Chapter 1
From the Private Journal of Jedi Master Jacen Solo
-With comments by B. Wrarm, Jedi Librarian-
-Six days after Mandalorian Assault on Hapes, 35 ABY-
-Soft click sound, some shuffling sounds and a soft pop-
Eww, what the...? Was that a... That's disgusting! How does a bug just explode? At least...I think it was a bug...Oh, man, that smells like...
-Indiscriminate frantic shuffling sounds and retching noises-
Whose stupid idea was it to build anything on this planet? Okay, get serious. Record button, and...
This is the private journal of Jedi Master Jacen Solo. Approximately three weeks ago the Sith attacked and took over Ossus while the Jedi were otherwise occupied, and by all reports my aunt and uncle, the Skywalkers, are dead.
I don't believe it. My sister doesn't believe it. And my mom doesn't believe it. Dad just kinda goes along with whatever mom says, but I think he believes us. Kyp wouldn't let us do anything, but Jaina, Mom, Dad, Eriana and I sat down to talk about it. I realized then that we couldn't risk anyone else, so I forbade them from doing anything. I left, alone, on a mission to find my aunt and uncle against the explicit orders of what is left of the Jedi Council, expressing the need to visit a group of Force users I had discovered years ago. Kyp was furious I was leaving – so furious that he refused to speak to me anymore – but if he wasn't going to authorize the mission, I knew I had to go on my own. He said we "had to sever ourselves from attachment and move on. A hopeless mission would only cost more lives." This isn't about attachment. This is about saving the Jedi Order. Luke and Mara are too valuable to the Jedi Order to be lost. Any chance of them still being alive warrants a rescue attempt for everyone's sake.
I left only two days after the attack, and already the Order was falling apart. Kyp practically seized control himself citing emergency measures, and the other Jedi Masters were in a power struggle with him on how to re-establish the Jedi Council. I couldn't stand to watch the idiocy of it all, and I knew I had to do something. Nobody but my family believes Luke and Mara are alive. I mean, who would believe us if we said otherwise? They are our highest ranking and most respected Jedi Masters and they're in the hands of the Sith. They've played ball with Palpatine and came back on top. It's not like they're going to be turned anytime soon. It would be much easier for the Sith to just kill them.
But that's not how Soora likes to operate. He's a perfectionist. Unstable, a bit psychotic, but a perfectionist nonetheless. But he's not stupid – a fact I think Kyp likes to ignore during the few times he grudgingly admits the Sith have, in fact, returned. If Soora's planning a war against the Jedi, and I'm sure he is, he's going to want information. Who better to provide information but the Grand Master of the Jedi? Uncle Luke knows about all the operations the Jedi have planned, safe houses, communication codes, and procedures. He is, for all intents and purposes, the key to the Jedi. And this is why, family issues aside, I have to rescue him.
Officially, they are dead. The day I left Cal Omas even held a memorial ceremony broadcast galaxy-wide to honour the loss of one of the Rebellion and Republic's greatest members. -He switches to a sarcastic tone of voice- What a tear jerker.
-Resumes normal voice- I believe I am the only one who can save them.
-He laughs softly- Sounds a tad arrogant, doesn't it? I didn't mean it that way. Honestly. It's just that I look back over the last five years, my training with Yoda and the others, the various cultures I've visited, and even the Sith holocrons I've studied, and I see that I have learned a lot of very useful skills in the Force that nobody else in the Order knows. The knowledge I have gathered will be extremely valuable in my search and will allow me to keep a step or two ahead of the Sith. Does it make me arrogant to say such a thing? I hope it is merely a statement in practicality.
One thing I learned is that the Sith, the real Sith, not these wannabes, were amazing at deception in far greater ways than we ever suspected. I picked up a technique from a holocron that Palpatine used to mask himself from the Jedi while he was around them every day. Combining it with Vergere's lessons, I can use the Force in small ways while maintaining a perfect disguise to the Sith in the Force. It should be just enough to keep myself going and use the Fallanassi techniques I learned so I can maintain an image of a different face that even Jaina would be fooled by.
As you probably know by now, I am infiltrating the ranks of our enemies in order to get close to Luke and Mara and free them. I have found an ally, who shall remain nameless in case this journal is somehow found and decrypted, that will help me as possible. We developed a plan, and both agreed to develop our own plans should the other be found out. We also agreed that, if necessary, one of us has to let the other hang if it means exposing both of us. Whoever has the best shot must take it for the sake of the Jedi Order.
-He pauses for several moments-
Everyone realizes that only Master Skywalker can repair the fractures in the Order, even Kyp. Uncle Luke must be brought back at all costs before Kyp's attempt at leading the Jedi destroys them.
If all goes well, anyone who reads this journal will already know who my ally is and the outcome of this unofficial, and likely crazy, mission. But I'm a Solo. If you listen to my dad, the Solos invented crazy. I mean, if a Solo could break into the Death Star with a Wookiee and...
-Distant shuffling sounds and indiscernible noises growing louder-
I have to go; someone's coming. I hope, if I am found and killed, this explains why I ran off while the Jedi Order was falling apart. Some Jedi said I should be replacing Luke, but that is not my place. Everyone knew someone needed to do something, and nothing else made sense. If I failed and you find this, please tell my family I love them.
End Entry
-
Roshi Grall checked his DC-92AJ-S sniper rifle for the third time, and swore at his superior officer.
"How kriffin' long do I have to wait here?"
"I'll make you lie there forever if you don't shut up and watch your target."
That was all the answer he expected to get. As the sniper in his squad of Mandalorian brothers – and sister – Roshi's job was to be patient and pick off targets when his squad mates told him to. Lanos Gaff, the squad leader, was an old Mandalorian. Old enough to brag that he almost became the template of the clones used during the Clone Wars. Nobody actually believed him, but his skill in battle, even in his old age, was second-to-none. He was a tough gundark, and fought every day to prove that. Some rumours around the ranks even claimed he was able to beat Jedi in hand-to-hand combat in his youth, and others traced his lineage to the Mandalorians that fought with Exar Kun. Either way, his gold-painted commander armour was well earned.
"Easy there, Roshi." A second voice came through the private squad frequency. The air-tight helmets kept sound from escaping so Roshi could be screaming bloody murder at his teammates and an enemy could walk within a metre of his head and not hear a thing. "We'll attack soon enough."
That was Parmis. Roshi only knew him as Parmis, and that is all he needed to know. Clad in blue and yellow armour, he was the second in command of the group and had been hand trained by Lanos since he was a baby. Parmis was a jack-of-all-trades on the battlefield. A born field combatant and leader, Parmis could fight bare-handed or with any weapon almost as well as anyone else in the squad. He carried the diplomacy in place of Lanos's gruffness, and always brought home his team. Usually he deferred to Lanos when the team was together, but Roshi had heard Parmis led his own missions from time to time.
"Gotcha, Parmy," Roshi acknowledged, his greenness amongst the Mandos showing through with an unauthorized nickname. "I'm just wondering why I can't take her head off now. I have a clear shot."
"Not too soon," Parmis replied. "When you're hunting down a Sith, the farther away you are the more likely they'll whip that lightsaber out and deflect it."
"I doubt she could block this thing," Roshi laughed, marvelling at the 92AJ's barrel.
"Shut up and wait," Lanos barked again. "Squeak, Trigger, move up and set your charges on that ridge. Don't forget your cloaking fields."
Roshi activated the scanner on his scope so he could track his cloaked squad mates. It was calibrated to detect the Mandalorian cloak energy field, but only for a specific squad. He glanced over the battlefield once more, taking in the whole picture. They were in an abandoned durasteel quarry on some unnamed planet in Hutt space attacking a Sith 'base' in a training exercise to teach Mandalorians how to defeat Jedi. So far the other Mandalorian squad was pinning the Sith down with long distance blaster fire as Lanos' squadron was sneaking around to take the Sith out from behind. Half an hour since the start of the exercise, Parmis and Blade had snuck around the left side while Lanos, Roshi, Squeak, and Trigger were on the right. Roshi had moved ahead on the right to get a clear shot across the side of the base, easily able to see all ten Sith and protect the rest of his squad while they laid charges on the ridge left over from mining operations. Parmis and Blade had already laid their charges, and Trigger and Squeak were finally in position.
"Isn't this gonna piss them off?" Roshi asked. "I mean, we're not supposed to be killing each other. Burying them in rocks isn't exactly playing friendly."
"Do you ever shut up?" Blade, the only female in the group, asked. A hand-to-hand and melee weapon specialist, she was tough as nails, short tempered, and carried an ancient Cortosis-wave sword on her green armour that could withstand blows from a lightsaber. She hated blasters, but carried a heavy repeating mini-cannon. She once explained to Roshi that if she had to fight at a distance, she might as well fight with the biggest, most forgiving weapon she could find. "The rocks are to trap them. Then we charge in, and shoot them in the head with a stun blast to win."
"Do you even have a stun setting on that portable turbolaser of yours?" Roshi asked sarcastically.
"Who recruited this kid?" She retorted. "I swear we should've left him on Nar Kreeta."
"Best raw sniper talent I've ever seen," Lanos grunted. "Shut up, both of you."
"Charges are set, and we're clear," Squeak reported. "Let's roast us some Sith!"
Squeak was the slicer in the company. Barely with the group longer than Roshi, he could reportedly handle any electronics, but was slightly clumsy in combat. He carried an assault rifle on loan from Trigger, but his blue armour was lined with various computer hacking tools whereas everyone else had retractable blades, flame throwers, or other weapons of the trade. He was the smallest physically in the group, and looked a lot like a Dantooine field mouse with ears that naturally sat pushed out from his head – which is how he got his nickname.
Trigger was the complete opposite of Squeak. The largest in the group with huge muscles and minimal brain power, he was likable in that he was grounded in his own reality, whatever that reality might be. An explosives and heavy weapons expert, he carried an assault rifle that mimicked his massive frame and he thoroughly enjoyed the usage of mines, grenades, and various other explosives whenever possible. To him, using explosives was more of an art than an expression of war. He wore full Mandalorian assault troop armour equipped with more integrated weapons than Boba Fett's, but he painted it completely black. While it looked very intimidating and intentional, Blade once told Roshi that he fell into a vat of paint during a mission and never bothered to clean his armour afterwards. Even though he looked like he could wrestle a Wookiee into submission, his hand-to-hand combat skills were as brutal as his etiquette.
"Whenever you're ready, Trigger," Lanos said calmly.
"Ready for it…and…BOOM."
Nothing happened.
"Now, I know I'm new to all this," Roshi said. "But isn't there supposed to be fire and flying rocks and that sort of thing?"
Trigger growled some indiscriminate and inappropriate words at Roshi, some of which were drowned out by intense clicking noises making their way through the comm channel.
"Heads up," Parmis said calmly. "The Sith know we're here. Blondie just pointed at us."
"They must be jamming the detonation frequency," Lanos said. "Roshi, make that rifle of yours useful and hit the charges or I'll beat you with the thing myself."
"Yes, boss!" Roshi targeted the detpacks and tagged all four of them with his HUD using a series of eye blinks and the linked targeting scope on his blaster.
"Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom."
Four explosions sent a cascade of rocks sliding down towards the Sith. Roshi twisted the focus on his barrel, separating it into five parts and aimed at the Sith leader. Suddenly distracted by the discovery of a rockslide coming at her and destroying her jamming equipment, the rather pretty blonde with three ugly scars on her forehead did not sense his aim at first. He pulled the trigger to launch five blaster bolts at her, and was glad to see that one made it through her lightsaber defence. He smiled to himself, enjoying the effect of the Anti-Jedi technology modified into the sniper rifle. In theory, a Jedi would be able to deflect two, maybe three, or even four of the five blaster bolts the multi-position five barrel rifle could produce, but not the fifth. The blaster bolt that made its way through her defence struck her forearm and sent her lightsaber flying away. A second shot to the chest with all five barrels dropped her like a rock.
Speaking of rocks…
"Did someone forget to do the math?" Roshi asked. All the rocks that were loosed by the explosion were tumbling slowly, running out of momentum as they bounced down the rock face. They finally stopped just shy of the Sith as the remaining nine charged up the settling rockslide towards the commando squad.
"Nope," Trigger said happily. "Those little gundark lickers won't know what hit them. Boom." He squeezed a second trigger and half a dozen flash-bang grenades amongst the rubble went off, burning magnesium for ten seconds and creating a deafening sonic wave to overload the senses of the Sith. Roshi took the opportunity to down another three Sith, while his squadmates opened up and wiped out the rest of the Sith squad.
"Mandos: Ten, Sith: Zero," Blade said, a grin obvious in her words.
"And I didn't even get to use my plasma grenades," Trigger pouted.
-
Ossus' fluffy clouds buffeted the transport as it made its way through the atmosphere on the way to the new Sith Academy, bouncing the occupants around as it made its final approach. Sekava finally pretended to wake up and instantly regretted it as the annoying red haired boy beside him started jabbering away again.
"Hey, you're awake!" The boy exclaimed. "Do you think its safe, the bumping around? This is the first time I've been in a space ship."
"I know," Sekava moaned. "You said that when we got on the ship. And when we took off. And twenty times an hour since we got on here. Do you ever shut up?"
"No," He shook his head enthusiastically. "My mom always said I'd talk the ears off a gundark. That reminds me of a joke about an Ithorian, a gundark, and a krayt dragon…"
Sekava turned his ears off and stared out the window again, pretending to be absorbing Ossus's landscape. The boy beside him was less than half his age, and Sekava could not understand why he had been selected to become a Sith. This boy's mannerisms seemed more aligned with the Jedi than the Sith. He was as weak as they came, and twice as annoying.
This sure wasn't in the brochure, Sekava thought. I thought the others were annoying, but this kid is just painful.
"Say, Morris," Sekava turned to the little kid beside him as the ship finally started to settle down. "Tell me about your home. What was it like?"
"Oh, we lived on a farm," Morris said as enthusiastically as an over-charged droid. "Mom and dad were great and they always took care of me. Dad said he was going to build me a …"
"Attention passengers, this is the captain speaking," A deep mellow voice suddenly announced. "We have arrived at Ossus and you will now exit out the doors you entered. Your belongings are to be removed with you or they will never be seen again. Depart immediately."
"That guy makes me laugh," Morris grinned. "He sounds so happy when he talks."
Sekava knew the reason the pilot sounded so 'happy' – Morris had spend about an hour questioning him about every last knob and dial in the cockpit before being physically removed and having the door locked in his face. The pilot refused to come out for the rest of the trip, and only opened the door for meals. Sekava did not bother responding and picked up the small satchel that carried all his possessions – two changes of clothes and various pieces of survival gear. As his story went, having been a drifter that the Sith had picked up on Nar Kreeta, he did not have many possessions save a few credits, a couple good vibroknives and the blaster he wore against his chest beneath his tattered leather jacket.
Morris, however, seemed to have packed everything short of his favourite nerf. Sekava helped him carry one bag off the ship while Morris struggled with another one. They made it out of the ship with the twenty other Sith-hopefuls who were travelling from various worlds to Ossus to be greeted by an angry looking man with a shaved head, black robes, and a ragged leather cape that looked like it was torn off a giant beast.
"He has a lightsaber!" Morris pointed at the angry man. "Sekava, look at that, a real lightsa-!"
Morris' words were cut off by the sound of the lightsaber igniting and the sudden breeze of air bringing that lightsaber and the angry man up to his neck.
"You will speak when spoken to," The man growled with his nose a thumb width from Morris's. "Or you will not speak again."
Morris stood petrified as the man withdrew.
"I am Darth Krak," He announced in a low voice just above a growl, lightsaber still humming angrily in his hand. "You are the newest students of the Sith Empire. Here on Ossus you will learn the ways of the Force from myself and others. Failure is not an option. Bravery and cunning will be rewarded, while compassion and weakness will not be accepted. You will not leave the Sith Academy unless an instructor allows otherwise. Your training is serious: It will be up to you to continue the Sith legacy. We have two rules here: Do not speak to the Mandalorians; and do not find yourself somewhere you should not be."
He pointed to a building in the centre of the complex with his lightsaber blade.
"Those are the dorms," Krak said. "Find a room to yourself and wait there until I find you. If I catch anyone wandering the halls or in another's room before I speak to them…"
A flourish of his blade finished the sentence.