A/N: Hello again folks!
Just an FYI this is the second installment of my own Star Wars Trilogy, so if you have not had the chance to read/finish Star Wars: Variance please feel free to hop over there and read that. I promise it's an exciting read and you can come back to this when you're finished. Or not, but you'll be a bit confused, so I highly recommend it.
To those of you who have finished, I I'm super late, I know, but I wanted to make this next part just right before I posted this. Good news is it's all finished, so there should be no delays once we get rolling.
I hope you all enjoy this journey as much as I enjoyed writing it.
Let's begin, shall we?
Luke had always wanted a family. Even when he was young, he'd dreamed of having a wife and a children to call his own. After he'd had his adventures flying the universe of course, he'd planned to settle down on a planet far far away from his home of Tatooine. He dreamed of forests and lakes and planets instead of dusty surroundings.
When he'd accepted his training as a Jedi, it wasn't long before Luke realized the dream he'd always expected to become a reality, could never come to be. Luke had quickly learned that as Jedi, he was expected to let go of his attachments, in order to find greater peace within the Force. This meant no wife, no children. Luke would never be able to be a true father, not as long as he continued on his path to become a Jedi Master. So instead of mourning, Luke had thrown himself into his studies, searching far and wide for teachers who, though were not Jedi's themselves, but knowledgeable enough in the ways of the Force so he could learn from them and become as much of a master he could be without a live Jedi to instruct him. Though the life of a roaming learner was not the life he had imagined when he'd dreamed on that sandy, dry planet, it held a certain amount of satisfaction that had left him content for many years.
That was, until he met his niece and nephew. They named the girl Larissa, after one of Alderaan's former moons, and her twin brother, Ben, named after his own mentor. When Han had found him and told him about Leia's condition, they'd raced back on the Millennium Falcon just in time to help Leia give birth to the next generation. Luke immediately had been taken with the twins. He'd never really been around young children, but the more time he spent with the rambunctious twins, the more he loved them.
It became evident very quickly that both the twins were powerful in the Force, far more powerful than any of the other children he'd encountered in his travels. Though he loved Ben, he'd always been partial to Larissa. She'd always had a certain wonder when Luke described the Force to her, a thirst for knowledge only stalled by her seemingly innate understanding that the power she possessed was not to be trifled with.
Even though Leia had originally said no to Luke training her children, Luke began set a place for them, and all the other children who he'd found with powers of their own. Seeing his sister bring new life into this world, roused another dream inside him: to rebuild the Jedi once again. He searched out the teacher's he'd found throughout his travels and enlisted their help in creating a temple for other children like his niece and nephew. Of course, for the first few years of their lives, Leia and Han refused to let Luke teach their children, until, that is, Ben began ask about Darth Vader. It had been subtle at first, the gentle curiosity of a child. Then the curiosity became darker. Leia had come to him, fearful of where that curiosity might lead. It was then Luke had shown her the temple, and suggested Ben and his twin come to train with him. Luke was sure that if they learned the practices of a Jedi, that both Ben and Larissa would be better for it.
Luke had thought the plan was perfect, that he'd get to see Ben and Larissa grow to lead the next generation of Jedi into the new world. But as he sat in pilot's seat of the ship, he wondered how he'd gotten it wrong. How far had he been in a delusion not to see it? Now he'd done something irrefutable. He'd taken her memories away, all of them, stripped her abilities from her, because he'd had to. It had taken him a while to realize just how powerful Larissa was, and just how dangerous Ben Solo had become. They couldn't be allowed to be together, especially after what he'd seen. He had to find someplace for her that she could be safe, far far away from her brother.
He set the controls on course once he'd determined his destination, a remote royalty known as the Britannia System. It was isolationist, the rulers determined to keep themselves as far from the rest of the galaxy as possible. It would be the safest place for her. He would never find her here. In the back of the ship lay Larissa, breathing, in a deep, heavy sleep. He caressed her hair softly, the sadness welling in his mind. He could sense the sleep she was in was not natural. Her mind was blank, empty, nothing more than a shell. He took her small hand shakily in his own and held it.
In this moment he grieved.
Though he never had had children of his own, he'd always thought of Larissa as the daughter he never had. The fact he'd been forced to take such measures in order to keep the world safe pained him, but Larissa could never awaken again. The only place she could exist now would be in the memories he possessed, because if she ever awoke again, Luke feared nothing would stop her. She would rise like a wave of vengeance and destroy the world for what he had done to her.
Of that, Luke was perfectly certain.
The one thing Lelouch had always prided himself on was patience. One had to be patient in order to complete his objectives, to play the games he had to play, and achieve the goals that advanced his cause. It was paramount to keep his patience, because it meant no one held any power over him, that in every situation he was always in control of himself at the very least. As long as he held that power, everything else was adaptable, able to move and shift as he needed it to. His patience was what had gotten him this far, his patience was how he had managed to survive against sometimes seemly insurmountable odds. In the last six months, however, his patience had done little stop Larissa.
Shortly after the holo-recording from the base had been recovered, the First Order had begun an aggressive campaign to capture all territories that had previously been under the now destroyed New Republic's control. It had become apparent all too quickly for those in the Resistance and the Black Knights exactly who was leading the campaign. Only someone with the kind of training and intellect that Larissa possessed could efficiently take out the reigning government of a planet and replace it with the First Order. If Lelouch stepped back and looked at the situation impassively, he could freely admit how impressed he was with her efficiency and skill. Though each attack pretty much slaughtered any resisting government, the attacks were so accurate that most of the surrounding areas survived, as opposed to the Order's previous strategy of total destruction and then claiming victory over the ruins.
However, Larissa's well aimed campaign was causing far too many problems for the Black Knights' new allies. Any Resistance member identified in the new territories were executed on sight, and with every world that Larissa won, meant it was another world the Resistance lost. Slowly but surely, the First Order was eating away at the Resistance's control. The only reason the Black Knights hadn't been affected as severely was because Lelouch had always focused most of his efforts on his own system and used other means to get his information from other systems.
While this was a problem to be sure, one that Lelouch needed to address quickly if he was to continue working as efficiently as he had before, most of his patience was spent dealing with the Resistance leadership. While he respected Leia, and was utterly convinced of her strength and intelligence as a leader, Larissa's turn to the Dark had broken something in the older woman. A part of her had disappeared, and it still had yet to truly return. In Leia's deficit, the other ranking officers had taken charge, but they didn't have half the intellect and perception Leia had in Lelouch's opinion, and more than once Lelouch had had to explain simple things in such a way he almost wished that he was facing his own brother than dealing with the fools.
"I don't understand," the old mashed face of Commander Caluan Ematt repeated again, for what seemed to Lelouch like the millionth time. He gritted his teeth beneath his mask and began again.
"These attacks by the Order are not random, Larissa is choosing them for a reason," he intoned slowly, with gentle emphasis in each word, hoping that this time the Commander would finally hear and understand. "She is systematically taking out the strongest allies and supporters of the former Republic so that the weaker ones will fall to the Order with little resistance and effort."
"But why choose Variath first?" the Commander insisted. "Though Variath was a strong supporter of the new Republic it was by no means its strongest ally. If your theory is correct, then there were far better planets and systems she could have chosen." This man clearly had no imagination, that much was clear.
Li interjected quickly, sensing his commander's frustration. "It was a trial run, Commander. Larissa was testing the efficiency of her team, before she could move onto larger targets."
"Why would she waste resources on something like that?" Caluan Ematt questioned.
"So that resources would not be lost later," Lelouch said through gritted teeth, "and it is the reason that she has managed every other battle with total victory."
"This is not the strategy the Order has employed in the past," the Commander stated roughly, "How did she learn this?"
"Larissa spent ten years on Britannia, under the tutelage of Schneizel el Britannia, who is considered to be the best strategist that Britannia had ever seen, and Larissa is one of the most intuitive and brilliant person that I have known, her powers notwithstanding. It's not surprising that she's managed to absorb Schneizel's knowledge and use it as she has." Lelouch paused, and an unwilling smile lit on his lips. "I dare say that she has even improved on what she has learned. It's the reason she continues to win, the reason why none have been able to stop her. They simply don't know how."
Commander Caluan Ematt had snorted then, looking disgruntled. "Is there anything that Prince didn't teach her?"
"Mercy," Lelouch said simply, and everyone fell silent.
I sat in the white hard chair, holding a glass of clear liquid in my hand. Across from me sat a nervous statesman from planet in the Castia cluster, his pale uniform practically blending into the white decor of the room. He was practically vibrating with fear at simply being in the same room as me. There was a time I would have tried to calm him down, give him a sense of peace, but his fear was far more useful to me now. The more unbalanced he was, the easier it would be to get what I needed from him. That didn't stop me from exchanging pleasantries to keep up appearances.
"Senator," I said patiently, resisting the urge to smirk, else it would be far too predictable. "There's no need to be so nervous. After all, wasn't it you who I called me?"
"Y-yes," the man stuttered out. "Forgive me Lady Ren."
"Larissa suits me fine," I said dismissively. "Now, I've taken a look at the proposition you were so kind to send me. I'm afraid there are some, problems."
"Wh- what kind of problems?" The man asked nervously.
I paused for a long moment, enough that the man began to shift even more in his chair before I began."Well, for one, I don't see any further provisions provided by your new government for the First Order. You wouldn't be taking advantage of the First Order's generous offer to place your government in control of this quadrant?"
The poor man paled even more. "N-no! We wouldn't-"
"Because if you were," I continued cutting him off like he hadn't spoken in the first place. "I would have to tell that the First Order does not take kindly to being used. I need not remind you of what happened to the last system who made that mistake."
The Senator was silent for a few moments, his fear getting the better of his voice. "What is it- you require of us in return?"
Finally, we were getting somewhere. "You will give us every known location of Resistance outposts in your cluster, as well as every government and official known to be harboring them, including any members of your own government."
"That is, a significant request," The Senator replied hesitantly. He was close, he just needed a little push.
"But Senator, we'll be doing all the hard work, we just need the specific information necessary for out targeting systems. You don't even have to lift a finger."
"None of the bloodshed will be on our hands?" he asked quietly. Oh this was far too easy, offering to do their dirty work. People like this Senator and his government were a dime a dozen. The moment a scapegoat for their guilt was offered, they latched onto it like a life preserver.
"Of course not," I said with a soft porcelain smile. "We wouldn't dream of making you do something so, uncomfortable." And it would be far too much of a liability to have their soldiers do the work. They could miss a Resistance member, or worse, let one go, and then I'd have to track them doing and that would be a waste of my time. Better to be sure now that to regret it later.
"I believe we could provide that information," The Senator finally said reluctantly. "As long as you can deliver on what you have promised.
"Do you doubt the First Order's ability?" I asked softly, raising an eyebrow.
"No," The Senator said quickly. "I have no doubt you are able to provide what you have asked."
"Excellent," I replied, satisfied he was now quite where I wanted him. "Now that, that little unpleasantness is out of the way, there are a few more things I would like to discuss."