A/N: I will be on hiatus for the next three weeks because I'll be on vacation without internet. Posting will resume on August 9th.

Chapter 10

Soora had hardly stepped foot on Ossus when his lieutenants called him to an urgent meeting. He rushed into his office and found his two Sith and Mandalore waiting for him. Neither was stupid enough to comment on his delay, and simply started once he was seated.

"The assault on the Black Vornskrs was a complete success," Darth Treulos said. "We lost one Mandalorian commando team, but the other escaped. We were able to neutralize the defences in time for the fleet to destroy the base. No other casualties or losses on our side."

"Excellent!" Soora exclaimed. "Please tell me the rest of your news is equally favourable."

"Indeed," Krak spoke with his characteristic predatory grin. "We have reports from our spies on Coruscant that the Alliance is demanding blood for the Jedi's failures. The videos of the assault on Mandalore and of Kyp Durron's blunder have only been the start of the Jedi's problems. The Alliance is now preparing an assault on the Jedi Temple to put the Jedi under arrest until things stabilize. Apparently they believe the Jedi are a threat to the cohesiveness of the Alliance."

Soora had not smiled so broadly in years. Years of plans, schemes, and dreams were finally coming to fruition.

"An ally of ours on Coruscant is broadcasting the assault to us," Urik said, playing with a holodisplay. "If reports are correct, it should be starting momentarily."

"While we are waiting," Krak spoke slowly. "I have some unfavourable news to report."

"Oh?" Soora asked.

"I was in the medical wing last night and I overheard treason among one of our most promising students," Krak reported. "The one you saved from Zaren."

"Ah, that one. Such a powerhouse, that Sekava is. A valuable addition to us," Soora drew silent for a moment. "But we are too few to accept treason. Give him the chance to redeem himself. If he does not, fix the problem yourself."

"Yes, Master," Krak said emotionlessly. He noticed a flicker of interest from Darth Treulos, but would refuse to say anything even if he had the chance.

"I have it," Urik said. The holo image appeared, showing the Jedi Temple on Coruscant.

A giant pyramid atop a giant pedestal, it was an obelisk amid a city of spires. The image showed a column of Alliance troops approaching from each side with a pathway. Before the troops could arrive at the tower, a ring of explosions fired off a quarter of the way up the obelisk, stopping the advance of the troops. A moment later an explosion of fire burst out from the ring and the entire Jedi Temple seemed to raise itself up.

"What is happening?" Soora demanded, slamming his fists on his desk.

The Temple hesitated a moment before a secondary burst of flame increased the rate of ascent and launched the building into the sky. The camera jerked as it adjusted itself hastily to follow the Temple as it soared into the sky like an ancient ballistic missile, tracking its progress until the Temple became a spec in the sky.

"What happened?" Soora shouted, throwing the contents of his desk at the holo display, shattering the screen. He reached deep into the Force and flung his desk against the wall with enough force to send half of it through the wall and bend the legs back. His throne met the wrath of his lightsaber, and if Darth Krak had not attacked and disarmed Soora, Urik would have been next.

"We don't know, Master," Krak growled. "And destroying your office will not change that."

"Find out!" Soora shouted. "Get out!"

It was an order the lieutenants could not refuse.

-

"What was that?" Darth Treulos grabbed Krak's arm when they were down the hallway and out of earshot from both Soora and Urik. "Has he gone nuts?"

Krak looked around to ensure they were safe, and pulled her into an empty room.

"Lord Bulq's condition worsens," He said to the little woman. "You have not been around him as long as I have, but sometimes he…needs protection from himself."

"Is he insane?" Treulos asked with enough concern in her voice to make it clear she was seriously considering the possibility, not just over-reacting. "He doesn't exactly seem all there, if you ask me."

"He is a clone," Krak said after a moment of consideration. "He told me once he was cloned from the body of a Jedi Master. I have heard stories that Jedi clones do not come out…normal."

"Like Joruus C'boath?" Treulos asked with a heavy dose of disbelief. "Great. This is just great. We're committed to a lunatic!"

"That fact does not leave this room," Krak ordered. "But you may be right. I suppose you didn't hear about Zaren?"

"No. Who is Zaren?"

"One of our most skilled students," Krak explained. "Or at least, he was. Soora killed him for breaking a rule of the Sith Academy. He said Zaren had repeatedly offended the rules, but nothing of the sort happened. That was the first time. At first I thought he killed Zaren to punish me for selecting him as an apprentice, but it didn't make sense. I think he's losing his grasp of reality."

"We might have to act against him to save ourselves," Treulos said.

"Such is the Sith way," Krak agreed. "But not yet. He still has his uses. We will keep this between us for now."

"Agreed."

-

Sekava accessed yet another document of jumbled letters and damaged images recovered from the Jedi database. During the assault on Ossus the Jedi had activated the auto-delete safeguard on the databank, but some residual data remained. Several Sith students were doing their best to comb through the information, searching for a nugget of information that might reveal a Jedi secret to gain favour with their instructors. So far, the purge was winning the battle.

"Find anything?" Hashi purred as she slipped her arms around Sekava and pressed her chest hard against his back. He took his eyes off the jarbled mess of letters on his datapad and rolled his eyes in annoyance.

"Nothing," Sekava said irritably. And I'm not going to find anything if you keep nibbling on my ear!

"Maybe we can do something else instead," She suggested playfully, sliding a hand down to his thigh.

"Here you go," Sekava said, removing her hand from his leg and pressing another datapad into it. "You can see if there is anything important in the medical files."

She withdrew immediately and bashed the datapad on the back of his head. To her dissatisfaction the datapad refused to turn off, so she hit him again.

"What was that for?" Sekava exclaimed, pushing her away.

"Testing the Force," She growled, plopping herself into a seat to Sekava's right and putting her feet up on his lap. "If it broke, I'd know there was nothing important on it."

"Hmm," Sekava grunted, returning to his datapad. After several minutes of having the general area of his upper thighs rubbed by her feet, the datapad hit him on the head again.

"Would you stop that?" Sekava demanded.

"But it's so boring here," Hashi drawled. "Come on Sekava, let's do something fun."

"You're worse than Morris," Sekava mumbled low enough that she could not hear. A couple seconds later she lit her lightsaber and started to trace his head with it, just outside of touching his hair and skin. He stopped reading as she hovered the blade at his eyes. He turned to glare at her after she waved the blade up and down a couple millimetres at a time to create a very annoying buzz.

"Please?" She pleaded, pulling the blade away and deactivating it.

"Fine," Sekava said irritably. "What do you want to do?"

Bounding with excitement, she dove forward and grabbed his forearm with a giant smile on her face and a twinkle in her eye.

"Let's steal some of those Mando speeders and take 'em for a ride into the forest where we'll be all alone," Her smile turned to a grin more commonly seen on a child being taken to a candy store for the first time.

"That won't help us stop the Jedi," Sekava said adamantly, turning back to his datapad. The importance of these Jedi files was enormous. He had to make sure he found anything that survived before anyone else. "If we find something, then we'll go."

"Sekava," The deep voice associated with Darth Krak came from behind him.

"Master?"

"Come with me."

Sekava got up and followed his master, leaving Hashi behind. She reluctantly called the discarded datapad to her hand with the Force and started reading it again.

When Krak reached a door down the hallway, he entered it and beckoned Sekava to follow. He walked into an otherwise empty room and a rather stern expression on his master's face. The door slammed shut behind him, giving him a start.

"I know what you are planning."

Sekava's heart sunk. He struggled to clear his mind, keep his thoughts on the data files, but he knew Krak was not talking about them.

"You will fix this problem, or I will."

"How, Master?" Sekava asked.

"Morris is in that room waiting for a special lesson," Krak nodding to the door behind him. "You will give it to him."

With that he started to walk out, but stopped himself.

"You are our most promising student. If it were not for that, I would not even give you the chance to redeem your treason."

-

About twelve hours, sixty sabbac rounds, several drunken battle songs to the tune of a couple bottles of smuggled Mandalorian moonshine later, Roshi and Trigger were sleeping against the security door that led to the holding chamber when Lanos and Blade came for their scheduled shift. Roshi's blaster rifle was crammed between his leg and the corner of the door with his head resting on the barrel, and Trigger was curled up in a ball hugging his heavy repeating blaster against his body like a lost lover. The rotation was designed so that there would be an overlap between shifts to double the guards when the Jedi were awake, but it seemed that there was no plan in place for sleeping guards.

"What I wouldn't do for a holoimager right about now, I don't know," Blade said.

"Better wake them up," Lanos said. "I'd rather not have the Sith find out about this."

"True," Blade extracted her sword. "But they make a cute couple."

She rapped the side of her blade on Roshi's helmet, and then on Trigger's. Roshi instantly jumped to his feet, but Trigger rolled over and mumbled some words to his blaster and made some motions against it that would have been inappropriate suggestions even in a bedroom with a mistress.

"I really didn't need to witness that." Blade sounded like she was about ready to revisit her last meal. "I've seen gore easier to take than that."

"You and me both," Roshi agreed. He kicked Trigger's helmet with a roundhouse kick that could wind a Wookiee. "Rontobreath! Get up!"

"Woah. Hey, man," Trigger adjusted his helmet and pulled himself to his feet. "Is our shift over?"

"Four more hours," Lanos said. "Which is four hours longer than you would've had to live if the Sith caught you two idiots sleeping."

"Sorry, Lanos," Roshi apologized. "But they shouldn't have put us on a sixteen hour detail after an op and nearly twenty hours without sleep."

"You're a Mandalorian," Lanos said coldly. "Start acting like one."

"It's just not fun here," Trigger said. "I can do fifty hours in a lightfight without batting an eye, but this is just plain boring."

"Let's have some fun then," Blade said. "The Jedi are awake."

She shoved past Trigger and Roshi and shoved the door open as the Jedi were being pulled up into the Embrace of Pain.

"Oh, look, Luke," Mara said. "It's the tin can collection. Just as dumb as stormtroopers but one for every décor."

Blade pulled her sword out and slapped Mara's head with the broad side.

"Wanna play some games, girly?" She asked, holding the blade to the hollow of her collarbone and using the broad side to pull Mara's chin up. "I could carve you up and feed some parts of you to your buddies here."

"I sense you have issues," Mara said knowledgably. "Let me guess: You had a buddy who was killed by a Jedi? No, wait. Let me think. I assassinated your granddaddy? That one's come up a couple times."

"Jedi slime have been killing Mandalorians for centuries," Blade said, pushing the blade against Mara's neck a little harder and twisting it slightly. "You don't seem to understand that sometimes that hurts after a few generations."

"I've never killed a Mando," Mara said nonchalantly, ignoring the pain in her neck. "Stormtroopers, Yuuzhan Vong, politicians, spies, governors, but never a Mando. Why don't you let me down so you can be my first?"

Blade tried to slash the vines of the Embrace, but Lanos grabbed her wrist at the last second.

"The former Emperor's Hand isn't the smartest person to pick a fight with," He chided her. "Especially now that she's a mother."

"You're no fun," Mara and Blade both said to Lanos at the same time, then glared at each other.

"Why are you here?" Luke asked.

"We're your guards," Lanos replied. His voice was indifferent, as if he would not care if he was playing cards or shooting at the Jedi rather than guarding them. He grabbed a bench and pulled it over to sit in front of the hanging Jedi. "We just wanted to get to know our charges a bit better."

"Oh," Luke said. The vines twisted his arms a bit, causing him to wince. "In that case, my name is Luke. I'm a Jedi, I have a kid, Ben, this is my wife, Mara, and I love flying X-wings. But won't say no to an old T-14."

"I'm Mara. The Emperor trained me as his best assassin and I told me to kill the guy I eventually married."

"I'm Kam, married, and I love sleeping in on weekends and playing sabbac."

"Wow, this is so very touching," Trigger said with false sympathy. "Let's let them loose and hunt them down. It'll be fun!"

Roshi took his helmet off and rubbed his eyes. He looked surprisingly tired, even when considering the long shift he just had.

"Oh quit it, will ya?" He said to Trigger. "They're prisoners, not pets. I bet they couldn't even walk if they were let out of that Vong contraption. That little one with the sandy hair hardly looks strong enough to sneeze without breaking a rib."

"I'm with Trigger," Blade said, still eyeing Mara. "I think they'd be a worthy hunt."

"More of a hunt than you can handle, I assure you." Lanos said. "Put your bucket back on, Roshi. This isn't a vacation."

"Yessir."

"I saw you in action once," Lanos pointed at Luke. "You took on an entire sail barge of Jabba's troops without batting an eye. A few of us were planning to take care of Jabba together after they dumped you into the pit, but you rebels beat us to it. You'd be worthy among the Mandalorians."

"My sister killed the slug," Luke said, hardly able to believe what his guard was saying to him. "I just provided the distraction."

"Still, your feats have only been better since," Lanos said. "I could welcome you among our ranks, if I wasn't sure you'd kill us in our sleep and try to escape. I could never trust a Jedi among us, but together we'd be a force to be reckoned with."

"We could offer you a place in the Alliance," Luke offered. "I have Cal Omas's ear."

"And leave the Mandalorians?" Lanos laughed. "Wishful thinking, Skywalker."

At that moment Darth Treulos entered the prison.

"You're lucky you're inside," She snapped. "Get out and watch the door. It's time I had some fun with the prisoners."

"Just don't start with the head," Roshi slapped her on the arm as he walked past on his way out. "The brain gets all fuzzy."