on an instinctive level to restore herself? To hold back age? If so, could she do it externally?

Her only real fear was that she would kill the child accidentally.

Perhaps it was that selflessness that allowed it to go as well as it had. The woman withered to a husk, the child lived and was taken below, she would serve the Invictus, cook, clean and receive an education. In time she would join the imperial military, or should she show potential in the force, their own order. Hers would be a life of service, but never servitude.

Rheanessya Aladar was clothed in the same dark blue armor as her master and robes with the colors of the order. She was presented with a new lightsaber, to replace her old Inquisitors blade, one that she could sense had a crystal within that had been grown, cultivated off her own emotions and actions these last few weeks. The blade was smooth and curved, the blade of a duelist one studied in Makashi and Juyo -she knows where my talents lie- Aladar thought, but it had been so long since she practiced the second form that it would require her to study it again.

The prospect wasn't daunting though and maybe she'd take Phasma up on her offer to spar one day soon. For now, duty called.

.................................

Coruscant



War Master's Council

@Honesty Crow@Guy of Z@countlessinsect

The Imperial palace remained the immense mountain that it always was, rising into the "Night" sky as their hemisphere of the world city shifted into its evening phase. The palace itself was lit, shining in the night which was a stark contrast to the Emperor and Sate Pestage who kept the immense structure dark.

The difference between them and Grand Vizier Hissa, who favored opulence and vitality to conceal his inner dark.

Though, from what she understood, the Grand Vizier refused to be part of the meeting when he realized that the Pontifex was not coming, instead sending Supreme Commander (Who was going to attend any way) Gilad Pellaeon and Grand Admiral Rae Sloane, his attendants and his biggest supporters (Who were also, oddly allied to her master). A political display, one not borne of malice but a not so subtle reminder to the Pontifex that they were equals and while she may have "crowned" Hissa, it was by his leave that the 501st wasn't ordered to blow her palace up and killer her knights...Or so Hissa believed. The once legendary legion seemed far more loyal to the woman who handed them their first victory in years than to a moff who barely addressed them. Not that either side was willing to test that theory, the remnant had been reorganized to weed out the disloyal, not foster them.

Captain Phasma, Highsinger and newly minted Knight Aladar made their way up steps that were so vast and wide they almost looked like the base of a mountain. At the entrance, she could see the aids of General Derricote and one of the other Moff's who managed to parlay themselves onto the council in the chaos following Pestage's murder. "We're meeting in the night garden"

"Of course we are" Aladar remarked, she'd anticipated this and brought some seed packets from the water garden in the Invictus palace, the new bastion of the Knights. She knew both Gilad and Derricote were avid enthusiasts for gardening and she also knew they were probably going to spend more time surveying the Emperor's night gardens after the meeting. This way, at least, she could make a gesture of mutual respect. The cultivation of plants was a hobby her former Jedi teacher shared as well, though Aladar lacked the knack for it until recently. "Has Director Raveem arrived yet?" She added, stepping through the grand doorways, taking the lead in the group and reminding herself she spoke now with the voice of her master and was going into a den of starved Hutts.

"He arrived five minutes before you did Inqui.." the aid corrected himself "Knight Aladar"

"And who else is in attendance, Carvin, Grand and I believe one of the surviving Grand Admirals the Bothan and your master didn't kill" the fact that he couldn't name him was rather annoying. "Admiral Karius, General Veers and Cardinal, a young Star Destroyer Captain named Canaday" "The solicitudes Captain?" Aladar asked surprised, the Solicitude was part of the Queilli oversector fleet, she was sent out there to track down a rogue Inquisitor once and spent a week shipboard the solicitude. Canaday was a competent commander, but he didn't stand out to her at the time.

"He arrived with a dozen ISD battlegroups after Endor, something about refusing to take orders from Mando scum and mommas boys"

"ah"

"We shouldn't be fighting the Republic yet, we should be invading Zsinj's space and clearing that trash out"

"It wouldn't be that easy, those two are always dismissed as dandies, the starlanes between Sereno and Dathomir are littered with the bones of the ones who do that" She warned, to her surprise the aid actually listened nodding his head in concession. -Things are different now- she thought.

A table had been set out, in one of the courtyards in the immense night garden, Serving droids were laying out tea and various cakes on a secondary table off to the side. The gathering looked at once informal and yet, comprised of the most serious of men and women in the Empire and Grand Admiral Sloane.

As she suspected, Gilad Pellaeon and Evir Derricote were returning from a stroll in the gardens as her group arrived, Moden Canaday was sipping tea and snacking on something in the corner with Grand Admiral Grant, whose attendance hardly needed to be noted. As commander of the Home Fleet, it was mandatory. -Canaday is ambitious, but not stupid- she thought, he was only drinking or taking a bite, after Grand did the same from his own plate. Not out of a sense of sycophancy but due to understanding how serious Grand took his nobility and lineage, General Veers and Admiral Karius were both seated beside Raveem who looked like he was napping both of them looked like they were debating who to strangle first, Raveem for napping, Admiral Sloane for her..views on proper tactics or Aladar for not arriving before everyone else did.

Which was as she intended, she wanted to arrive late to see how the attendees arranged themselves, which groups stuck with which and who was at odds with the others.

"Knight Aladar, congratulations on your promotion!" It sounded genuine and probably was, it was really hard to hate Gilad Pellaeon, he was a sailors, sailor. A true Naval commander and a loyal subordinate who fought for the same values she now found herself fighting and he was well liked by all. Treachery against him was rare, he wasn't as stupid as people thought he was and he inspired a kind of loyalty that meant those who did betray his trust were often butchered by his own men long before they got anywhere near him. "And you as well!" she added enthusiastically, before producing a small box, handing one to him and the other to the aid of General Derricote who presented it to the master of biological warfare.

"The seal of the Jedi Agricorps?"

"from eight thousand years ago, I found them in stasis pods in our groundskeeping level"

Gilad almost gasped when he opened them and saw the crimson seeds. "Alsakan orchids" he mouthed, they were among the greatest oxygen producers in the known universe, instrumental in terraforming before the pias dei crusaders wiped them out. "We've begun planting some in the gardens at our palace, I hope you find a good home for them"

"My gardens are not properly equipped for this sadly, but we're looking for a new place one that I could make a home for these in. My regards both to you and your master"

"Byth Cacti for you" Aladar motioned to Derricote, another rare plant but one that was legendary for turning rad burnt hellholes into water rich paradises if given enough time.

"Yes, yes, fascinating..now tell us why your master decided to call us here" Carvin broke in, he had absolutely no patience for the obsession with gardening his colleagues held. To him, it was the work of slaves and servants, unseemly for men of power and he could barely stand the former inquisitor who attached herself like a barnacle to a lunatic.

"As you wish" she offered a slight inclination of her head, sarcastically before offering a diplomatic smile. "Gentlemen, ladies, our respective leaders believe the Empire has been idol, too long"

That was something everyone could agree with. "So we're finally going to pick off some warlords?"

"No, we're going to do something more brazen than provincial territory grabs" She answered, her eyes narrowing with resolve. "The Pontifex Invictus: Janus and Imperial Grand Vizier Bertoff Hissa believe it is time hit the Republic in its heart"

Everyone seemed to grow quiet focusing now on what the woman had to say. Gilad's eyes flickered to a droid that entered, a small astromech that was flanked by four floating holoprojectors, each one igniting to show intendem with the astromechs projector a small moon, orbiting a gas giant.

"Endor" She added stating the obvious and in doing so silencing everyone.

The place where it all went wrong.

Star Wars: The Aftermath (A post-Battle of Endor RP)

Orbit over Yavin IV


Arrival

@Jollan

Captain Argus went from amused but questioning their sanity to convinced of their insanity while doing his best to keep himself from laughing out loud. The Mon Cal's goggled eyes began to dart about the bridge of his Recusant class Starship as the Captain of the Nexu happily proclaimed his desire to help them make war on the Zaan Consortium. Something, the Fishman wasn't even certain they were doing, but probably should. Everyone was so focused on either Zsinj or the Empire around Coruscant, but there were hundreds of minor warlords with their picket fleets out there and the fact that two warring organized crime syndicates had the power to unify them all (To say nothing of how dangerous Jerec and Kaine were). Always disturbed Captain Argus, the fact that the Alliance was content to ignore two powerful, syndicates that somehow managed to conquer Hutt space seemed even more insane.

The Captain of the Nexu and his funny little crewmate presented an opportunity for his benefactor, but the Bothan was busy with bigger fish to fry at the moment. The Mon Cal leaned forward, thinking as the room around him flashed in holoreels and visuals of various starships which were either waiting in "line" to dock on Yavin or one of the space stations in its orbit or bored sector patrol vessels inquiring if Captain Argus needed assistance, something his communications officers were repeatedly shooting down. Large, bowl like eyes narrowed as if he was considering when the decision had already been made.

"Very well, Nexu, prepare for a fighter escort from my vessel to escort you to a landing base near the Lunar equator, from there you'll be escorted to the main Alliance settlement. Krayt out"