Five Years Later
It was always dark on Corellia, the heavy clouds and heavier smog from the shipyards overhanging. Canna Vizs, Administrator of the Commerce Guild, made her way through the halls of the Bright Star Shipyards administrative building, where they had been churning out ships ever since the Separatists declared themselves independent. The Republic had signed most of Corellia to exclusive contracts not long after which allowed the Commerce guild to produce out ship after ship of war for a price more than some systems' annual budget. There was the issue of the treaty and the shaky peace it had ushered in, but Vizs wasn't worried. It wouldn't last. Peace never did.
She opened the door to her office and stepped inside. It was quieter in here, the walls bedecked in dark woods and art and crimson velvets designed to demonstrate influence and power to potential clients and to muffle the endless cacophony from outside. But the lights did not automatically turn on as they should have. Grumbling under her breath, she turned to fiddle with the controls with her long, elegant blue hands.
She certainly didn't spend enough time in this soot trap for the office to get regular use, maybe one of the wires was faulty. But the staff should have kept up with this most basic of maintenance. Maybe she'd have them all reviewed and fired in the morning.
A warm breeze reeking of factory fuel wafted over her, and Vizs made a noise of disgust before turning. Who had left the window open?
Not only was the window open, but an intruder stood in front of a painting, humanoid and dressed in trim black tabbards and a black helmet that entirely hid their head. They blended into the shadows, barely touched by the light spilling from the lamp, and they held their hands behind their back as they regarded some painting on the wall with unsettling ease. No client of hers, certainly.
She growled. "Who are you? Who let you in here?"
The intruder didn't move. "I let myself in. Please, have a seat." His voice was low, softer than she expected, and almost warm as if they were discussing a business deal over dinner instead of an office invasion. He tilted his head to one side, and she was suddenly unnerved.
"You can explain it to the chief of security." She stormed over to her desk, reached for the alarm, but the intruder raised his hand, and her office chair hit the back of her legs, and she sat down hard. What on-Vizs grabbed for the drawer with the blaster in it, but he was across the room and standing before her.
"Come now, my friend, there's no need for anything so uncivilized." He sounded almost as if he were smiling.
Trying not to panic, she grabbed at the communicator on her belt, but it flew from her hand to the intruder's and he crushed, sparks falling from his gloved fist.
"How did-What do you want?" she sputtered.
"Your guild has connections to the Black Sun."
She shook her head. Deny everything. That's what her litigators would tell her. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"You're lying." The skull-like helmet tilted ever so slightly, and she thought the room might have gotten colder despite the heat of the factory coming through the window.
"I'm not; I swear it."
"You are. You're well connected in the galaxy, on Coruscant. You stood to benefit from the blockade of Naboo, and you don't care where your ships go or what they're used for. You don't care if they're used to blockade innocent systems to starve or frighten them into obedience. Your greed and your callousness reek of the Dark Side." He reached out and raised two fingers in front of Vizs' face. "You will tell me what you know about Darth Maul and the Black Sun."
"I will tell you what I know about Darth Maul and the Black Sun. They're nothing. Weak. They support our mining operations, help us move cargo we don't want to be taxed or noticed-"
"I know that. What about Darth Maul? His associates?"
She frowned. She did want to tell him what she knew, but her memory came up blank. I don't know anybody named Darth."
"Don't you? Think harder. Red and black Zabrak, angry."
"I have so many clients; I meet so many people." She shook her head, and it cleared slightly. Why was she talking to this man? Where the hell were her guards? "What do you want? Money? A ship? I can give you both."
He fell silent for a moment then let go of her wrist and straightened. "Fortunately for you, you're not what I'm looking for."
"What—"
The door chimed, and six guards poured into the room, blasters raised.
"It took you long enough!" She jolted to her feet and spun the chair around to put an obstacle between her and the spy or whatever he was.
"Halt!" One of the guards ordered.
He raised his hands in the most casual surrender Vizs had ever seen. An explosion boomed in the distance, the flare of red light blinding and concussive sound rattling the windows. She flinched and covered her face, but the window held.
"Ah. That would be my cue."
Red alarm lights and a horrible siren blared through the building.
Then the intruder was at the window, holding onto the frame with one hand as he leaned out over empty air. He couldn't think to jump; it was hundreds of feet to the shipyard floor. That would save her the trouble of having him killed and his body disposed of in the incinerators. But she wanted to know who he was behind the helmet. She wanted to make him suffer for his impudence. The reek of burning oil filled the air, and black smoke billowed from the distant fuel reserves. Millions of credits, gone up in smoke.
She turned her fury on the intruder, but the flickering light of the fire finally illuminated the front of his helmet properly. From the chin of the helmet to the center of the forehead spanned the white imprint of a human hand.
The White Hand.
With a sudden surge of terror, Vizs staggered backward, and the guards hesitated. They'd all heard the stories about Count Dooku's right hand. None of them wanted to be the first to charge the Separatists' attack hound.
"Gentleman." To the guards, he raised two fingers to his temple in a jaunty salute. The distant flames backlit him like some kind of demon. "Madam. My apologies for the mess."
The guards surged forward, but he flipped out the window and vanished from sight. Vizs rushed to the window, wanted to see herself that the White Hand was dead. But when she elbowed the guards aside and peered down, there was no sign of the man in black. Only the drone of the alarm and the smoke and sparks of the distant blaze.
Bant lay atop the rise that hid the temple and village from sight, and she used the rifle scope to pan once across the horizon and the various islands and inlets that dotted the landscape. Luminara lay at her side, company for the watch shift, and the Mirialan used a set of binoculars Anakin had repaired to scan for any incoming visitors.
Plo and Garen were due back any day now with the youngling from Balmorra. A retrieval that far into Republic territory was dangerous, and Bant had tried to go with them, but two was already two too many. And she had a padawan to worry about now-Nahdar, eager to learn, more eager to please. Kit would have liked him.
Bant's heart twisted. Not as much as it might have once, but she had lost two masters to untimely deaths. She wouldn't inflict that on Nahdar.
Distant shrieks of laughter caught her attention, and she glanced over one shoulder. A group of padawans was scattered through the tall grass desperately trying to round up a young shorgoat that must have escaped the pen. A gaggle of younglings sprinted after them, laughing and shrieking and bobbing in the brown grass after the older children. The goat darted back and forth, evading their dives, then it leaped up one of the stone mounds and stopped on an invisible ledge, precariously balanced.
Grouping together, the padawans stared up at it. Then a blonde boy blisteringly bright in the Force began climbing after it. Anakin.
"Hmm. Looks like Skywalker is handling it." Luminara peered through her binoculars with a small smile.
"He does always seem to be in the thick of things, doesn't he?"
"Obi-Wan rubbed off on him. Master Billaba has her hands full with that one."
Bant smiled. For everything that had gone wrong, she still Garen and Luminara. They had lost so many others, had lost Quinlan and Siri and Shaak Ti, but the three of them were still alive. Still together. Obi-Wan too was out there somewhere, looking for them. Force willing, he would join them soon. "Just wait until you get a padawan, 'Nara. Then you'll be the one chasing after some child's wild ideas."
Luminara's smile faded. "If we are still taking padawans by then."
Bant frowned. "What do you mean?"
"Nahdar was the last of the younglings with their own lightsaber. Our numbers grow every year, and there is no way to get the new younglings kyber crystals."
Bant blinked her large eyes and glanced back at Anakin, who was halfway up the rock face. "Are you certain?"
"It is simply too dangerous. The Republic has locked down Illum, Dantooine, Jedha-"
She jerked her head back to her friend. "Jedha is supposed to be neutral territory."
"It was." Luminara finally lowered her binoculars and shook her head regretfully. "I heard Masters Masona and Nema talking last night. The Republic offered Jedha famine relief that came part and parcel with military protection to 'keep the peace.'" She bared her teeth, and the Force twisted ever so slightly in grief behind the Mirialan's shields. "That's supposed to be us, Bant. We're meant to be helping people, and we can't even help ourselves."
The Mon Cala sat up, legs crossed, and laid a webbed hand on Luminara's shoulder. "I know. But we can only do what we can. Even if… if none of this had happened, we could still not help everyone."
"I knew there would be hard choices as a Jedi," Luminara said slowly, the struggle to speak her heart evident in her face. "I was prepared to make them, but this…" She didn't know how to be a Jedi like this. None of them did. Clenching her jaw, Luminara looked away for a moment to master herself. Then she raised her binoculars again. "The Holocron has kyber in it."
Bant inhaled sharply. That was… that was true. That was why the holocrons could only be opened by a Jedi. But taking the kyber out of a Holocron would destroy the knowledge inside, and Jocasta would fight tooth and nail before she let anyone dismantle what was left of her archives.
"Do you think they'll do it?"
Anakin had chased the goat down to the ground where Nahdeer and Kalifa pounced on it and collared it with a grass rope. The younglings cheered, and Anakin swung Caleb onto his shoulders with a victorious raise of his fists. The boy laughed and raised his own small fists in the air. Those boys would be nothing but trouble when Depa took the Dume boy on after Anakin. If they were still taking padawans by the time Caleb was old enough.
Luminara didn't look at her. "I don't know. But whatever the Council decides, things are changing."
Then the padawans were shouting again, and Anakin took off through the grass, a gaggle of screaming younglings in tow. The Mon Cala knight shook her head and turned back to her watch. "I think things have been changing for a while, Luminara."
"I know. I just hope it's for the better. I am tired of hiding, Bant."
"Me too." Bant scanned the horizon. "Me too."
All spaceport diners were the same—by design, of course, to be of some comfort and familiarity to the traders who rarely returned to one planet more than once or twice a year. By the same logic, all covert contacts tended to be alike as well. It made them harder to identify after the fact. So Obi-Wan stepped into the spaceport diner on Felucia and was hit by the faux familiar wave of grease and grill, and scanning the room for his contact, he spied a Tholothian female slouched in a corner booth away from the front windows and holding a cup of caff that looked like it had gone cold a while ago. The Force hummed with nervousness around her, eagerness and worry, but no ill intent.
Obi-Wan slid into the booth across from the woman, leaned back, and crossed his legs to give any observers the appearance of a casual acquaintance. "My apologies for keeping you waiting. Frell, I presume?"
A fake name, certainly, but he knew the value of keeping one's identity to one's self. Especially in the information business.
Frell looked him over with a sharp eye. She was nervous but canny. Whatever she had, it would be worth the detour. Finished with her assessment, she shook her head. "You're not what I expected."
He smiled and hitched one shoulder. "What were you expecting?"
"I don't know-" She raised an eyebrow ridge. "-Maybe the masked demon that routed the Black Sun syndicate from Mustafar to Ord Mantell."
Obi-Wan waved a hand dismissively. He preferred not to talk about that if he could help it. "Yes, well, I've found others' expectations tend to work to my advantage. Now I'd love to chat with a lady as charming as yourself, but Hondo said this was important, and I do have other places to be."
She flicked a data chip across the table, purposefully sending it wide, but it flew straight to his palm.
He flashed his most charming smile to hide his irritation. "Now, my dear, it's rude to test your contacts."
Frell shrugged. "Just making sure. Usually, people like you send proxies."
He held up the chip between two fingers and let the hard interior light shine through its fine circuitry. "And what's so important you wouldn't trust it to a proxy?"
She clasped her hands on the table, clenching and unclenching them, her sudden nervousness leaking into the Force. Glancing once over her shoulder, Frell said. "Project Reforge. It's some top-secret program running straight out of the Chancellor's office, but it's been a nightmare to get anything on it. All the files are redacted, some are just deleted or obviously fake, but they're moving cargo. Not a lot, not often, but enough they don't want anybody looking at it."
"And what is this cargo?" Obi-Wan frowned, sliding the chip into his sleeve.
"Dunno for sure. Some old Mando tech, some artifacts, some illegal wildlife maybe. But it's from all over, and it's just enough that they're covering it up."
"How did you find it?"
"None of your business."
"As you wish. Black market smuggling seems below the Chancellor's interests, but who knows these days. I'll look into it." He laid one arm across the booth back. "And the price?"
Frell clenched her hands ever so slightly then pulled a bit of flimsi out of her pocket and slid it face down across the table. "I've got a cousin in jail. Picked by the CIS' troops two years ago, but he was just trying to scrounge up enough to keep his kids fed. He doesn't deserve to rot for it."
He raised one eyebrow then picked up the flimsi and glanced at the information-name, prison, sentence. Dooku's iron-fisted crusade to secure the Outer Rim from pirates had certainly assuaged the fears of the Separatist planets, but it was not without its body count. Obi-Wan ought to know. "Piracy is a steep crime these days."
"I know. But there's more on Project Reforge where that came from. If you get my cousin out, I'll get you whatever you want to know. Manifests, ship numbers, pilots..."
Frell was telling the truth. Not quite all of it-Obi-Wan imagined this cousin had a body count of his own, maybe some other crimes she'd neglected to mention-but enough. More research was in order before he actually tried to get the man released, but if this contact could get him a look into Project Reforge and the Republic's black box programs, it might be a worthwhile trade. He nodded. "I'll see what I can do."
She relaxed and looked away. "There is… one other thing."
He gestured for her to go on.
"I came all the way from the Mid Rim for this. If this cold war finally boils over, I'm not leaving Republic space to deliver what I find."
Obi-Wan flashed his teeth. "Don't worry, my dear. If that's the case, I will find you."
He knew his words had not been a comfort when Frell smiled humorlessly. "And the White Hand always gets his quarry. Thanks for picking up the tab." And Frell slipped from the booth and the dinner and disappeared into the spaceport crowd. Obi-Wan waited a few more moments then made his own exit to his ship. He had another appointment to keep, and Dooku would take much less kindly to being kept waiting.
With a splitting headache, Depa emerged from Mace's hut to squint into the orange sunset. The Council had been deliberating since before dawn about the latest development in the Order's new way of life. Well, not really a new development. Their lack of access to kyber crystals had been present from the moment they'd left the Temple on Coruscant behind, but Dooku and Valorum's Cold War. Jocasta emerged right behind her, and the two women held eye contact for a long moment before the archivist nodded and went her own way.
Depa shook her head and strode into the village before anyone else could emerge and restart the discussion on whether or not to dismantle the Holocron.
"How are they to defend themselves?
Jocasta crossed her arms. "Our history is what makes us who we are. Even with Avee and Professor Hyuang's help, we've barely begun to scrape the surface of the knowledge inside. Without it, we will be lost."
"Maybe it is time to make new traditions," said Master Nema. "The galaxy is mere months away from a war between the Republic and the Separatists, and we will be caught in the middle."
"And how many changes will we make until the only thing that marks us as Jedi is our weapons? We are not warriors only. Master Yoda-"
"Enough."
The Council quieted. Depa dragged a slow breath and shook her head. "Master Yoda is not here. Even if we dismantle the Holocron, that will only give us a limited number of kyber crystals. How do we decide which younglings get them? Do we save them for the knights who lost their sabers in the purge? For padawans who reach knighthood?" Depa looked to Mace, who waited for her to finish, and she gave him a small smile of gratitude. "If we must try to be Jedi without one or the other, I wouldn't erase any more of our history or our knowledge to gain a few more blades. War or no, the Holocron stays as it is."
Depa made her way between the beehive stone huts, passing Shmi who was helping Nahdar and Kalifa and Anakin fix the goat pen, and the padawans were listening to whatever she was telling them with careful attention. The Jedi master approached and waited, and Shmi paused in her work, wiped her sweat from her brow, and smiled. "Depa."
"Miss Skywalker." Depa bowed then smiled at her padawan. "Anakin. When you are finished, meet me at the training ground."
"I'm done now." He glanced at his mother then at his friends.
Shmi nodded for him to go on, and he bounded to Depa's side. "Lightsaber practice?"
Depa smiled at his enthusiasm, and master and apprentice made their way to the edge of the village where a great circle of dirt had been packed down by five years of studious feet. After a few warm-up katas, she handed her lightsaber to Anakin, and he began working his way through the forms while Depa watched. He swung and leaped, flipping and spinning in powerful loops from one end of the training circle to the other. He was skilled, had already overcome his education gap by leaps and bounds to land solidly ahead of his peers in saber skills. His strength in the Force was staggering, which made sense given his origin, but his ease with the Force and his self-discipline were not quite in step with the other padawans, but each pilgrim walked at their own pace.
Anakin landed solidly at the end of his last form, holding the blade in guard position for a long moment before he turned the saber off. He looked to Depa, and she rewarded his hard work with a smile and a nod. "Well done, padawan."
He beamed and bowed, hands together. "Thank you."
"Come sit with me, Anakin. I have something I need to discuss with you before the evening meal."
He handed her lightsaber back to her and knelt with his hands resting on his knees. "What are we talking about?"
Smiling slightly, she knelt beside him. "Meditation first."
He exhaled dramatically, and his bangs tousled in the breeze. "How am I supposed to meditate if I know we have to talk when we're done?"
"Hmm." She closed her eyes. "Perhaps the Force will show you."
For a half-second, he grumbled under his breath before he too began to meditate.
They sat together, the fabric of the Force gently bearing them up. Anakin floundered a bit beside her, trying to steady himself as if he were in a hammock and the intricate ties were catching at him, but she waited patiently, offered a steady point to fix on as he steadied and came to rest beside her. After some time, the third small presence joined them. Caleb sat down beside Depa, his bright presence orbiting around her and Anakin with fascination as the not-quite-six-year-old tried to meditate with them.
"Hey, Caleb," Anakin whispered. "How'd you sneak off?"
"Wanted to see you. What are you doing?"
"Meditating. We gotta be quiet now, okay?"
"Okay."
Depa didn't need to open her eyes to know Caleb was mimicking her and Anakin's pose, though he struggled to sit still for long. Anakin was beginning to squirm too, so after a moment to let the boys make an earnest attempt, Depa inhaled and opened her eyes. "Hello, Caleb."
He grinned. "Hi, Mast'r. What are you doing out here?"
"Meditating on the Force, youngling."
"Why?"
Anakin cleared his throat. "You wanted to talk to me, Master?"
Depa gestured for Caleb to return to the village, and the boy sighed and ran off. He was a good boy, but he had enough questions to fill a Holocron of his own. Once he was gone, she turned back to her current padawan. "Your lightsaber work has come a long way. I am proud of you, Anakin."
Beaming, Anakin sat taller. "Does this mean I get my own lightsaber?"
Better to tell him the truth now. Depa shook her head. "I am sorry, padawan. The Republic has blockaded Jedha, which means there is no way for you to get a kyber crystal right now. Perhaps in a few years-"
He sprang to his feet, fists clenched and eyes wide. "What? That's not fair!"
"Sit down, Anakin."
"No! It's my turn for a lightsaber. I've waited for five years!"
She should have expected this reaction. She had in a way, but she had hoped Anakin would be mature enough to understand. "Why is a lightsaber so important to you?"
"Because I'm a Jedi!"
She waited. Anakin floundered, sputtering a little as he struggled with his thoughts, but she held back the urge to spring to save him. Finally, he spat out an answer. "I'm a Jedi, and a Jedi has to have a lightsaber. It's their life."
"Perhaps it should not be."
He scowled, the image of teenage petulance. "You don't understand."
"Then explain it to me, Anakin. I am listening."
He laced his fingers in his hair and tugged like he could force his thoughts to align. "You have to have a lightsaber to be a Jedi. We're warriors. We can't fight the Sith without them."
"If a weapon is our first choice in a conflict, then we have already failed as Jedi."
"But I need to be strong. And Nahdar and Ayala and the others all have theirs!"
"Strong, Anakin? Do you not think you have learned strength? Everything the Force has led you through has made you who you are now. You do not need a lightsaber to prove that."
"But I have to be stronger!"
Depa frowned. There was something he was not saying, bubbling just beneath the surface with the large emotions he always struggled to comprehend and direct. She could see the shatterpoints in him still, the hairline fractures that shot through him like cracked ice always just above his heart and behind his eyes. They had always been there, always would be. "Why, Anakin?"
"I've… I've seen it." He let go of his hair and hung his head. "In my dreams."
Oh.
"Anakin," she said slowly. "You promised to tell me if the dreams returned."
A spark of fear flared up in him, and he lurched forward. "No, not those dreams. They're… they're different. It's like, like when the Force tells you something bad is gonna happen right before it does, and all you have time to do is react. Just try to get out of the way."
Depa pressed her lips together. It was good that the searching dreams were not back. The last thing any of them wanted was to deal with a Sith lord, but premonitions… her lineage had never been plagued by them, and they often did as much as harm as good.
"I see the village on fire. I see." Anakin closed his eyes tight like he could shut out the images that had danced in his head. "I see my mom. She's hurt real bad. She's dying, and I can't help her."
"The future is always in motion, Anakin," she said softly.
"But what if it does happen? I could stop it. But I need a lightsaber."
Fear rang in the Force. Fear of loss. Fear of suffering. He was floundering in it, and she reached out to him and laid a hand on his shoulder. "I understand your fear, Anakin. I feel it myself, every day. But having a lightsaber will not make the dreams stop. You must not allow fear to rule you."
He went red in the face, his anger seething inside him like a summer storm, and it struck like lightning, grounding to the first hurt it could find. He sprang to his feet, knocking her hand from his shoulder. "Obi-Wan would have understood!"
Depa did not flinch. Anakin's regret burst like a thunderhead as soon as the words left his mouth but he didn't back down. "Obi-Wan would have taken me to get my crystal, but you left him behind! And now he's lost, and he'll never ever find us!"
She would take it back if she could have, but regret did not change the past. Neither would getting angry with Anakin. "Are you finished?" she asked quietly.
Anakin was bright red from shouting now, full of shame, and still, he couldn't back down. So he spun on his heel and stormed off into the tall grass, disappearing into the waving grey-green blades and leaving Depa to sigh and cross her legs as she sought answers in the Force, alone at the edge of the village.
The comm room was dim with red light, seeping the Dark Side like a cold draft. The apprentice knelt, head bowed, two bulky arms resting on his knee. His voice rumbled deep in his chest and echoed in the small room. "You sent for me, my master?"
The blue holo skipped and jumped, and the cloaked figure on it went static for a moment before a silky voice played over the comm. "Yes, my apprentice. I have a mission for you."
The apprentice raised his head and peered up at that hooded face. How long he had waited to hear that. "A mission, my lord?"
"War is at hand. It is time to remind the imposter and his Hand who the real Sith are."
Author's Note:
Welcome to Arc II! It's been five years since the end of the interlude. The Republic and the Separatists are locked in a cold war of planets flipping allegiances and building up their armies. What everyone has been up to will be discussed more in future chapters, but
Obi-Wan has been chasing a bunch of dead end leads on Sidious since he lost all the data from the Mustafar castle when Avee when with Anakin.
Anakin has been training with Depa while the Jedi carefully build their numbers and their way of life back. Lothal does still have kyber crystal! They just don't know it's there because Jocasta can only sort through 10,000 years of data so fast, and I imagine Holocrons don't have a great search function.
Sidious has been doing what Sidious does, which is make life difficult for everybody else.
References:
Frell is from the Star Wars 1 comic that came out January 2020, where she's a Pathfinder for the Rebel Alliance.
Canna Visz is an OC and a terrible person.
Obi-Wan's title "The White Hand" is absolutely a Lord of the Rings reference to the servants of Saruman, who wore white hands prints on their armor as a kind of coat of arms. His White Hand get-up looks like
www. /dywa/art/Sith-assassin-363450871
Reviews:
Sheeta 14: oof, yeah, this story has gotten pretty badly desynched from AO3. Thank you for pointing it out! And thank you for reading; I'm so glad you're enjoying the story.
Marie: Thank you for reading and leaving a review! I have the rest of the fic plotted and written in snippets, so it will get finished, it might just take a little bit, haha.