Uncharted Planet, the Outer Rim
Two Years Ago
"Report, Emir Tambor."
"This planet is uninhabited, Count," Tambor replied. "But we have found evidence of a prior civilization… and they have many treasures for us." The Foreman of the Techno Union waved his arm, showing the holographic projection of his leader the various collection of goods his droids had brought to him.
"Do not let your pursuit of trinkets deter you from your mission, Emir," Count Dooku insisted. "Is the planet capable of serving as a staging ground for our forces or not?"
"Unlikely, Count," Tambor admitted. "The surface is covered in some sort of black liquid our tech has been unable to identify. It's really slowing our salvage operations…"
"So the planet is of no tactical use," Dooku acknowledged. "Fine, then. Gather whatever your droids have recovered and bring it to our storehouses on Serenno. We will discuss your subsequent redeployment to Ryloth after the goods you've collected have been apportioned for the war effort."
Tambor was not at all eager to share what he'd found, but knew better than to refuse Dooku to his face. "As you wish."
Once the transmission ceased, Tambor looked over the goods his droids had collected. "Hm… I hope some of this was worth the trouble…" He held up a dusty old golden lamp. "Might be able to get a few credits for these…"
"Emir, our scouts have returned with the metal they were sent to collect," a B-1 commander told the Foreman. "Where should we take it?"
"Put it on the ship," Tambor dismissively instructed. "Pool it together and mark it to be melted down on Geonosis."
"Roger, roger."
The Foreman was still consumed with the yellow rocks and shining metals. He paid no heed to the curious coloration adorning the metal… the strange dots on synthetic flesh, the green clothing, the orange hair…
It was just another relic of a bygone age, and not one he perceived to be profitable… and for the Techno Union, this war had no other purpose but profit.
Third Moon of Vassek
Months Later
"Why have you brought this to me?" the General snarled, stifling yet another cough as he inspected his Doctor's latest… curiosity.
"I requested these samples be delivered from Geonosis after they proved difficult to melt down," EV-A4D explained. "Apparently this specimen had synthetic components meant to imitate organic matter. I thought it might be useful in repairing your own superstructure if I had an additional subject for study."
Grievous was not pleased at his personal physician showing such initiative… but if it improved his ability to keep the General together…
"Very well," Grievous allowed. "But the next time you decide to request military assets, I expect you to keep me informed."
"And I expect the next time I repair your Duranium armor and save your life you'll express sincere gratitude," his medical droid replied. "We will both be disappointed."
Grievous sneered but did not punish the insubordination. Dooku always lectured him on how expensive his precious droids were, and he had no wish to damage the only medical unit capable of repairing him yet.
The General allowed himself a cough and stepped over to his console to measure the progress on Pantora, and the Trade Federation's attempts to gain a foothold… more dull politics to consider.
The Battle of Coruscant
19 BBY
R2-D2 hadn't heard from Anakin for some time. He'd grown tired of waiting with the ship and took the opportunity to check into the files on Grievous's ship. Apparently in the quarters of the General's personal doctor there was an interesting find from an uncharted planet… something that the medical droid intended to strengthen his master's armor with, if he could but understand how his find worked.
R2 had a little time and access to the ship's central computer. He had the find shipped down through the elevator, hoping his Jedi friends wouldn't have a need for it while indulging his curiosity.
When it was deposited in the hangar bay the astromech rolled over to it, inspecting this strange find. It was nearly complete, nearly fully assembled… but something was missing. Something hadn't made the machine whole.
R2 plugged into her systems and set to work.
After a few seconds, her eyes opened. "W-where… am I?"
R2 beeped and whistled.
"My internal systems… I can't correct my readings," she muttered. "I'm so confused."
R2 maintained the connection, helping her gain her bearings.
"Thank you," she sincerely offered. "You're very nice, Mister… um…"
R2 identified himself.
"R2-D2," Penny repeated. "Are you… my friend?"
The Bridge
"The negotiators… General Kenobi, we've been waiting for you," Grievous mocked. "That wasn't much of a rescue…" He snatched the two Jedi Knights' lightsabers from one of his Commander droids.
"You're welcome," the droid remarked before returning to its post.
"And…" Grievous continued, turning his attention to Kenobi's apprentice. "Anakin Skywalker… I was expecting someone with your reputation to be a little… older."
Anakin remained defiant. "General Grievous. You're shorter than I expected."
Despite another coughing fit, Grievous was undeterred by his captive's response. "Jedi scum…"
"We have a job to do, Anakin. Try not to upset him," Kenobi requested.
R2 beeped at Anakin, waiting for his cue. His friend briefly shook his head, begging off.
But R2 had another plan lying in wait… albeit one he didn't quite believe. His new friend went on about 'Aura'. When R2 tried to correct her assertions by explaining the nature of the Force, she seemed convinced she could use it.
She was a droid. That wasn't something they were capable of.
"Your light sabers will make a fine addition to my collection," Grievous observed, sliding the two Jedi weapons into his cloak.
"Not this time," Kenobi assured him with a confident smile.
R2 prepared to attack the droids… when the door to the bridge slid open and she stepped inside. "Sal-u-tations, friends!"
Whatever Kenobi and Skywalker had in mind was abruptly put on hold at the sight of her: a short girl dressed in green, with eyes to match and bright orange hair. Chancellor Palpatine looked on, perplexed… there was no droid of that specification assigned to Grievous's command ship…
"What is this? Another Jedi trick?" Grievous speculated.
"Um…" a genuinely confused Obi-Wan Kenobi had no idea what deadpan remark to offer, because this girl's presence was very much not to plan. She seemed like a civilian; a young non-combatant who somehow wandered into a Separatist capital ship in low orbit over Coruscant. "She's not one of yours', General?"
"Oh, you're the bad droid leader R2 was telling me about!" the girl realized. "My name is Penny! I'm here to help R2 and his friends rescue the Chancellor from you!"
That was… surprisingly forward. "Well, then," Grievous mused. "Kill her."
R2 beeped at her, worried everything had just gone wrong.
"Don't worry, R2," Penny assured him.
She wasn't sure this would work. But she reached out with her Aura towards the weapons in the General's cloak and pinned to his Duranium waist.
She could barely feel them… but she could feel them. She could generate Aura enough to reach out with a light grip and draw the object to her.
The General's B-2s and MagnaGuards moved in on Penny, and she still reached with her outstretched hand. The droids leveled their blasters at her…
The lightsaber detached from Grievous's hip and flew to her hand. Penny pressed down on the device and summoned a blade of green light.
The first B-2 in her path fired. Penny raised the lightsaber and deflected the blaster bolt back at her attacker. Kenobi, Skywalker, the Chancellor, and even Grievous all looked on in shock as a girl they'd never seen drew a lightsaber to her hand and defended herself from attack. R2 couldn't believe a droid somehow managed to affect the Force.
Penny leveled the green blade, rotating it in her hand. She liked the weight of it. She liked the feel of it.
And she knew how to swing a sword.
Penny stared down the droid general and prepared a stance. "I'm combat ready."
Grievous took note of the girl who managed to steal his lightsaber. Jedi or not, she was able to wield the force... and alongside Skywalker and Kenobi, that left him facing three adversaries possessing the one skill he lacked.
But for the moment two of his foes remained bound and he still had his elite guards. "You want to see combat, little one..." He reached to his hip and chose two lightsabers. "...I will be happy to educate you."
"Now!" Kenobi declared, reaching out with the force to call his own lightsaber to his hand. He unclasped Anakin's manacles with the blade, and the younger Jedi summoned his sword right from Grievous's cape.
"Make them suffer!" Grievous commanded, sending his MagnaGuards to deal with the Jedi, while he focused his attention on the little girl making a scene.
Penny watched the droid general ignite the two blades. R2 whistled at her, sternly warning her not to underestimate the monstrosity she faced. She could hardly back down now... considering the trouble R2 had gone to on her behalf, Penny had no intention of leaving him or his other friends in this bad man's clutches.
Grievous couldn't maneuver as well while he wore his cape, but he could easily decipher how deadly his opponent was by drawing out whatever lightsaber form she was adept in. Dooku taught him to recognize each technique and adapt on the fly, and anyone short of a Jedi Master couldn't hope to outmaneuver him.
Grievous spun the two lightsabers around in his hands, creating a constantly swirling attack. He took his steps towards her with his blades singing in the air... and the girl in green stepped forward to meet him, slashing at his left hand and locking green lightsabers together.
Grievous went on the defensive, stepping back and luring her in, waiting to see what style she'd use. But when the girl chased after him with her Jedi weapon her swings were wild and uncoordinated... at least for a lightsaber. She was swinging it like a sword made of metal.
Grievous quickly grew tired of indulging her while she was providing openings. With his free blade he struck her unprotected shoulder, grazing the girl... who didn't visibly react at all to his lightsaber burning her skin.
Because he hadn't hit skin.
Grievous looked at the still smoking wound and then to the girl's green eyes. She saw his surprise and confusion and reacted, slashing at the general and he just barely had time to react, clashing lightsabers with her and saved by his own instinctive reactions.
Grievous reached up with his foot, clamping his toes over the girl's head. Balancing carefully on one leg, Grievous spun around and flung the girl away from him and towards the bulkhead, though with his cape obstructing his vision the general couldn't be certain where he aimed.
Penny tumbled through the air, slamming hard into one of the MagnaGuards, still clashing with the Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi despite its missing head. Upon impact, the small girl shattered the larger droid, breaking the MagnaGuard into several pieces before she hit the wall of the bridge.
The Jedi Master just looked on, stunned, as this short girl easily clamored to her feet, unblemished after crashing against a droid and receiving a lightsaber wound. He'd seen incredible feats of strength and endurance from smaller beings, but none of them had so easily broken through metal armor... certainly not without apparent cost.
R2 whistled at her again, concerned. Penny smiled. "Don't worry, R2... I've figured out how to fight him."
Penny reached out again with her free hand. A second lightsaber unclasped from Grievous's waist and flew to her. Penny ignited it, drawing the two green blades and rushing back towards Grievous.
Though taken aback by the girl's durability, Grievous scoffed. Clearly the girl could be wounded... and if she could be wounded, she could be killed.
But when Grievous went to clash blades again, Penny placed both light sabers in a single hand and began spinning them rapidly around, similarly to Grievous's first attack on her... and every bit as fast.
Grievous tried to counteract her motion by spinning his two lightsabers in a circle on either side, only for Penny to reverse the direction of her own cycle, intervening and knocking the general's attacks off-balance. Grievous lost a finger in mistiming his swing, losing his grip on one of his lightsabers.
She saw her opening. Penny drew her second saber to her free hand. She pinned down the general's right arm and slashed his unguarded left flank. All Grievous could do was tilt his head back, only narrowly avoiding having half his slice faced off. Instead Penny cut a deep gash in his Duranium plating, exposing more of his flesh and briefly upsetting his sensors. Grievous tumbled backwards, a plate of his face mask falling down on the deck.
The Jedi looked on, stunned. Palpatine was even more aghast. This strange woman -this little girl- managed to get the better of General Grievous?
That would not do at all. Dooku was dead. If Grievous fell now, there'd be no reason to prolong the war, no pretext to maintain his emergency powers...
He fought the urge to act. He had to hope the faith he'd placed in Grievous -if only to save his own skin- was not misplaced.
Lying on the ground with his B-2s and MagnaGuards hacked to pieces and facing two Jedi and one astonishingly durable girl, Grievous realized he was outmatched. He glanced back at the windows of the bridge, then to the still ignited lightsaber in his right hand.
This was not how he died. Not for this girl. Not for Kenobi and Skywalker. Not for this failed offensive or this war effort... not until the lightsabers this girl took from him were back in his hands and her head mounted in his trophy room.
"Not today, Jedi," Grievous snarled, slashing his lightsaber against the plexiglass pane. The vacuum of space tugged at him, pulling him out through the shattering window.
Penny watched R2 and his friends struggle to hang onto something as the bridge was depressurized. She engaged magnaclamps in her feet to hold herself in place and stared out at the droid general floating in space a hundred feet away.
She thought perhaps if she charged her Aura between the lightsabers she could redirect their energy... fire at him and slice him in two while he floated there. She began spinning the swords, knowing her window would be narrow.
The general leveled his wrist. Penny thought he meant to attack her. She'd have to be even faster...
Something shot from his wrist, something attached to a long metal wire...
Wires...
Wires attached to her own swords...
Cutting her... slicing her apart...
Pyrrha Nikos looked on, horrified, as her handiwork reached Penny, losing structural integrity as she was cut to pieces...
She couldn't swing her lightsabers any longer. She could only watch in horror at the metal wire coming towards her, just as it had before.
And then the bridge sealed up under emergency plating, and the vacuum of space no longer pulled on them. Penny heard her friends behind her crash into consoles and returned to the present, turning to R2-D2, instantly asking: "Are you all right?"
R2 beeped at her again, offering reassurance... though his language was unusually coarse for such a nice fellow.
Penny silenced her lightsabers and turned her attentions to the other three humans with R2, stepping over to help the frail old man first. "I hope you weren't hurt..."
"Not at all, thanks to you," the old man assured her. "Thank you, madam Jedi."
"Jedi?" Penny repeated. "What's a Jedi?"
The old man looked utterly stunned. "I'm..." he glanced down at the two lightsabers in Penny's hands, "...not sure where to begin."
"I'm sure we all have a great deal of questions," Obi-Wan agreed as he dragged himself up to the nearest console. "But perhaps there will be a better time..."
"Yes," his apprentice agreed, looking over the topographical data on the flight controls and the blaring alarms. "All the escape pods have been launched..."
"Grievous..." Obi-Wan quickly concluded. Palpatine smiled to himself. It seemed he'd been correct after all.
R2 wheeled over to the controls alongside his friends. Penny stepped past the old man to join them at the front of the bridge, as Obi-Wan asked his apprentice: "Can you fly a cruiser like this?"
"You mean do I know how to land what's left of this thing?" Anakin inquired.
"Well?" Obi-Wan asked, taking a seat at the co-pilot position.
"Well, under the circumstances I'd say the ability to pilot this thing is irrelevant," Anakin deadpanned as he started working on the controls. "Strap yourselves in."
"Oh, boy, this is going to be so much fun!" Penny noted, clapping her hands together.
R2 whistled at her, trying to encourage her to be a little more subtle. He had quite enough irritating exuberance to manage...
In an escape pod on his way out of the system, Grievous thought on his battle with the girl. Normally his ignominious defeat would be enough to send him into a fury, but he was far too curious about the girl's ability to fend him off to maintain his anger.
The wounds he dealt her... the way she fought through them without the fleshy human weakness he expected...
The green...
A4 had brought something similar to study...
Something he said was difficult to melt down... hard to kill.
And now the Jedi -and the Republic- had it... another weapon to join the morale this victory over the Separatists would grant them.
Grievous caught a brief sight of his reflection in the window of his escape pod and the wound the girl dealt him... and the two lightsabers she'd claimed from him, the trophies of her surprising triumph over the Supreme Commander of the CIS military.
And his anger returned, leaving him to fume as he left the greatest battle of the Clone Wars with half a face and his tail between his legs.
On the surface of Coruscant, Penny managed to avoid annoying her new allies by directing her questions to R2. The old Chancellor and the two Jedi were talking about military strategy and politics and all manner of things that flew over her head. They assured her they'd find time to discuss her role in the battle later, including rewards for her bravery and heroism, but Penny was far more interested in finding out what all she'd missed.
R2 brought her up to speed as best he could, but it all seemed so astonishing. She was on a planet she didn't know, caught up in a war that spanned multiple solar systems (a feat that sounded astonishing even to a mind as advanced as Penny's) and there was some sort of ongoing conflict involving multiple factions and governments...
But that wasn't what Penny truly wanted to know. "R2... can you help me find the planet I'm from? And my friends?"
R2 assured her he would once he'd finished his primary duty: his safeguarding the life of Anakin Skywalker, the Jedi Knight the old Chancellor was constantly doting on. Apparently, he'd have been dead many times over if not for R2.
"I understand," Penny assured him. "And if I can, I'll help you too... maybe we can get this silly war sorted out and then you won't have to spend so much time worrying about your friend!"
R2 beeped at her again. "Aw, you're very sweet, R2! Maybe if you used some cleaner language..."
The Jedi Master named Kenobi turned to address her. "Now, Penny... I believe we should take a moment to address your ability to use the Force. How did you learn to do that?"
"Oh, the Force? Yes, R2 was telling me about that..." Penny nodded. "I... don't know, exactly. I've always just been taught it was called 'Aura'."
"I see," Kenobi scratched his bearded chin, deep in thought. "And where did you learn to use a lightsaber?"
"A lightsaber? Well, I studied swordsmanship at my academy in Atlas..." Penny explained. "I'm not sure exactly how long ago that was. R2's been bringing me up to speed, but my sen- I mean I still haven't quite figured out how I ended up here."
Kenobi smiled gently at her, brushing a hand over the wound on her shoulder. He leaned in closely and whispered: "I'm sure once your sensors acclimate we can get a picture."
"I, um... yes, I think you're right," Penny whispered back.
"Curious," Kenobi pondered, "I've never seen a droid create such an effective facsimile before..."
"I'm not a droid," Penny quickly interjected. "I'm... not a normal girl, but I am a girl just the same."
She thought of Ruby looking at the exposed metal and still taking her hand.
"Someone very special taught me that..."
At the Jedi temple, deep in meditation, Master Yoda sensed something in his visions.
The darkness obscuring the Force withered, ever so slightly as a point of light shot up to pierce its shroud... a light burning bright green; a single flame bringing illumination and chasing shadows away one by one.
And then, far from it, another light... a deep, shining silver pushing up into the night and up through the sky. The darkness was still everywhere around the two points of light, but no longer smothering everything... no longer so overpowering as it once seemed.
The Force was out of balance, the corruption of the Dark Side threatening to swallow everything... and yet new lights had emerged, new hope to drive the darkness back and restore balance, as had been foretold.
The Jedi thought they'd already found the Chosen One. So what were these curious new lights bringing hope to a galaxy shrouded in darkness?
A Separatist Scavenge World, the Outer Rim
The discarded Grimm matter slowly peeled back to release her. After thousands of years her time had come, to finally bring salvation to millions of voices after failing to save them the first time.
She opened her silver eyes and looked up at the stars thinking -somehow knowing- that a friend still lived, waiting for her across an ocean of black.
She would find her missing light... no matter how much darkness she had to wade through to hold that hand again.