Starwars is the property of George Lucas and I do not mean to infringe on his rights. Almost all the characters in this story belong to me, except for references to characters, places, vehicles, etc that you would recognize.

Chapter 1: Story of a Hunter

Rais Kanar stepped out of his Y-4 Raptor into the dry, hot air that perpetually turns around Tatooine. His shirt was a royal blue and he wore a red vest over it that was buttoned up with several pockets going down the right side. His pants were black and a DL-44 blaster rested in its holster on his right side. He began walking over to a door to leave the hangar when a hand rested on his shoulder. He whipped around to see who it was when he felt something jab into his side. The barrel of a weapon was now embedded into his vest. He turned his head to see a tall Twi'lek standing with a deadly grin on his face. "Nice to meet you too." Rais said. "My boss would like to see you know human." the Twi'lek hissed between his triangular teeth. "Am I really that much in demand? Wow I just started and I am already wanted more than Fett." Rais said being his typical self. It would be the last thing he would say for awhile however as he felt a metal object collide with the back of his head.

Three Years Before

Rais brought his vibroblade up in a block keeping his opponent's blade from cleaving his head open. "Rais, you need to speed up if you are ever going to go after someone with the Force." Rais' instructor said, this statement was quickly followed by a kick to Rais' right leg causing the hunter in training to fall to the ground. The master thrusted downward attempting to get Rais while he was down. However Rais blocked the attack off to his side and then slashed but stopped just before he removed the man's foot. "Not too bad anymore am I." the pupil said with a big grin. The trainer reached down and helped the blonde youth up to his feet. "Very good. So to defeat your opponent all you have to do is lose a leg." the man said pointing out the flaw that could have cost the youth his life. "Dra, why can't you ever complement me?" Rais asked placing the vibroblade back onto the wall. "Because you have had it too easy your whole life. It is said that Boba Fett was raised in a military group, he didn't get everything he wanted you can be sure of that. All the greats are where they are because they had to fight for everything they wanted. But you, no you come from the best schools, a rich family, everything you ever wanted on a silver platter. Then you have this great delusion that you can be a bounty hunter and come to me for training in the deadly arts. You came in your own luxury speeder didn't you? That is why I don't complement you. You must prove yourself worthy of everything from here on out." Dra said opening a box and retrieving a DL-44, it was a reflective ebony with a barrel that was silver. It had a symbol engraved on the handle but Rais couldn't make it out. Dra tossed it to Rais who caught it out of the air. "Follow me out side." the master said exiting the building.

Current

The Twi'lek and a Tusken Raider threw the still unconscious form of Rais to the steel floor. "Wake him." A voice said. The Twi'lek reached onto his belt and grabbed a small stun rod. He activated it and electricity started flowing between two small towers, then he shoved it into the back of the neck of Rais. A yell came from the formerly unconscious form of the young bounty hunter. "Silence!" came a voice from the shadows that echoed throughout the room. It wasn't the volume of the command though, it was the power behind it. Rais' mouth shut and he looked up, the room was completely dark he couldn't even see the people to each side of him though he knew they were there. Finally after about a minute from the command given by the voice a dim light flickered on from the roof of the building. It gave a dark outline of the two figures, one seated and one standing. The seated one was wearing a black robe with a hood that shaded his face from any light that might touch it, a chains of what might have been beads hung down in what could possibly be a armored chest plate of some sort. The standing figure though seemed to carry the most ominous air about him. The head was rounded with a lateral slit in the center. From the top of the head branched two large eye stalks, not going straight up but outward each to its own side. Rais had never seen anything like it before in his life and he couldn't even guess what the two protrusions were from its shoulders. "Rise, Rais Kanar. Or are you an animal that is only fit to walk on all fours?" the seated figure said. The young hunter stood up and felt at his right side surprised to find his blaster still in place. He heard the people that were next to him step away silently and he gripped the handle of his weapon. "I have a proposition for you. You will live, become rich, famous, and hold a key position in a new order of things if you pledge your loyalty and blaster to me." the man said his tone dripping with evil and as cold as the metallic floor that Rais had been on previously. "What happens if I don't want to be part of some new order?" Rais said getting ready to draw his weapon. "If you do not wish to join me, you will leave here. In pieces." the man said, once again his tone never altered. Rais quickly drew his blaster and fired twice, once at the seated figure and once at the standing one. The seated figure waved a hand and both blasts dissipated against an invisible wall, however that wasn't the only movement. The figure that had been standing at the right hand of the throne was no longer there. Rais spun around over and over again trying to find where the man went. He soon knew though when he felt a hard strike to the back of his legs and neck. Rais landed on both knees in pain, he had been hit before but never anything like this. It was if he had been hit by a pissed off wookie. He heard a strange noise, he wasn't quite sure what it was but right after he heard it he felt cold steel pressing up against his chin with the blade just barely touching his neck. "Barakus stop!" the man sitting on the throne said. The blade did not move but just kept its position ready for a killing blow. "Now young hunter, are you persuaded to join?"

Three Year Before

Rais dodged around trees and rocks trying to get away from the ten or so small orbs that followed him shooting small blasts there were just enough to leave stinging welts that would last a month. He jumped on top of the stump of a tree and spun around firing three times. The crimson bolts soared through the air finding their targets and exploding them in a flash of color and shards of metal. He heard the whirring of a couple more coming to his right, he swung his arm in that direction and fired but this time the orbs moved out of the way and began firing. "I hate these things." Rais complained as he leapt backwards as burn marks landed on the stump. He rolled to his left and was then up and running not daring to look back as he heard the small emitters firing off the small energy blasts. He ran between trees trying his best to lose them but their onboard computers kept up with him. He ducked just in time to not run into a low hanging branch. That gave him an idea and he checked the power of the blaster still running as fast as he could. After awhile he stopped and turned around, the orbs came after him and he fired five shots at them sending them scattering out of formation. Then he raised his arm and began shooting branches down from the trees above the orbs. Some of the orbs moved around them only to get picked off by a well aimed energy bolt from Rais while others went dead from the impact. "Finally, the wannabe got an idea into that Hutt spit he calls a brain!" a voice came from a small clearing. Rais looked over and saw Dra standing there with a controller in his hand. "Yeah, yeah, you finally give me credit for something." Rais said giving a smile that showed all of his perfectly white teeth. "Not really!" Dra screamed out as one orb collided into the back of Rais' head and two more shot him from behind. The young man turned around and fired taking all three down. Then he threw down the blaster in anger. Dra came walking toward him, "Don't ever get caught up in what looks like a victory, never let yourself get distracted, and finally always watch your back because that is the perfect place to put a knife or a blaster bolt." he said smiling at his humiliated student. "That wasn't fair!" Rais whined looking at his teacher who stood about 6'0 and was wearing a blue, loose fit, shirt and some gray pants. "Nothing is fair and you better remember that." Dra said not giving the man any pity what so ever. "Now Rais, I have taught you everything I know. You have excelled in practice but you always seem to fail in these live fire exercises. By the Emperor on paper you are as good as Fett himself, you always hit what your aiming at, you know several fighting styles, and yet you never seem to be able to do anything with them." Dra stopped for a moment and looked around him. "Back in the house. Now!"

Current

Rais awoke in a bed, well some might call it a bed. It was actually a sheet of metal that jutted out from the wall with a very thin piece of fabric over it that provided the only protection from the hard surface. "Hey everyone, the new guy finally woke up!" a voice came from about 10 meters to Rais' right. Rais rubbed his neck as he looked over and saw a menagerie of races all staring at him. "Here's your breakfast late one." Came the voice of a Mon Calamari who threw a bowl of some strange semi liquid thing at him. "Now, now Grina. Be nice to the new guy, he's going to get enough of this from the others." a female with four arms and black hair said. "Where am I?" Rais asked looking at everyone. "Yousa at da worsest place on da planet!" a voice said. The eyes almost popped out of the head of the bounty hunter hopeful. "A Gungan! These stupid freaks brought in a Gungan to help them!" Rais screamed in his own head. The Gungan walked out to the front and looked at Rais. "Gungans, I thought the Empire wiped out all of you." Rais said wishing that the guy named Barakus had slit his throat. "Mesa offa planet when bombad ships come. Theysa drop big numbers of." the Gungan was cut off by the Calamari named Grina, "Shut up. The imps dropped about twelve AT-ATs and a thousand troops and wiped out most of them. About 500 too many made it." Rais didn't listen to Grina as he talked. Rais was fixing to say something when a man wearing a black uniform similar to that of the Imperials walked in followed by two Rodians carrying E-11's. Everyone quickly went quiet, as the man cleared his throat. "You bounty hunters are here for two reasons only! The first is because you are expendable, your lives do not mean a thing to the Dark Lord. You will do as we say and if not this." With that one of the Rodians pointed into the crowd of unknown bounty hunters and fired. The bolt found a target, a human female possibly 17. Rais reached for his blaster but this time he didn't have it. "Secondly, you are here because you have been deemed worthy to hold a position in a new army. I do not share in that view!" the man looked over the whole group. "When I call your name step forward!" he yelled out and his guards checked their blasters once and then went back to looking at everyone. "Grina, Bar Juks, Nordra, and Rais. The rest of you try to kill yourselves by the time I get back." the man then left the room leaving his guards to make sure all the ones he called followed. Once the last of them was out of the room the door slid down and Rais found himself in something like a briefing room. For humans came out from a door from the front of the room each carrying a needle. "Administer the tracking device." the uniformed man said. Grina, the Gungan Bar Juks, and Rais all tried struggling but stopped seeing the barrels of weapons pointed at them. Only Nordra, who was a Noghri, stayed still as the needle was shoved into his neck implanting a microscopic tracking device to the base of the skull. "Now all of you will be tracked on your mission. Do you see this man?" he said as a holographic display activated showing a man on the New Republic's senate. He was a human from Corellia that was heavy set and bald. "He is to be assassinated as is every one of his aids and guards." the man looked at each of them. "You will all be paid for this, possibly even given a position if you succeed. We will have one of our own personal hunters looking over each of you to make sure you don't try anything foolish." he said his eyes clearly showing he would rather see them all dead.

"Barakus, what is on your mind?" the dark figured seated at his throne asked. "Master, why do you send hunters out on this mission?" the pupil of the newest dark lord said looking at his master. "Do you doubt me my friend?" the man asked looking into the very soul of Barakus. "No sire I do not doubt you." Barakus was telling the truth, if there was one thing that the dark side hadn't corrupted him on it was his honesty. "Barakus, many would think that the Emperor was the greatest lord the Darkside had seen since the days of the ancient Sith. However he was defeated, one might ask what led to this defeat. Well my answer is that he showed everyone he ran everything. What I intend to do is run everything from the outside, using puppets and decoys to work my will. If I sent you the Jedi would begin trying to find and destroy us. No, you must not be used until the last. Now, go train for the hour is not yet ripe. However do not worry, it will soon come to fruition." the lord of the Dark Side said. Barakus knelt on one leg and bowed his head, "Thank you, my lord Retribution."