Chapter 19: The Kessel Campaign

2 hours early

Kessel

"Ok so everyone is familiar with the plan," Luke asked.

"What plan," demanded Sabine from the front of the ship. "The plan is to literally just release Galen on the entire facility and let him run loose."

"I know," said Galen, practically drooling at the image. "I have waited so long for this battle."

"Just remember you can destroy only the buildings, don't destroy people."

"Fine."

"Ok, so I'm going to touch down at the south side of the base. There you guys can get off. Alina and Luke be ready need to clean up whatever mess he makes." Luke was about to respond when the entire ship began to rock.

"What in the world," shouted Alina, grabbing onto the seat.

"I think Galen decided to take the fun routed," yelled Sabine over the turbulence.

Luke and Alina investigated the cargo bay. Sure enough, the ramp had been lowered and Galen was gone.

"Oh great," called Luke. "That place is about to be hit by a crazy meteor."

Kessel was a quiet prison, surrounded but rock and sand. But today its quiet day was interrupted by a screaming meteor, streaming down from the heavens. It landed get in the center of the facility. After years of trying to be killed off, Galen had developed the ability to survive from great heights. Unlike being impaled like any other human being, Galen merely pulled himself out of his dive bomb and landed gracefully, like a cat, on his feet.

The center of the prison was nothing more than the engineer or maintenance room. A large brick space filled with mechanical parts. Luckily it was uninhabited.

"Ahh," said Galen stretching out his arms. "This is going to be great." He quickly pulled out his earbuds and put them into his ears and clicked played on his comms. If he was going to work out then he needed his playlist. The first thing he did was punch a wall. It immediately shattered under his attack. Shortly after that everything became a haze of violence. He used to everything his arms legs and even his blades to tear smash and sever everything that he came into contact with. after he finished destroying the room he immediately entered the corridor, by then the guard or whoever was in charge had realized that something was amiss and had sent some guards to investigate. Galen quickly made short work of then, without killing, he mostly just ran straight into them by running headfirst down the corridor and running over anyone who got in his way. once the guards were taken out, he continued to move through the corridors smashing and just destroying us he went until he reached the large barracks where all the convicts were stored. Pulling out his blades he ran down the room, slicing open the rooms as he went. Once he was done on one floor he would jump to the next and keep on working slowly through the building.

By the time he reached the roof the guard ships, that were in orbit, had concluded that they weren't going to be able to stop him without destroying the entire facility. They shot at him, but he wasn't called Starkiller for nothing. He saw the attack coming and absorb the energy before releasing it back at the ships in the form of lightning.

The ships were hit and even one of them begin to lose orbit. Deciding to at least take Galen down with them, the crew steer their dying vessel towards him. Galen summoned the force to him again and slammed it into the ship, steering it away from the prison and into the desert sea. He ended his jamming out session with a pose as the ship blown up in the background. He loved working out with his music. Sadly the high of a good workout was always quickly followed by the strain of all the fighting finally catching up to him. He fell off the prison and into the sand below.

"That was awesome," he proclaimed loudly from where he laid. Last time he took down a ship it hadn't made nearly as big an explosion as this time.

Luke sighed. During the cacophony of the destruction, he had to stand outside waiting for Galen to be done. He did however had to take a few steps back to prevent Galen from landing on top of him and crushing him. "Tell me the truth," he asked Galen, "you got hit by too many explosions growing up and now you only have half of a mind."

"Maybe," admitted Galen. "Or it could be because someone was trying to kill me since I was three."

Luke's first order of business was to evacuate what remained of the building, thinking that it was only a matter of time before it came crashing down on everyone's heads. It took a lot of conjoining from both him and Alina and a lot of threatening by Galen, to get the convicts to leave their open cells. It took even more work to get the prisoners who were too injure or sick to leave under their own power. Thankfully a few of the convicts had warmed up to them enough to help. Eventually, everyone was piled up in the sand where Sabine had landed to ghost to use it as shade and to store the more critically injured.

Alina rushed through the field of injure and sick, seeing to all the were wounded. Luke joined her as well while Galen stood guard around the prison personal that were kept a little way off from their prisoners.

They were quite relieved when the first people on the scene, Sabine and Obi-Wan, had brought with them Mandalor's medics. More than likely Satine's idea after overhearing the call for healers. Alina immediately took command of them and stream them throughout the camp. Some of Satine's security personal also went to stand guard with Galen. Another Mandalorian ship landed and some personal were unloaded and began to set up a little makeshift camp for all the people.

Obi-Wan immediately demanded an explanation from Luke about what was going on. But Luke being his usual 'why should I tell you when you should learn it for yourself', self merely told Obi-Wan to look around and the answer will become clear to him. That immediately got a laugh from Satine. Still, Satine had just as much as figuring out what was going on as Obi-Wan. It was Padme, who had arrived two hours later with the supplies demanded that was the first to notice the problem.

Padme was walking around to check on the injured when she noticed something out of the ordinary.

"Is this a child," she demanded to the warden. "What is a child doing here?"

"Um…well…I believe that child is a pickpocket defended the warden."

"A pickpocket ended up in the republic's maximum detention facility? The one that's only to be used for hardened criminals?"

"I don't make the rules ma'am they send me the prisoners. Unfortunately, all of our documents were in the facility so I can not even look up his record for you."

Padme gave him her 'i don't believe you for a moment face' before moving onto exam a woman who was acting like the boy's mother. Padme looked up again, "this woman has whip scars on her back. Since when were whips use in a prison."

"She could have been a slave before doing whatever it was that got her sent here defended the warden. We never know the backgrounds of these convicts before we get them."

"Or," said Padme slowly as she figured it out. "They were slaves when they were in here. Oh, force she proclaimed loudly there are slaves here. You bought slaves to use the Kessel's mines and you hide them among the criminals. What convicts were not enough for you."

"No no" proclaimed the warden "that's silly who ever heard of something like this."

"Look at these injuries," shouted Padme as she weaved through the groups now knowing what she was looking for. Obi-Wan and Satine followed her, the horror of what they discover was etch on their faces. "These people are half-starving," shouted Padme, "and there are fresh marks on them caused by chains and whips. No wonder there was no prison outbreak when the entire building was on fire. They literally couldn't run away nor did they think they would get far. Admit it you have been running a Republic finance slave mine."

"What do you want me to say" proclaimed the warden. "Do you have any how much credits are behind a spice operation. And Kessel is a planet made out of it. We are on top of a gold mine and we weren't tapping it because we didn't have enough manpower. You guys only send enough convicts to sustain the medical use of spice. That is a fraction compared to its recreational use. We needed more manpower to sell in the other market."

"Of force," proclaimed Padme "an entire slave mine being run by republic employee, finance by republic and running in republic space. Do you have any idea of the amount of damage you have done to the republic's image not to mention what you have done to these people." She walked over to the warden as if she wanted to punch him. Before Obi-Wan could catch up to her, Galen step in front of the warden, stopping her in her tracks.

"Senator," he said slowly as if he was placidly a wide animal, "everybody has a right to make a pled in front of the judicial courts. Even slave owners."

It was then that Obi-Wan noticed that all the guards around the prisoner employees weren't to protect them from convicts but to prevent them from running. "He's right," agreed Obi-Wan, addressing Padme, "he will see justice and we will get these people helped, including the criminals that were sent here. I doubt that the courts agree to let the prison work them this much."

"Well," said Satine, jumping in. "You don't have to worry about the criminals or these newly free slaves. I can grant them Mandalorian citizenship."

"What," asked Obi-Wan, "no I appreciate that Satine but this is a Republic issue and we can handle it."

"As I told you before Kenobi," she said quite sternly, "that while I wasn't yet behind any slave issues I would be more then happy to get involved especially if I was going to get blamed for them. And this matter seems just like the situation in the Hutts tertiary, doesn't it? You guys do make good friends."

"No, it doesn't" objected Obi-Wan secretly wondering while Padme hadn't jumped in yet to help him defend the republic. "This was just a mistake, an unknown variant."

"Mistake? Unknown variant? Admit it you guys just shipped people to this planet and never looked back, never wonder what was going on here. And when the bill came asking for money you never once notice that it was asking for oh I don't know, ten times the amount of food needed to sustain its supposed occupancy."

"I'm not a financial expert Satine. I don't know what was going on when renewing the budget came up."

"Or maybe the higher-ups were also involved and that's how it was kept a mystery."

"Look Satine I have already apologized for accusing you, while I was accusing you. I was just doing my duty."

"And if you actually knew about this beforehand and your duty told you to keep this a secret would you have followed your duty. What about your Jedi code, the whole reason why we couldn't marry."

"Satine." Obi-Wan sent an alarmed look at all the people within hearing distance. "We agree not to discuss that ever."

Satine continued. "Seriously I think you guys realize how much of your code you're sacrificing in exchange for being the Republic's arm." She looked coldly at Obi-Wan. "I'm taking them," she proclaimed. "It's as simple as that. If you and the senate have the time and effort that's not being used in the war to proclaim that we have stolen your slaves. Good luck on getting your people to back you up." She looked over to Alina and address her. "I'm going to contact some Mandalorian shuttles to get these people. I want all of them on the ships."

"Understood," agreed Alina before returning to her duties.

Obi-Wan walked over to Padme. Padme looked up at him. "I suppose I should contact the senate and you should contact the order. "

"Yes," he agreed. "But why didn't you object with me."

Padme looked at the entire field of bodies writhing in pain. "It seems like the least we could do for them is to give them a fresh start."