Chapter 1
STARKILLER HATED BEING ON THE SHIP SO CLOSE TO VADER AND HIS DARK AURA. The bulkheads and corridors between them did nothing to ease his mind. Every time he slept, he saw Vader there, watching over him. Replays in his mind of his training—his template's training. The beatings, the electrocutions, the chokeholds with a hand he could not pull away. Though his body did not bear these scars and bruises, they were still in his mind.
Juno stirred beside him. Her hair, though short, was enough to cover her face completely when she slept. He brushed her hair away from her face and looked at her beautiful features. He knew, though he didn't tell her, that she was the only thing that kept him from his darker side. His memories—killing Shaak Ti and Kazden Paratus, maiming Master Kota and all of the other lives he'd ended during his tenure as Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine's naïve servant—could not be changed. Those wounds, more emotional than physical, still hurt. Were he to lose her, he feared he'd revert to that fool, that mindless monster that had needlessly killed for no sole purpose than because his Master had told him to.
He needed a distraction. He picked up his lightsabers and left the room. PROXY was currently deactivated for maintenance. Master Kota was asleep in the cargo hold. Though the older Jedi had his confidence and his link to the Force back, he still liked to drink a little more than he should. Starkiller kicked the man's shin. He woke up and looked up at him with his cataract eyes. "What is it, boy? Can't you let me sleep?"
"You've been asleep for a day, Master. How can you sleep with that monster in the brig, anyway?"
"I can sleep because I know where that monster is. As long as he's in the brig, he's not harming anyone out in the galaxy." Kota burped. "Now, what do you want?"
"Are you up for a sparing match?"
"Can't you use PROXY?"
"He's down for repairs. Besides, we wouldn't want you getting rusty in your old age."
Kota laughed. "Jedi don't get rusty, kid, we're either good, great or rusty when we start out."
"Well then, get up and prove to me that you weren't rusty to begin with."
Kota laughed again, then stood up. His lightsaber was in a sheath on his back. Though its practicality was questionable—unlike a sword with a durasteel blade, he couldn't just put a lightsaber with its blade extended into a sheath—it seemed to be in keeping with the old man's style. He looked like a warrior of old.
He drew his lightsaber now, and with a snap-hiss, his green blade appeared inches away from his face. Starkiller took both of his lightsabers from his belt and ignited them. The lightsaber in his left hand was red, a left over from his time as Vader's slave, the one in his right hand was blue, a more recent blade he'd gotten from a small, green, frog-like creature on Dagobah. Unlike Kota, who held his blade forward, in an Ataru-like pose, Starkiller held his back-handed. Maris Brood had held her baton-like lightsabers the same way.
Kota took the first swing. Starkiller hopped to the left, and used his blue lightsaber to block Kota. The green blade swung up now, and Kota jumped with it. Starkiller waited three seconds, then jumped up with him. The cargo hold on the Rogue Shadow was not excessively large, but it could hold a few AT-ST-sized crates. Kota landed on one about the size of man and Starkiller landed on a similar-sized one two meters away.
Starkiller sped forward with the Force, then cross-slashed in Kota's direction, but Kota was no longer there. He'd sensed Starkiller's move and jumped out of the way. He then brought his own blade in a diagonal slash toward Starkiller's leg, but he moved out of the way before the blade hit. Kota landed back on his crate, and Starkiller landed on his.
"You're pretty fast, old man," Starkiller said, with a smile.
Kota nodded. "I told you, either good, great or rusty to begin with."
"So which were you? Good, great or rusty?"
"Well, considering I was able to stay ahead of you? I'm at least a good."
Starkiller laughed, then jumped down to the cargo bay floor just as Kota did. "Go get some sleep, old man. I'll see you when we drop Vader off at Dantooine tomorrow."
"Right. You get some yourself." He flashed a quick smile. "Juno should be happy with you."
Starkiller reached out with the Force and sensed her standing in the doorway, staring straight at him. He sighed and put his lightsabers away. They wouldn't help much in his current situation. He walked over to her and saw the stern look in her eyes. "What? I couldn't sleep."
"And if you can't sleep, you just disappear and I find you trying to kill your Master?"
"I wasn't trying to kill him. We were sparring."
"Sparing, killing, is there really a difference in the lives of the Jedi?"
"A huge difference. It's the Sith that don't discriminate between the two."
Juno just looked away. She knew of his apprehension to being compared to a Sith. Starkiller lifted her head up and kissed her on the lips. "I didn't mean it like that," he said. "I just want you to understand: my past—the real Starkiller's past—haunts my dreams. I don't know what to make of it all."
"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said it. I'll go back to bed and you can do whatever it is you want to do."
"Actually," he said, "I could use some sleep now, too."
A DISTURBANCE IN THE FORCE WOKE HIM. He instantly sat up and stretched out, looking for the cause. He saw it immediately: a wedge-shaped battleship, and another with four massive orbs on it. An Imperial Star Destroyer, and an Interdictor cruiser. They'd been brought out of hyperspace by the gravity-well generators of the Interdictor. "Juno, get up!" Starkiller almost shouted. She was up almost as instantly. She ignored putting the rest of her clothes on and ran to the cockpit. Starkiller left his shirt, as well.
Two Lambda-class shuttles were en route to the Shadow. No TIEs had been launched, and neither the Destroyer nor the Interdictor were firing at them. "What are they doing?" Juno asked.
"They want their commander left unharmed."
Juno switched on the cameras in the holding cell. "Vader is still locked down. Looks like those Force-inhibiting slugs General Kota gave us are working just fine."
"Yeah, but as soon as those stormtroopers get on board, we're gonna be in big trouble—start evasive maneuvers, let's see if we can't get them shooting at us."
Starkiller sat down at the weapons console and got the blasters going. He targeted the closest of the two Lambdas and fired, hitting its dorsal wing. It was a lucky shot: it suddenly went out of control and hit the other Lambda. Two more left the Destroyer's docking bay. They were persistant, he'd give them that. "They're still not shooting us," Juno said with humor in her voice.
"I'm trying, Juno. Just keep us moving."
Juno had gotten them away from the two battlecruisers, but the Interdictor's gravity-well was still in effect. They were currently in the gravitational field of a gas giant the size of Bespin. Kota rushed into the room. "What's going on?"
"Imperials are coming for Vader. Looks like the Emperor can't let his valued commander go for even a few days." Starkiller turned to look at his Master. "Sit down and strap yourself in, old man."
"Oh, so this is where the fun begins, huh?"
Juno scoffed and said, "Funny, I was just gonna say I had a bad feeling about this."
Starkiller turned back to the weapons console and kept shooting, taking down another of the Lambdas that were chasing them. Two more were quickly closing the gap. "Juno, we need to go faster, right now."
"What the hell do you think I'm doing? Picking roses?"
"They're gonna havta be for our funeral if we don't go faster!"
"Now, now, boy, patience," Kota said, his voice calm.
"We're being chased by a Star Destroyer, an Interdictor cruiser and six Lambda-class shuttles that are probably full of stormtroopers—why should I be patient?"
Juno added, "Don't forget to tell him about the Sith Lord on board."
Kota said, "If you look at the nav computer right now, Juno, you'll find that we've cleared the Interdictor's gravity field."
Starkiller glanced over at the readout and found that Kota was right—they were now capable of going into hyperspace. Juno pulled back the levers and hit the switch. The star field expanded into star lines and then into the blue star tunnel that was hyperspace. Starkiller breathed a sigh of relief—for now, they were out of it.
He turned to Kota. "So, you egged me to be patient for the two seconds we needed to go into hyperspace?"
"And I was afraid clairvoyance wasn't your strong suit."
Starkiller shook his head. "You're a very unorthodox teacher, old man."
"My students used to call me 'wise'."