I am not named George or Rumiko. Meh.

Alrighty, I know I've said a time or two that I would rather not update my two SW stories in a single month, but that is just what happened this month for various reasons. Since I won't be updating either story next week due to it being an ATP update month, it seemed doable.

Anyway, hope you all like this!

this was betaed by ultimaflare0, but if you see any mistakes and point them out to me I will do my best to correct them quickly.

Bold - emphasis

Italics - thoughts

Underline - written words

Italics, underline - specific ship names.

And now on with the show!


Chapter 11: Discussions

"So, are we agreed that this planet is bad luck even with Exxy-kun gone?" Ranma quipped, pulling off her shirt and wringing it out again, as she stared glumly up into a sky that was currently raining cats and dogs. They had just gotten dried off in front of a fire, over which they had been cooked the remains of the beast that had interrupted their date when the sky had opened up abruptly, so abruptly even Shaak hadn't felt it coming.

"And I think this shirt is done," the redhead muttered, staring at a large rent in the back, which basically had taken out the entire back of the silk shirt.

"You can't sew Ranma?" Shaak asked, confused. He had after all lived on the road for years, and had picked up a grab bag of survival skills there.

"I can do patches and things like that, but not a major repair like this." Ranma replied, shrugging and tossing the sodden, ripped mass away. She quickly pulled out another one from her pants pocket's ki space, not because she was embarrassed at Shaak's appraising gaze, she had gone shirtless several times both in this from and his/her birth body but because she was wet and cold, and every little bit helped.

Shaak nodded then turned her attention back to the sky above them from where they were sheltering in one of the larger trees. Its foliage was so heavy that it actually was relatively dry. "That looks like it's going to go on for at least a few hours." She groaned, rather unhappy.

The date had been going so well even after they'd had that fight with the water monster. They could have recovered their romantic atmosphere and had been in the midst of doing so, but no, something else just had to come along to ruin the mood. "You realize, the number of dates we've been attacked on outnumber the number of dates where nothing has gone wrong?"

"I consider it lucky that we've had a few dates that've gone right at all Shaak," Ranma said with a faint laugh, leaning back against the tree trunk as she too stared out over the pouring rain. It was somewhat nice, a great view and all, but Ranma would have felt better if she was watching it while she herself was dry and warm. She'd been wet, cold and uncomfortable far too often on the road to enjoy days like this.

Shaak leaned back, trying to settle her head against Ranma's soft chest, but her montrals and back lekku got in the way. Shaak shivered at the feel of the other woman's bared breasts scraping along either side of her back lekku, as she moved up, so that she leaned her head back against the tree next to Ranma's. They were silent for a few moments, then Shaak asked, "So what do we do from here? I need to check in with the Order, about what went on here of course."

"I'd like to head out to this planet called Copra. I looked it up on the Hypernet back on Eshan when I was looking at what other planets had their own personalized martial arts styles, and particularly any of them based around grappling or disarming your opponent. Grappling's an area I haven't studied much, so I figured I'd find some place based on that. But I'd guess you want to report in person right?"

"I haven't heard of that world, but you're right I would prefer to report in person. By Hypercom I have to talk through the high Council on Coruscant, and of course we run the risk of someone listening in on our mail. If we choose to go back to Kashyyyk however I can give my report to Master Yoda in person. And we do need to do so, about more than just Exar Kun's ghost. Your involvement with the Mandalorians is a big deal Ranma." Shaak replied, understating that last point by quite a bit.

"I can see why," Ranma said with a shrug. "But on the other hand I don't think it's any of their business what I do. I mean I'm happy being friends with the Order Shaak don't get me wrong," the redhead said, leaning over to kiss Shaak at the base of one of her horns. "But I am not willing to let them control what I do or who I talk to."

"Have I tried to do either of those things?" Shaak asked tartly, turning slightly to stare at the shorter woman in the eye.

"No, but you can't tell me that a lot of the Council members would like to do that just that."

"No I cannot but Master Yoda certainly has no wish to do so, nor does Master Dooku. If for very different reasons. Dooku I think is enjoying the way your abilities have changed how he personally views combat and the chaos around is amusing at a distance. Yoda, I get the impression he realizes any attempt to control you would backfire horribly. He's most wise like that," Shaak said, her voice dust dry.

"Dooku is not part of the Council, and I'll see your Yoda and raise you Mace Windu and Eeth Koth, or as I think of them, the baldy and the bastard!" Ranma said with a laugh, hurrying on before Shaak could take umbrage at his nicknames for such 'learned' Masters. "Besides which, Copra is nearer here than Kashyyyk. You can drop me off there, go back and make your report then come back and join me. I really would like to see if I could work some grappling into my style."

"We'll see," Shaak said, unwilling to give up the argument just yet, and the idea of leaving Ranma being rather an uncomfortable one in many ways. But the Order did need to know what had occurred here. "However, we need to talk about our involvement with Bo Katan and her faction. You have to understand Ranma, we are going to face a lot of opposition on this, even if the New Mandalorian's grip on their planet is as weak as she says."

"I know," Ranma said with a wince. "But I think the Mandalorians could change if given the example. And if they are heading to a civil war anyway, getting ahead of it, and finding a faction to back that has a chance of winning a popular vote is a better idea than trying to bolster a regime that won't ever have that."

"True, but getting the Order and the senate to see it that way will be the hard part…" Shaak's lips twisted into a grimace, and she turned away. "That is going to take a lot of talking, and I just don't know how it will go. Or, or what my position within the Order will be afterward."

Ranma nodded silently, understanding this issue was more important to the Jedi than the redhead could easily understand. The antipathy between the Mandalorians and the Jedi went back so long and was based on wars of a scale he couldn't get his head around it. But he/she was still unwilling to not go forward with his plans with meeting Bo Katan again and said so. Shaak merely nodded, understanding her point, unwilling to try to change his mind, though still worried about how the Order as a whole would take it.

After that they fell silent, simply basking in one another's presence as they stared out into the rain, occasionally exchanging chaste kisses, though neither were in the mood for anything more. Both of them were no longer thinking about the long term issues they would have to deal with, instead they were both silently thinking about the same thing: their relationship.

The declaration of love they had made had been some kind of threshold in their relationship. For Ranma, it meant that he/she had finally said the words he'd wanted to say for a while now, despite not having that good an understanding of what it meant. Where they went from here was still a question, but that they would do it together for the rest of their lives was not in Ranma's mind, because that was what loved ones did.

Need to think about something special to do. Shaak told me she loved me first, so that means the next gesture needs to be mine right? It makes sense anyway, but I need to look up what I can find about Togrutans and heh, mating rituals. Weird ass universe, but I guess it would be even weirder if every race out there was like humans. The redhead snorted, but when Shaak looked at her she waved it off, going back to watching the rain.

For Shaak Ti, giving voice to the depth of the emotion she shared with Ranma had removed the last smidgeon of doubt she had in her current course. It was as simple as that, as long as she was alive now Shaak would be two things, Jedi and in a relationship with Ranma, whatever the formal name of that relationship might be.

I wish I had any close human friends outside the Order to talk about things like this. Is there an equivalent of a promise gift, and would it be appropriate for the woman to give it to the man? I know it wouldn't in my own culture, though admittedly that is among the few things I know about it. Despite being very much an equal opportunity society, indeed Togrutans had been so since their earliest written histories, in terms of courtship it was expected to be the male who took the lead.

Or perhaps I should concentrate on somehow taking our relationship to the next level physically? I know I will have to be the one to do so given what Ranma has dealt with in the past, and I am ready for it I think. Shaak's lips twitched. More than ready in many ways, certainly intrigued.

When the rain let up for a time they made their way back to the Wild Light, where the two droids had made their own escape from the rain quickly.

HK stood in the ramp leading up into its they, sitting area, looking out into the rain. "Irritated grumble: I had enough of getting wet when I had to tramp through the swamp to the ship before that final battle. This is just irritating."

"You're telling us," Ranma groused, as Shaak laughed, moving past the droid and dropping her still soaked outer robe on the floor. Before Ranma could say anything she had already entered the bath, winking over her shoulder Ranma who growled, snapping her fingers irritably before sitting down, shivering a little.

The case Shaak gave the redhead after coming out of the warm water from the shower however made up for having to wait.

By the time Ranma was both warm and male again, Shaak had made herself comfortable on the couch wearing her normal underthings. Ranma stood there in the doorway taking in the view for a moment until Shaak turned, smiling at him and taking in his bare chest in turn for a moment before making a gentle come hither moment with one finger. Smiling tenderly Ranma moved over and sat next to her, leaning down into a kiss. The kiss turned ardent even though HK was still staring out at the rain from the open ramp to one side of the sitting area.

They both were oblivious to the droid's presence until the droid turned just as Ranma was about to gently push Shaak back down onto the couch. "Disgusted query: Master, could you at least wait until I am in the cockpit, or have shut down my audio and optical sensors? I would prefer not to try to erase my short term memory of events of this nature, given the damage my long term memories have taken it could lead to further degradation of my skills."

Ranma growled, twisting so that he was now sitting on the couch and Shaak was in his lap, his arms clasped around her waist. He muffled his voice into her back, interspersing his words with kisses to her back lekku which, thankfully for Shaak's present state of mind wasn't quite as sensitive as her front two. "What… is…with…today…and…people…interrupting…us!"

"True. I am afraid that today the Force seems to have it out for us. Let us just admit it and move on," Shaak said reluctantly standing up from his lap and heading towards the cockpit.

Ranma followed her, grumbling once more about giving the Force, "or Lady Luck, whichever is fucking with my life for shits and giggles" a spanking once more, which caused again that bizarre blushing feel in the Force for a moment. That in turn brought a smile to Shaak's face and she sat down in the cockpit in a remarkably upbeat frame of mind.

Not 15 minutes later the ship entered hyperspace, coming out into a regular Republic system with a Hypercom relay several hours later. There Ranma, before Shaak could do anything quickly punched in information on Copra, only to quickly stop and stare.

The Copragan were giant six armed beings, with massive hands each of which looked as large as Ranma's entire head, and six fingers too.

Shaak began to chuckle, leaning over to stare at the image, before reading off a few lines next to it. Ranma's ability to read Republic still wasn't very good, though it was getting better thanks to her off and on tutelage. "It says here the Copragan are heavy grav worlders who literally can't live on planets without more sulfur in the air than humans can live in."

"I've not run into them before," Shaak mused, scrolling down. "Ah, here is why. It also says that the entire species suffers from an extreme case of claustrophobia. So they can't wear bodysuits or helmets like other gas breathers can. That is interesting. So still want to go?" she asked brightly, knowing she had won the argument of where they would be going next.

Ranma mock glared at her, then laughed shaking his head. "Heh, no. I'm tough, but I'm not tough enough to breathe what these guys can, and I might not suffer from a fear of small places, but I sure as heck wouldn't want to be wearing a helmet for that long."

"Good. And now to Kashyyyk?"

"I did say I would get in the way of you doing your duties, I just had hoped, well, whatever." Ranma shook his head, a little irritated for getting his hopes up. Some nice sparring and new techniques would have been just what the doctor ordered after the combat on Yavin 4.

Shaak shook her head with a smile before reaching over, taking Ranma's hand with her own. "There will be other planets out there who have martial arts styles you can learn Ranma, don't worry." Ranma nodded but was still pouting, and with a giggle Shaak leaned over, kissing him hard on the lips.

The way Ranma quickly returned the kiss made her roll her eyes, knowing his irritation had at least been partly feigned. This didn't stop her from opening her mouth almost immediately however. Their tongues began to dance around one another in her mouth then his, despite the noise HK made of someone being violently, if robotically, sick.

Ranma's deep blue eyes were twinkling as Shaak pulled away before leaning forward to kiss her lightly on the lips before she could pull away. "As a consolation prize that certainly would take some beating."

"I, I should hope so!" Shaak said with a laugh, wondering if now would be a time to try out what she wanted to in order to take their relationship to the next stage. But it wasn't a very romantic moment, so she shook her head deciding against that for now.

A moment later the ship once more entered hyperspace, bound on the first of six jumps which would take them once more to Kashyyyk. Yet while Shaak was perfectly correct in that she had to report to the Order what had happened on Yavin 4, she really should have remembered that Wookies always liked to brag about battles, hunts and other valorous deeds…

OOOOOOO

Yoda made his slow but certain way through the trees towards Rwoookrrorro's landing area, chuckling quietly at the latest escapade from the younglings learning in this, albeit smaller Jedi temple. They had taken the idea of using pranks and ambushes for training purposes to heart, and even without Ranma here to be their victim they were still acting out at times. But because of that, and because they were having so much fun with the learning process, their abilities were growing slightly faster than normally would be the case.

That wasn't to say there weren't issues with the clans being trained here on Kashyyyk at the moment. Occasionally their jokes and pranks went too far or occurred at an inappropriate time. The teachers had come down hard on a few cases of that, but all in all the education of the clan was continuing apace.

This despite the teachers, Consulars almost to a man, pulling their hair out at the changes Yoda had railroaded into the curriculum. Metaphorically of course, these were Jedi after all, and some of them were aliens who had no hair, but the point still stood. None of the teachers here or in the main temple on Coruscant agreed with the need to change the way they were teaching their charges unwilling to admit that times were becoming dark or that the traditional training, with its emphasis on diplomacy and meditation was not up to the demands of the Dark times ahead.

Still they were obeying, and at least here on Kashyyyk Yoda could personally make certain they were following the new curricula. And he trusted Master Windu and Master Giiett to do the same on Coruscant.

Yoda took a moment to pause, staring out into the foliage around him as he thought of one ongoing issue that had nothing to do with his fellow Jedi's unwillingness to change their ways. Young Anakin Skywalker, he of the massive potential and a background and general attitude that made Yoda leery of him, had not been able to make friends with his peer group, acquaintances yes thanks to his leading them in pranks, but no close friends.

Admittedly his peer group was quite a bit younger, since Anakin had not been found and taken into the Order at the normal age he'd been Forced to start with the younger group. But even more so, his life experiences were far beyond anything they had ever dealt with. The only exception was a few younger students who had somewhat more of a greater world view, having been left with their families for a time for various reasons, mostly biological or logistical, after having been found. And there Anakin's coming in after the clans had already formed told against him.

Anakin's skills with the Force also set him aside. He could do things already with the Force that only advanced younglings or newly made padawans should have been able to do. Despite Yoda's injunctions to treat him just like all the others this had gotten around and Anakin had begun to show an air of assumed superiority when dealing with his fellow younglings. It was not a good attitude for prospective Jedi to have but until he tripped up there was little that any of the teachers could do to curtail it beyond stern injunctions about arrogance being beneath Jedi, which normally went in one ear and out the other.

Thankfully however Master Jinn was able to deal with him. In return for Anakin's good behavior and his not showing off in classes, Qui-Gon gave him some personal instruction. Not that Yoda was happy to see that, since in the long run it only served to exacerbate the issue in the long term.

Yet, Master Jinn, the only proponent of the Living Force we have on planet, allowances, made for this must be alas. The rest of the teachers like the vast majority of the Order believed in reaching out solely to the Unifying Force rather than the Living Force, to reach out into the future and try to guide their steps from that rather than from the 'sensation of the now' as Master Jinn put it, which seemed in some ways to tie into the ability to utilize one's own Living Force as Ranma did.

Master Yoda hadn't realized that so few of the teachers even understood the idea behind the two types of Force before looking into it here on Kashyyyk. Master Jinn's understanding of that topic made up for a lot, even his coddling of Anakin.

Yoda's thoughts changed abruptly as he came out of the small tunnel between one wroshyr tree limb and the next onto the landing pad, moving forward to join a few Wookies already standing there. They all turned and bowed respectfully, the chief among them speaking quickly in his own tongue. "Thank you for coming Master Yoda. As you know, a clan of my people acted on your suggestion to search out Knight Ti and Ranma in order to help them against a foe."

"Senile I am not!" Master Yoda groused, smacking the giant Wookie lightly on his calf with his gimer stick. The Wookie took it in stride chuffing in amusement at the ancient Jedi's crotchety nature. "Returning they are, felt that I did. Certain I am, a story they have to tell."

The group of natives all nodded at him eagerly. Wookies always enjoyed tales by the fireside, especially of faraway places and hunts in far off woodlands. Fights not so much since despite their violent tempers and the incredibly deadly ecosystem they had evolved from, Wookies were not a warrior species. They didn't have to be given the fact they had the strength to tear most species apart with their bare hands of course, and sometimes even battle tales had their places in the fireside.

Moments later the Wookies and the ex-slave ship touched down, with the Wookies quickly absconding from it, moving forward as a group. Yoda's ears flopped down low as he noticed seven of Liac's clan were missing, but was grateful to hear that the ex-slaves at least had been already dropped off at their various planets, mostly Alderaan and two of its colonies.

"Greetings Chief Liac," Yoda said as the other Wookies finished their own welcome, which involved backslapping and many hugs fit to crack most species' ribs. The Wookies were an effusive people, and Chief Liac and his clan had many friends here, other clans they had married into, other large families they were allied with.

Chief Liac bowed deeply to the ancient Grandmaster, his hands clenched and dew claws drawn in so as to indicate extreme respect as he did. "Master Yoda, your prediction was correct! Great deeds were done these past few weeks, and my clan and I were a part of it because of your word. We have tales to tell Master, of a great evil vanquished, and of mercenary groups not just brought low, but wiped out!"

Master Yoda blinked slowly, nodding his aged head as he tapped his glimmer stick on the ground, his Force powers translating the Wookie's language with the ease of centuries of practice as the sector Jedi. "Know this I did. This great evil, sense that I did not, interests me it does. The tale telling, when begin it will?"

"I have injured I would like to see to, and I must see my wife. But say this evening?"

"Agreed." Then Yoda actually smiled. "Send a few Jedi to hunt I will. A fire we will start on the temples roof. For tale telling, a good position it is, hrhrhrm."

Normally campfire tales would happen in the main wroshyr tree that housed the clan doing the tale. To have it elsewhere was unusual and a sign of respect, especially if it came from one larger clan to a smaller one. To host the tale telling in the temple itself was like Master Yoda was saying that the Jedi clan welcomed Liac's clan as an equal.

Chief Liac bowed again, even more deeply, as did many of his clansmen. "We will be honored, Master Yoda."

That evening, Aayla, Master Unduli, and several dozen other Masters and Knights joined Master Yoda on top of the temple. Many of them looked a little bemused by the sheer barbarism of the moment, but they were there to hear about what had happened after Yoda had asked that aid be sent to Shaak Ti.

The reports the council had of the incidents on Corellia had been alarming so no one had argued with Yoda when he was able to discern that Shaak and Ranma would need help. The Death Watch resurfacing after a little over a decade was the reason for that. Everyone on the council, even their newest members, knew what had occurred during the Mandalore debacle. Seeing a faction of Mandalorians who believed that any kind of combat or killing brought them honor was a concern for any right-thinking Jedi. On top of that was this 'great evil' which Yoda had not foreseen.

In the center of the roof blazed a central fire about three feet wide. Stuck on traditional small sprigs of wroshyr wood a few of the local animals were roasting. Set along with them were scattered bunches of herbs and local fruits. Outside of one or two of the haunches, it was up to the individual how they seasoned the meat, or what they ate at all. Of course these were Wookie herbs and spices, so few offworlders could stomach them.

Aayla sat near the fire with a few of the Wookies, eagerly tasting things as they pointed them out. Her Twi'lek palette was strong enough to deal with the Wookie's traditional food and she was actually having fun. The Wookies were no threat to causing her to have a flashback and Luminara had decided she was far enough along in her treatment to be allowed out to mingle in a mixed gender setting in any event. Luminara sat elsewhere, keeping an eye on her charge, but otherwise willing to sit back and enjoy the convivial atmosphere. Everywhere Jedi and Wookie intermingled in the small crowd, setting on woven fiber cushions.

After everyone had some food, chief Liac stood up, moving around the fire to stare out into his audience as he began. He outlined what occurred, from start to finish, including how they had set up a trap for any bounty hunting group that came after them, specifically mentioning the Death Watch because of the attack they had launched on Ranma while he was on Corellia.

There were some mutters from the Jedi at that, which Master Unduli's put into words for the Wookies. "Despite the attack on Shaak and Ranma on Corellia we had hoped this was a small band of survivors from the original Death Watch, which was supposed to have been wiped out."

There were actually a few rumors, unsubstantiated ones admittedly that a single Mandalorian warrior from their former enemies in the Mandalore Civil War had wiped them out in a series of ambushes. Yet it seems as if that was not the case. Only Master Dooku had truly believed those rumors, though most of the Order had agreed that the Death Watch were no longer a threat to the Republic's stability.

Liac nodded, and began again. Master Yoda also noted that the Nova Guard was involved, and made a mental note to talk to Master Ranicisis about that. His diplomatic efforts with that group must've borne fruit. But his ears flopped down to his skull when the Wookies told them about Bo Katan Kryze and her group arriving. There Yoda had to stop the tale, asking Liac several pointed questions about Bo Katan this group and its long-term goals.

Learning that she had gotten close to Shaak and Ranma was disturbing, and there was more than one leery glance shared among the Jedi as they listened to what Bo Katan was trying to do, and Master Ard Nugien, one of the librarians assigned to the new temple turned, looking steadily into Master Yoda's eyes. "You see, Ranma is chaos incarnate! He as much as agreed to share his techniques, his skills with Mandalorians! And if non-Force users can learn how to do what he can…"

Yoda shook his head quickly. "Learn them quick they will not, decades, centuries of training it would take. While learning his abilities, the use of the Force a leg up it gives us." Besides. Yoda paused thinking. "Chaos creating chaos yes hrhrhrm, but possibly positive changes, come from sudden quarters they can. Watch closely we will, very closely, but making a decision before all facts are known, a mistake it would be."

The tale continued. There was much growling and snarling from the Wookies as chief Liac made certain to go into detail on each time they had an encounter with the Trandoshan mercenaries, and Yoda reined in a sigh with some difficulty. The antipathy between the Wookies and the Trandoshans was just shy of religious fervor, though he couldn't blame the Wookies really. Yoda might well have felt the same if some race decided that the skin of Jedi made fantastic coats, and they themselves made fantastic slaves or good eating as the Trandoshans had the Wookies before either species had joined the Republic. The fact that their raids still continued even now was a sad state of affairs and short of trying to change the Trandoshan's entire society it was impossible to stop.

But he was more interested in the tale of this darkness that Shaak had told the other leaders about, and which continually drew her away from the physical fighting in order to try to hunt down. It worried Yoda that he had never felt such as that when he decided to send Shaak and Ranma aid. Although there were some unsubstantiated records from the Great Sith War that mentioned Yavin 4. But there was no connection to that and…

"Apologies!" he said abruptly, as the tale began to wind to its conclusion and a name registered. "Repeat that name, you will."

"Exar Kun." said Liac grimly. "None of us had any idea how or why he remained as a ghost on the planet after the Great Sith War, but we did not question Knight Ti when she said it. And occasionally we and the Barabels would run into animals that were… warped, malformed, diseased. "

At the name of Exar Kun every Jedi Master there stiffened, even those who had not been paying attention much to the tales of valor and combat. That name was a name from the darkest annals of the Order's history, not only for the deeds he'd done, but for the fact that he had revived the Sith Order and had been among their brightest lights before his fall.

Yoda shivered, wondering about the comparison between that and a few others who had fallen to the Dark over the millennia. The brighter the flame, darker the shadow underneath it is, he thought musingly. Keep in mind this with young Anakin I must. He looked over at Master Jinn, noting the human master's eyes narrowing, and realized he too had noticed it. Good.

The tale reached its conclusion, and Master Yoda's eyes actually widened in shock, his normal self-control leaving him for a moment. Shaak had banished Exar Kun's ghost?! That kind of thing was impossible! It should not have been possible for Jedi Knight or even a Master who was not prepared for it to face a Force Ghost of that strength in their own mind and defeat it. Yet judging from chief Liac's tale, there was no doubt that had in fact occurred.

Possible it could be that training with Ranma, allow her to grow strong enough mentally? Strange if so, physical abilities Ranma's mostly are.

From there the tale slowly reached its conclusion, with the Death Watch leader dead, after having apparently been the host of Exar Kun's ghost until it attempted to take over Knight Ti. The change in tactics was mentioned approvingly by most, given the straights the defenders had been pushed into over the weeks of action.

Of course there were details that chief Liac did not know. He did not know about the song that Ranma had sung to Shaak in order to raise her spirits. He did not know how Shaak had battled Exar Kun in her head. She had shared none of that except the fact that she had won with anyone but Ranma. Nor had Liac noticed how the ongoing combat had worn at Shaak. And he only knew the bare minimum about the agreement Ranma had made with Bo Katan to journey to Mandalore in a week's time.

That evening, Master Yoda sat alone in the council chamber on Kashyyyk, the roughhewn of the room matching the rest of the temple somehow pleasing him in a way the council chamber on Coruscant did not as he imputed a code into the Hypercom communication device. This opened a connection to the Temple, but quickly shifted from the high council's Hypercom address to two others, Master librarian Jocasta Nu and Master Yaddle.

The two of them answered quickly though Jocasta looking a little irritated, and dressed as if she had been in bed. Yaddle was not. Yaddle occasionally spent half the night meditating, rather than sleeping since their species could use either to sustain themselves. "News I have had," Master Yoda said before either could speak. "Knight Ti, been to the moon of Yavin 4 she has."

Jocasta frowned thoughtfully, her fingers moving out of the pickup of the Hypercom as she muttered under her breath. "Yavin 4, Yavin 4… here it is. It was the sight of a battle against the New Sith Order. One of the last ones according to this, but that is all our records have on it. Did she find anything you want added to the records?"

"Information you have on it, share with us now you will," Yoda said simply. "All, even restricted histories."

Jocasta looked up sharply at that, but Yoda was Grandmaster of the Order, and had been so for far longer than Jocasta, a woman pushing 83 at this point, had been alive. At the site of the ancient met Grandmaster staring at her she only could shake her head and nod before diving into her work. The two green skinned aliens remained silent as she worked, and she frowned suddenly. "That can't be right. It's not directly connected but there is a rumor in here of some kind of Dark Side user being caught in a bombardment there and killed, but the records are so disjointed from that period I can't tell you anything more about it Master."

"Dark Side user, Exar Kun he was. Die in the bombardment he did not. A ghost he became. Exorcised it, Shaak Ti apparently has." From there Yoda filled the two of them in on what Liac had been able to tell them about the Dark Side ghost. Finishing the tale he asked the two research experts, "True it is, exorcised such a thing could be?"

Jocasta sighed faintly leaning back, scratching at her wrinkled neck. "Weak Force Ghosts can be banished back into the totality of the Force if need be yes by a combination of Force power against of their ethereal bodies, and the destruction of their physical anchor if they have such a thing. I know of only three documented cases where it was needed in all our history since Force Ghosts are not a normal phenomena and they are almost always Jedi Masters when they fall, returning to fulfil some purpose or pass on information."

"In two cases the Jedi in question was slowly corrupted by the Dark Side of the area they died in, becoming a threat to anyone nearby and propagating the Dark Side power. The last was reportedly an ancient Sith Master who had somehow lived on, only for a Jedi whose description matches that of Nomi Sunrider to banish him, though our histories of that time are… disjointed at best." She looked as if those words caused her physical pain. Jocasta had never liked the fact there were numerous gaping holes in the Order's history thanks to the number of times their libraries had been destroyed.

"But it sounds as if Exar Kun had no anchor, and wasn't a naturally created Force Ghost." Jocasta frowned thinking hard. "If the Jedi at the time had any idea that Exar Kun had done this thing, they could have exorcised it then I think, but after so for much time?" She looked over at the screen showing her Master Yaddle. "What do you think?"

"Properties of Force Light, not well understood. Among the Order, esoteric power it has always been, hard to teach, harder to learn. Yet powerful technique it is. Possible it could be used mentally to destroy a ghost. Effect on a ghost of such power, unknown it is. Join you I will on Kashyyyk to question Shaak Ti when return she does. Learn firsthand I would of this." Yaddle said, her voice nearly rapid-fire with her excitement.

"I wish I could join you, but I can't get away from the Temple right now. I am helping Master Dooku in that little project he's working on," she said obliquely, unwilling to mention via Hypercom that Master Dooku and Master Windu were heading the ongoing project to see if they could find any sign of there being a Dark Side user still out there somewhere.

They weren't unfortunately having much luck out in the physical world. They had found numerous leads, but all of them had been dead ends. At the moment the only physical clue remaining they had might be the Dark Sisters on Dathomir but the Order was unwilling to force things there. The Dark Sisters might be Dark Side users, but they were not completely evil and they kept to their own planet which allowed the Jedi to somewhat ignore them.

With the physical trails leading nowhere they had turned to the Jedi records. The two duelists were running Jocasta ragged looking through old records trying to figure out where and how a Dark Side user could've come from and if they had any clues about such before the Zabrak's appearance. They could now attest that at least a few mysterious Jedi deaths could be laid at the Zabrak's feet, including one of the Lost 19, but they hadn't turned up anything they could use.

"Apologize for that I will not," Master Yoda said sardonically, and Jocasta chuckled, shaking her head. The two of them often did not see eye to eye on many things these days. Yoda had begun to be far more flexible than he had previously imagined he could ever be, rolling with the punches and living in the now more than any follower of the long term thinking Unifying Force should be. Whereas Jocasta was all too certain about feeling that the past was more important than trying to discern the future.

"See you when you arrive I will Master Yaddle," he went on, addressing the younger member of his species. She nodded her head agreeably, but knew she would not be getting any sleep that night.

Irritatingly Yoda didn't get much sleep that night either, because he was woken up early the next day by one of the young knights who served the temple as general messengers. "Master Yoda, there is a call from Master Windu and the high Council for you."

Yoda nodded, getting out of the giant pillow that he used as a bed, quickly following the younger man out the door to the council room. He found the other Masters already gathered, and astonishingly a large portion of the High Council was also in attendance via the specialized holographic program. Master Windu was standing as Yoda entered, silent and turned away from the others as he stared out over the landscape of Coruscant, though of course all Yoda could make out was the fact that he was turned away.

Two Yoda's surprise, Master Dooku was also present. He was sitting in one of the chairs left empty at present since Master Giiett was not present, busy with teaching the younglings.

The tall Korun native turned back as Yoda entered, bowing formally to the Grandmaster, before sitting down and gesturing to Adi Gallia. "Master Gallia, you called this meeting."

"We have an unusual situation in the Senate, a small one at present, but one that bears watching, and which has made for quite a bit of gossip." She said the last word somewhat distastefully, though it was at best a front. Listening in on gossip and the feelings and emotions of it was one of the ways Jedi gathered information after all, and Master Gallia was one of the best when it came to navigating political waters.

"The New Mandalorians have appealed to the Senate for Jedi arbitration with the terrorist group called the Death Watch, a name we have not heard of for years." Gallia went on. "Duchess Satine Kryze fears that they will restart their old terror campaign against the New Mandalorians in order to seize control of Mandalore's government. She is also worried they will cover this through a push against the government in the political field. Any move to put the Death Watch or any other like-minded group in charge of Mandalore is a cause for concern, both for us and for the Senate."

Yoda held back a groan, but more than one of the other Masters not physically present on the Kashyyyk did not have his self-control, and Gallia looked around at their faces. "From your reactions I understand that you have some information on this?"

"Dead, the Death Watch as we knew of it is," Yoda said bluntly as the other Masters around him turned in his direction. "A trap Ranma and Knight Ti sprang on them, numerous other mercenary groups and gangsters also involved they were. Stronger the Death watch were than we knew. But wiped out the Death Watch were, except for a group under Bo Katan Kryze. Wish to create a new way of keeping to their code, they do."

"The New Mandalorians are pacifists," said another Master, named Presten Var, a human male. He was filling in for Master Ranicisis on the Council while he was still out in the Ailoni system. He had apparently felt the presence of a Force sensitive child on the planet and had decided to stay there and hunt down the feeling. Since it was every Jedi's duty to do so, no one had made any mention of it.

Right now however, Yoda was wishful for the other Master's reserved controlled presence. "Pacifism is always more welcome in a government, especially one such as that. We should try to put a stop to this new faction gaining ground. A mixed mission, part anti-terrorism, part political aid seems necessary here, though we would need to tread lightly on Mandalore given their antipathy towards Jedi."

"Thoughts on this you have padawan?" Yoda asked, looking over at Dooku.

Yoda briefly reflected on how Ranma had a distinct effect on Dooku because before this he would've taken umbrage at the gentle needling of Yoda calling him padawan. Now he merely arched a sardonic eyebrow, visible in the hologram, before looking around the temple's council room.

When Dooku spoke, it was in terms of extreme neutrality. "I have had more dealings with the Mandalorians than any of you and I have to say I am ambivalent about this. Neutrality is indeed a better and more desirable form of government than any other. However, a democratic government cannot survive if it does not speak for the majority of their constituents. And even during the debacle with the Death Watch and True Mandalorians we saw some signs that the New Mandalorian's government might not be as popular as they like to think, hence the so-called Clan War, which pitted many traditionalists backing a clan based government against the direct representational government that the New Mandalorians put in place. This new conflict might well have been festering ever since the end of those two clashes."

Dooku's lips twisted as he said that, not liking what he was saying at all. Nor did he like the fact that that so-called Civil War had been more of a clash between two relatively small factions than an actual civil war simply because it had never really called upon a larger majority of Mandalore's population. It had been bloody and violent, but small in scale. The Clan War in contrast had been more of a series of political clashes, with few examples of direct combat.

"While democracy is all well and good, I think that we need to seriously consider whether or not it is appropriate in this case," said Coleman Trebor, the council's newest member, shaking his head. A Vurt male, he was charismatic, well-connected in the media, and one of the best diplomats in the Order who did not deal with the Senate directly.

Despite that when he spoke it was not in favor of more talking. "We cannot simply forget the evils the Mandalorians perpetrated in their wars of conquest, we cannot simply believe that this new group will be able to create, let alone keep to a new code of conduct because of their interaction with this Ranma fellow. I haven't met him so I do not know the effect he can have, but surely his chaotic effect is not so great as all that."

"We're not saying we should, and they're not even attempting to say that," said Master Depa Billaba. "But you didn't hear chief Liac speak about this Bo Katan woman. I did. It was secondhand admittedly, but I think Bo Katan has had a personal epiphany, and I think that her opinion about her people's history has changed too. The Mandalorians might well change because of this, might change into something positive for the universe. A sheepdog instead of a wolf."

That analogy won many blank stares and the human Master rubbed her forehead. "A guardian instead of a predator," she said slowly. Everyone nodded at that, and she went on. "I realize that we as Jedi should be leery of the Mandalorians returning to their combative ways. It was we who did most of the dying to stop their wars of conquest. But can we in all good conscience turn our back on the idea of controlling this possible change for the good?"

"You're speaking of control in conjunction with something that Ranma's presence began," Dooku said, kneading the bridge of his nose for a moment. "I am struggling to figure out whether or not you're speaking from ignorance, or simply blind optimism."

Depa actually laughed at that and Dooku went on. "We are also forgetting the fact the hatred Mandalorians in general feel toward Jedi. The Mandalorians led by Bo Katan might have been willing to overlook the fact that Knight Ti was a Jedi Knight because of her association with Ranma and his teachings however we should not blind ourselves to the fact that we are not exactly popular among their people. Our very presence, no matter how soft we tread, might poison more Mandalorians to the New Mandalorian's cause. Furthermore," he paused, then shook his head leaning back staring over at Master Mace, who stared back.

The two lightsaber masters shared a long slow look, and Master Mace eventually nodded. "Yes," he said simply. They did not share what that long slow look had imparted. They did not share the fact that they needed to be aware that they might have a secret enemy out there which could turn this to his or her advantage. They were still operating under secrecy of that concept, and this was not the time or place to break it.

"Neutrality must be kept," Yoda said thoughtfully, also giving voice to those thoughts. "Tied down into another small-scale war, we cannot afford to be. Yet to arbitrate we have been asked to, do so we will."

Master Windu nodded thinking. As part of his process of revamping the Council of reassignment and its methods, he had gone over hundreds of thousands of mission reports over the past few months. "In that case, I suggest we call in Knight Kenobi to be part of the delegation. He and Qui-Gon were part of a delegation that helped save the Duchess Satine from an assassination plot early in her tenure during the so-called Clan Wars. Why Mandalorians call it that I have no idea, but they do. At any rate his knowledge of her and of the planet in general might well be helpful in diffusing any tensions and can also give us insight that is not tied in to either side or its version of what is going on."

"A good idea, but I would caution you about sending him alone, and remember we should not send an actual diplomat. It would be an insult to send a known diplomat, since the Mandalorians other than the NM's would have little respect for him, and the stigma of being a Jedi will make this task even more difficult."

"Master Plo Koon?" asked one of the other Masters. "He could serve. He is a known lightsaber duelist, he has been involved in several of the wars in the past few years, and is also known in diplomatic circles."

"An excellent suggestion," Mace said with a nod. "And Plo is even known to Ranma and Knight Ti." He looked over at Master Tiin, who was the only other Master present who had also been part of the mission against the Yinchorri. "Am I correct in remembering that Ranma had a good impression of Plo?"

"Quite good yes," Master Tiin replied with a smirk. "They got on well, though they didn't talk often. And Master Plo Koon has also talked a few times with Knight Ti I know of."

"A decision reached we have then," Yoda said with a nod. "Need more information we will about this Bo Katan woman, the truth behind her words, before plan going forward we can form."

OOOOOOO

"I hate flying, I hate flying, I hate flying!" Obi Wan muttered to himself in a very non-Jedi manner as his Sprite swooped down into the landing bay of the space station they were assaulting, one of its engines shattered. Thankfully the space station's shield had gone down before he had passed through that area of space and his crash did not end in his ignominious death by splatter.

"Why did I ever agree to pilot a starfighter in the first place!?" then Obi Wan was too busy using the Force to keep himself in his cockpit's seat as the starfighter tumbled end over end. The glass of it's canopy shattered on the first impact, and as the second began he quickly hit the eject button, launching his chair up into the air of the docking bay.

Unlatching himself Obi Wan used a Force Jump to hurl himself away from his chair before the rockets in the ejection seat could carry him up to splatter againt the ceiling of the hanger bay. Even as he did so, Obi Wan's lightsaber activated, deflecting several dozen blaster bolts as they came at him.

Slipping into form three with the ease of months of practice and several extremely hard missions in midair would have been impossible for many masters, but Obi wan did so, and landed unharmed. Then as a torrent of fire from the pirates began to train on him, his lightsaber began to return that fire directly at his attackers, flinging their bodies backwards dead by their own blaster bolts.

When Obi Wan allowed himself time to think about it, there was a kind of brutal irony in that maneuver. Live by the sword die by your own sword or in this case plasma bolt, he thought now, rushing forward. Tapping his headset, he asked, "Siri are you there?"

When she replied the other knight's voice was almost breathless, but she seemed to be calming down from the initial rush of battle while even more pirates began to rush into the hanger bay. "I am, though I have to say your mode of entrance leaves much to be desired from this side of things."

"You should try it from in here!" Obi replied, his lightsaber flashing again and again all around him. To relieve some of the pressure he reached out with the Force, pulling a few loose pieces of equipment into the throng of pirates, knocking them down. Their fire lessened enough he was able to close and get in among them. The next second, he had enough time to ask, "How goes the battle outside?"

"The rest of the pirate group tried to run, but Ord Duvac patrol ships caught them before they could calculate their jumps. Two of their ships still got away, but on random jumps and several patrol craft are already jumping out after them. This system's numerous navigational hazards might have protected their pirate base from detection, but it also means that their attempts to escape aren't going to be as easy as they could have been otherwise," she said her voice almost silky smooth.

Obi Wan carefully hid a wince. Siri had not enjoyed their current mission or rather she had not enjoyed dealing with some of the slaver scum they had been dealing with. The two of them had posed as a pair of murderous psychopaths named Gilver and Clorde, thieves, assassins, and bounty hunters of a sort even the guild would never allow on its books. They had acted the part very well, and through the use of Force powers had been able to get out of proving their bona-fides in any way until they had the information they needed. But the opportunity to take out the Soul Eaters had brought them up short of their original goal.

This particular pirate band had been operating for over three decades now. It was organized, large, and powerful, a full branch of the diseased tree that had been Black Sun. it's ships preyed upon the people, both the shipping and the planets of five sectors in the Colonies. They also had a habit of leaving particularly dirty bombs behind if forced to pull back, and of not leaving many survivors. Hunting them down had been a standing Jedi Order for decades, though this was the first real break the Order had gotten which could well lead to shutting the entire group down.

It felt good to be on a mission like this. These kind of missions sent a very powerful message to everyone involved in the underworld that the Jedi order was taking an interest. It was somehow cleaner than any diplomatic mission could be, Siri mused to herself.

"If that is so, could you please get in here?" Obi Wan grunted, diving aside and flashing his lightsaber around to partially deflect a quad laser burst. "These pirates don't know when they're beaten!"

"…SO Ord Conro's patrol ships have the Pirates, and their computer technicians are going over the data." Obi Wan reported to the council over two hours later, his voice and stance showing how weary he was from the constant combat. The pirates had never surrendered, knowing what awaited them in the local courts, where piracy was a act punishable by death. He, Siri Tachi and three companies of Republic guard had to winkle them out, and the guard had paid for it with over forty percent casualties. The green kids who made up the companies just hadn't had enough training to deal with live combat.

"They've already discovered a few other bases in the area, and will be heading to take them out quickly and in short order," Siri Tachi said from where she sat in a chair next to Obi, her voice and body drooping with exhaustion. "We hope you understand why we decided to end this operation quickly Masters. I realize a lot of work went into our cover stories but…"

Master Mace held up a hand, smiling for a change. "Do not concern yourselves with that. It has been a very, very bad few months for pirates and slavers throughout the Republic, and I for one am pleased that the Soul Eaters will no longer be a problem. Well done the pair of you."

He paused then, before going on more seriously. "I wish I could say that you'll both be having a few days off once you return to the Temple, but I'm afraid I can't. Obi Wan we have another mission for you. I understand you have a connection to Duchess Satine?"

Obi Wan blanched hoping that his emotions did not register for a moment, and knowing they did as soon as he felt Siri Tachi's gaze on him, her eyes speculative. "I do Master," he said delicately and began to describe from his own perspective the mission.

The mission had been to provide bodyguards to the then somewhat young Duchess Satine, during what amounted to a social shakeup of huge proportions. Her New Mandalorian party, perhaps the first purely political party had begun to piece together Mandalore's economy and infrastructure, which had been shattered hundreds of years before during the Mandalorian Excision, reaching out to the Republic for aid in doing so.

In so doing they had shattered several long standing traditions, and come under attack both for that and their pacifist platform. That they had also reached out to the Republic, the body that, like the Jedi, the Mandalorians saw as being the aggressor in that Excision, was a factor in their hatred. Satine had ascended to the position of leadership of her party via an off-world education, skillful diplomacy and charisma. A charisma that had thoroughly ensnared a young Obi Wan Kenobi, something Obi Wan was almost painfully aware of at present.

"Good," Master Windu said with a nod. "You will be seconded to Master Plo Koon, the two of you will join Knight Ti as our representatives in a arbitration that we have been called upon to do on that planet. There is some question about the legality of the New Mandalorians government, and apparently a growing movement to revert to a more warlike footing. Your job will not be to bolster the New Mandalorians government Obi Wan, but to gather information."

"We must know first how widespread the disdain for the New Mandalorian government is, how dangerous this new movement could be to the peace of the sector, and how best to stop it. We cannot be seen as unilaterally acting here, even if the locals wish to act out against the Republic government. You will receive a full briefing when you arrive on Kashyyyk, and we expect to see you there as soon as possible."

"That is a very thin line you're asking us to walk Master Windu," Obi Wan said, carefully keeping any expression off his face as he scratched at the stubble he was starting to grow. Siri had said that he might look good with the beard, and the grungy look had helped their cover. "I will however try."

Going on a mission that might bring me in direct opposition to a girl I had feelings for while leaving my current girlfriend, friend with benefits, whatever Siri and I are, behind. Joy. And now if Siri's expression is anything to go on I have to explain the emotions she felt. Somehow I just know that Ranma is involved in this…

OOOOOOO

If he were one to give into even his darker emotions Sidious might well have been twitching with fury at present. The ripples are spreading, Force curse the Chaotic Locus! How is he, she, whatever it was originally, doing this anyway!? With a visible snarl on his lips Sidious pulled his control around himself like a jacket, separating his thoughts from the fury and hate threatening to overwhelm him.

To be certain, many things are still going my way. His control of the Senate, clandestine of course for the most part, was now rock-solid. The Senate would of course never move in lock step but all its factions could now be used as he wished them to be, dancing to his tune like so many marionettes on strings. And he had begun the long process of turning Sora Bulq to the Dark Side. Indeed, Sidious estimated that within a year or two the man would agree to become his apprentice formally. And with him, would come several dozen other Jedi.

Indeed, Bulq might be able to create a true schism within the Order. From that, who knew how many other Jedi could fall into Sidious' lap? Such Dark Jedi would of course be limited, a tool could not overcome a lifetime's indoctrination and immediately be as useful as someone trained from an early age in a second sect. However, they would be good tools, both in the long term against the Jedi physically and against the Jedi's public persona once he could begin working on turning them in the first place.

But the source of his current fury was that the Grand Plan was starting to come apart in places, small ones for now, but from small things came large avalanches. First was that several dozen of the hate groups he had begun through several hundred cutouts were no longer responding to any commands, become mere terrorist groups in turn. Their violence was feeding the Veil for certain, but he could no longer predict their actions, and he had nearly lost local politicians on two Core Worlds who had long been in his pocket because of that. This was strange, but such people were uncontrollable by their very violent nature, so he had made allowances for it.

The Mandalorians training teams which Jango Fett had slowly been bringing together to start training the clones once the first batch was born suddenly leaving he had not planned for. They had handed the money paid them back to the clone Masters before heading home for some reason. It had taken him some time to learn the reason behind that: the destruction of the Death Watch, and the rise of a new faction to challenge the New Mandalorians control of their planet.

Even Jango had been interested in getting involved, only the rumors of a Jedi possibly being involved had stopped him from following his fellow Cuy'val Dar, or 'those who no longer exist'. That, and alone of all of them Jango knew and agreed with the real reason behind the army's creation: to kill the Jedi Order. Sdiious had nurtured the hate in the man, making it grow to the point where it had superseded his loyalty to his people.

The Death Watch being destroyed was of no moment, his circuitous method of communication with their previous leader would never be traced back to him. And while the loss of several mercenary companies he could've used for various clandestine operations was irritating, there were literally thousands where they came from scattered across the galaxy.

No, it was fact that he needed that clone army to be as deadly as it could possibly be, not only as an army, but as an anti-Jedi force. The Grand Plan had long hinged on the idea of playing both sides of the Civil War, in order to stretch the Jedi Order thin enough and wipe them out in one fell swoop. There were simply too many Jedi scattered across the Republic, over 10,000 of them to his certain knowledge, for anything else to work. Yes, the small-scale conflicts he and his Master had been fueling for the past two decades or so worked to thin the Jedi numbers, kill a few here and there, but that was small potatoes in comparison to the Order as a whole.

And even a small portion of Jedi survived and had enough public support they could then rebuild and Sidious would be faced with yet another round of the interminable war between Sith and Jedi. He didn't want that. Sidious wanted to wipe out the Jedi and reign forever as Emperor of the galaxy. That was his destiny, the Grand Plan the Rule of Two had been working towards for its entire existence. Sidious knew it had to be him. The time was right, and all the pawns in place, just like the cloning cylinders he had stolen and stored on Wayland.

The Veil of the Dark Side was in place, it would only grow more powerful. Now it was blocking any Jedi from seeing too far into the future. Within a handful of years anytime the Jedi tried to use the Force to any long term direction, Sidious would be able to manipulate what they saw. They were going blind, they would soon be deaf. They had neutered themselves in numerous ways since the Ruusan Reformation. If Sidious couldn't wipe out the Jedi now the way the Order was even with the Chaotic Focus' help, then no one could.

The hatred between species is still allowing me to heighten the tension in the Core Worlds, hiding the growing division between the corporations, the Outer Rim Territories and the Core but it is slowly becoming uncontrollable, even for me. If I cannot make it die down, it will start to impact my control in the Senate, and then it will start to take away from the unity the Core Worlds will need to stand against the Secessionists when I let them off their leash.

Admittedly, I know that at least four Jedi have died on recent missions to worlds with such tensions but if I cannot control it then how can I aim it solely at the Jedi? Worse the hate groups do not represent a large enough enemy for me to be able to seize the power I need in the Republic as a whole or to enact the broad sweeping changes I'll require as well as to build the Army the Republic will need. Of course I could use the Mandalorians as a threat, but they don't have the numbers to be the single visible threat I need. True I could use them as a scare factor, but…

Sidious growled, shaking his head. He would have to look elsewhere for trainers, and build up the army's numbers further as well. If I do that, and I also subtly start pushing the Senate to assign the Order more negotiations, push the Order further and further into the limelight out in the Outer Rim and beyond the Colonies while dealing with the hate crimes myself, I can strengthen my position in the public eye, sidelining them in the Core Worlds and also make them seen even more as the tools of the Senate out there, regardless of how those missions go. That will offset the good will they've been gaining thanks to their current operations, and my control of nearly every news agency will allow me to minimize that even further, though it will be difficult.

There were two other things however that were also worrying Sidious. One was that the Order definitely knew about the Sith now. He had known that would occur of course, if Darth Maul had died or even been seen it was obvious. But instead of clamping down on anything beyond the narrow focus of their Oaths, looking inward for their enemy and becoming more reactionary as the plan had called for, the Order was not in fact doing any such thing, at least not as an organized body. There was growing reactionism from many Jedi, but just as many were not doing so, simply going on with their duties.

Instead, Dooku and Windu at the very least were working different angles to try and find any sign of another Dark Side user out there. The death of the old Sith sorcerer Karkko to Master Dooku was a blow, he could've been useful in time, once he had been properly shown that he was no longer the Master in the equation. And Windu's methodical nature was… worrying. They could not be allowed to find the Clone Army until after the Secession War, whatever it would eventually be called started.

Sidious knew they would never find him, there was no connection between Darth Maul and him that they could find, no chance of them finding the secret Sith Temple here on Coruscant, no chance of them even realizing his old Master was a Sith. But the fact that they are searching for us in this way rather than simply reacting as they should by becoming more reactionary, is… disturbing. It shows the way many Jedi think are changing, in ways I cannot predict. The Veil is still in place however, and with that and my control of the Senate the end result is assured. I just need to find out how to predict their actions now…

At its core all of Sidious' concerns was very simple though he was psychologically unable to realize it. If everything had been going according to plan, Sidious could've been using the Dark Side of the Veil and his own prior planning to anticipate the moves of his enemies, turning them aside or turning them to his own purposes. Now events were cropping up, he was changing his plans to match. He was handling the changes well enough, but the fluid manner of many of the small scale events leading up to the end game was starting to get to him. Sidious was realizing he was, despite his control of the Veil, still only human.

OOOOOOO

The trip to Kashyyyk forced the Wild Light to jump in and out of hyperspace four times in order to orient itself to that system without intercepting any navigational hazards. The last jump out was a short jump from a nearby lifeless and utterly uninteresting brown star which had no planets and might never have had any according to what Tune's sensors were telling him. But as the ship began to turn to reenter hyperspace on its new coordinates HK at the sensor grid shouted a warning. "Exultant shout: Master, we seem to have bandits incoming! And I thought that this trip was boring!"

"Incoming from where?" Ranma asked, even as he grabbed the controls and began to twist the Wild Light into a corkscrew, an evasive maneuver which forced the ship downwards and away from any attacker on the same plane of space they had originally been on. Tune warbled a protest having just about entered the coordinates for the next jump, and been revving the hyperspace engines again. But Ranma ignored him as seven bogeys appeared on the screen their dots glaring crimson on the radar like drops of blood.

Shaak quickly powered up the shields above and beyond their normal low powered settings which was supposed to deal with small spatial detritus, while at the same time smacking her hand down on the weapons systems, bringing them up but keeping the proton torpedo and ion cannons behind their irises. "HK, you have the gun on the port wing, I have the starboard. Tune, get us a read on them. Are they pirates, and what kind of ships?"

A moment later that second question was answered as two starfighters, both heavily modified Cloak Shapes, came in on them from directly below. They would've been just below the Wild Light's former position, able to attack it's relatively undefended underside, but because Ranma had forced them downwards passed them, they were directly in line with the quad lasers on the wings. HK killed one of them while Shaak winged the other, sending it careening out of control through space. At the same time Ranma turned the ship once more, racing towards three of the dots which had stuck together in a clear formation coming at them from behind.

"Those three dots are large, heavily modified yachts Rendilli Drive Yards Space cutters, but they are moving in an odd fashion, almost too uniform Master, mistress." Tune stated. "We have five other starfighters, modified Cloak Shapes, all of them with the same modifications. Old ships one and all, but they seem well maintained from what my sensors say."

After a moment looking at the radar, Ranma shook his head. "Why the heck are those three ships keeping that close a formation?"

Shaak sent the radar a single glance and shook her head. "They're slaved together."

"What?"

"You can slave computers programs, droids or ships together with a 'slave system', it's usually kept in a separate control device. I would assume that one of those ships has better shielding than the others?"

"Affirmative mistress," said Tune. "The one flying somewhat back of the other two has better shielding, but not as good weaponry from what I'm reading."

A second later the two other turbolaser equipped yachts again to fire at the Wild Light, trying to bracket the wildly evading ship. When their blows actually struck, the Wild Light's shielding was well up to the task of stopping them barely dimming at all. The attackers however seemed to realize that too.

"Warning, we have a lock on!" Said Tune, warbling and rocking his section.

A second later the second yacht opened fire with concussion missiles, several dozen of them fired from four launchers swiftly, racing towards the Wild Light en masse. Ranma quickly juked them around, heading towards another the remaining starfighters, though, and even they were acting oddly, not flying as naturally as they should have.

"This is so weird. Those ships are moving like they are under remote control or something," Ranma muttered.

"They're slaved too Ranma," Shaak said simply. "I would guess that only one ship in this system outside of the Wild Light has any sentients on it."

"Disdainful sniff: it's a typical attack pattern." HK said, as he and Shaak lit up the two attacking starfighters destroying both of them as they easily anticipated where they would go. "Whoever is behind this is hoping that that ship's concussion missiles will do the real killing here."

"Let us disabuse them of that notion," Shaak murmured, looking over at Ranma. "Take us back towards them."

Ranma did so, juking this way and that to throw off the turbolaser fire, while Shaak closed her eyes, giving herself to the Force as her hands worked on their controls. Shot after shot from her quad laser rang out, destroying the incoming missiles, whilst HK concentrated his fire on any of the incoming remaining starfighters. But the two yachts with the concussion missiles fired another wave of them.

However, Ranma wasn't exactly defenseless either. He locked up the one ship with the better shielding and began to fire his own proton torpedoes out. The small starfighter variant of the weapon might not have had as much punch as the capital grade concussion missiles their opponents were throwing out, but they were faster, and he had just as many of them.

The opposing ship's shielding collapsed after two of them struck it nose on. Suddenly all three of the yachts began to turn away the two slave ships putting themselves physically between the Wild Light and their controller."

Shaak and Ranma exchanged a glance. 'Should we let them run,' Ranma asked silently, and Shaak shook her head. "Disable their engines," she ordered.

Two proton torpedoes smashed into the yacht that had fired the missiles and whoever was behind this attack now paid for not having modified their ships to be more well-rounded. Their shields were not up to snuff, collapsing after the first proton torpedo, the second one blowing their engines out and sending them both tumbling through space to join the first of Shaak's victims for the day.

A second after that ship was out of their firing arc, HK and Shaak riddled the command ship's stern, which had not heretofore been weakened by Ranma's fire. It's shields held, until Ranma opened up the last weapon hatches and fired the ion pulse cannon. Then those shields fell, the ion weapons blowing out their shield generators. "That was more spectacular than I expected," Ranma mused conversationally as they zoomed forward, HK and Shaak finishing off the enemy ship's concussion missiles.

Capital class missiles were far more dangerous if they hit, indeed if even one had hit the Wild Light their shields would have been a distance memory, two would have killed them. But they were not nearly as quick. Someone had learned about the Wild Light's shielding, but hadn't realized how maneuverable it could be.

"We haven't used that weapon on ships of our own weight class before," Shaak said with a shrug. "The larger the ship the more robust all of its systems would be of course, including its shields And those ships don't have Mon Calamari shield designs to boot."

"Makes sense, and I'm not about to complain about my opponent's being idiots." Another ion pulse blast lanced out slamming into the opposing ship's engines and suddenly almost all of the electronic on the yacht's surfaces went out. It's engine stuttered to a halt, throwing the ship into a tailspin as the engines went out one after the other.

The one remaining yacht, the one armed with turbolasers ceased moving altogether. It's engines shut down, its shields fading quickly.

"Completely slaved." Shaak said with a frown. "Interesting, I don't think anyone alive is on there but I will check." Again Shaak closed her eyes, reaching out through the Force and she nodded. "Three individuals on the ship in front of us Ranma, their thoughts seem somewhat reptilian, but do not match any race I have dealt with before. The others have no one living on them.

"Well that was anticlimactic," Ranma said, shaking his head. "Now, how to bring that ship to a stop so we can ask some questions?" The Wild Light after all did not have a tractor beam, which made this operation very difficult.

They had to nudge the other ship physically around, stopping its out-of-control tumble and then actually had to have Shaak hold it still with the Force for a time until its momentum was gone. That proved to be a difficult task for Shaak, almost as tough as redirecting the explosion back on Corellia had been. But she persevered, leaning back and sighing with relief as she felt the momentum finally fade under her grip. "That's it, we can pull alongside now."

Ranma did so, ordering the ship's to hover directly over the other one, before looking over at HK. "HK, your turn. I want at least one survivor alive and able to answer questions but otherwise it's your show." One thing that Shaak and Ranma did not have was spacesuits, and considering the fact they would have to cut into the opposing ship with it's power out as it was, they would need them to board it.

"Exultant chuckle: There are three sentients correct? I will bring you the most malleable one master."

OOOOOOO

HK exited the Wild Light via the hatch, landing quickly on the other ship, his legs magnetically clamping down onto its hull. Behind him the airlock cycled close, keeping the air in for his squishy Masters, as he turned his normal hand to work opening the opposing ship's airlock via the emergency mechanical latch. That took him but a few seconds, after which he closed it behind him, using his pressure sensor to make certain it would keep in the ship's air once he opened the interior lock. Once that was done, he ripped apart said door.

Sticking his head and shoulder mounted rifle through the opening HK intoned, "Sardonic amusement: Seller of Religious claptrap calling! Can I interest you in a one way ticket to the afterlife?"

To his surprise there was no one around, and HK grumbled to himself. "Irritated grumble: why is there no one around when I am feeling witty?"

He pushed his way forward, closing the outdoor behind him. The ship was without gravity and he couldn't detect any kind of machinery going, which meant that the ion pulse weapon was actually more effective than he thought it would be when he read the schematics. Interesting but not important right now.

Looking this way and that along the small corridor of the yacht, HK calculated that the airlock was situated further back in the yacht then it was on the Wild Light, so it was nearer the engine room than the through the corridors towards where the cockpit could be, he walked through what was a small living space for at least three sentients. Looking through a few of the yachts former rooms, he saw that several of them had been converted into weapons bays.

Two of them had also been turned into cages, and he nodded. "Analytical tone: Bounty hunters then, possibly specializing in bringing their opponents alive? Or just wishing to be prepared for that as well as the more pleasurable experience of killing them?"

As he moved past the weapons bays and cages, he finally came under fire. At the far end of where he was standing three orange scaled lizard meatbags of some kind that he had not had dealings with before, even in his disjointed long term memory, opened fire on him. HK quickly ducked back into one of the cages, raising his shoulder gun. "Monotone warning: Oh please surrender, oh please surrender, I do so care for your meatbag lives. I only need one of you alive to appease my master."

As he had hoped, this nod toward his mistress' command engendered no response but more laser fire. His order nominally obeyed HK opened fire himself, stitching up one of the defenders who was a little too slow to duck back into the cockpit, unused to moving in zero-g.

He swiftly pushed his way backwards rapidly however when one of the others through a tiny grenade towards him. It went off, shredding his former hiding place and blowing the door off the cage, but HK grabbed it out of the air, slamming it down into the ground and using it as a portable shield as he charged forward. "Exultant shout: You should have listened to me meatbags!"

A second later he was in among them, and the lizards simply could not move as normally in zero-g environment as HK could with his magnetized feet. They had spacesuits on of course, which included magnetized boots of their own, but they didn't seem to be as adept in their use as they should be. It always amused HK how there were so many uncounted trillions of sentients born into outer space but which still didn't quite know how to fight in null gravity. It was a sign of the inherent idiocy of meatbag kind in his opinion.

His claw hand snaked out as one of the two lizards almost lost his balance trying to back away. The claw grasped the orange lizard sentient's arm wrenching him forward and almost ripping his arm out entirely. A punch from HK's other hand nearly took his head off, shattering his helmet and the neck beneath it.

Reaching forward delicately with that same hand, smacking the last lizard's blaster rifle out of his hand almost absentmindedly, the gun spinning away down the corridor. The last lizard sentient reached down to its waist to grab up another thermal detonator but HK grabbed the belt before he could, wrenching him up into the air. The belt was torn off as he slammed the lizard up into the ceiling, tossing the belt behind him to continue to tumble on through the zero-g environment of the interior of the ship to join the body of the first attack HK had killed, which had come undone from its one magnetized boot to the ground.

HK thumped the lizard sentient against the ceiling twice for good measure, making sure to rattle him around just so he knew that there was no further fight in the creature. "Complacent tone: Now, I'm certain you'll be willing to answer some questions to save your meatbag life correct?"

He was therefore surprised when the lizards snarled something, trying to grab at a knife that he'd hidden along its spine, pulling it out and trying to slam it into HK's forearm. The vibroknife actually cut into HK's arm, causing a riot of electricity to erupt from the cut. HK grumbled angrily, letting the creature go before backhanding him hard, shattering his face mask and knocking him unconscious. "Irritated grumble: That was my new arm dammit! You know how much that's going to take to repair?"

Scowling HK used two of his claw-tipped fingers to delicately pull the blade out. A time-consuming process since his claw hand was not good for small work like that. Once done he reached down and grabbed up the survivor before he pulled the lizard sentient's helmet off and then slammed one from one of his fellows which had survived intact onto its head.

Certain now that the meatbag would not expire without its precious oxygen, HK tied him down to one of the three chairs in the cockpit. As he did his arms sparked and tingled whenever he moved his wrist. He turned glaring daggers over his shoulder at the instigator of that irritation. "Frustrated growl: If I did not need you alive for my master's questioning, I would have stomped on you and me make a mash out of your bones for that meatbag."

A few seconds later he called his master and mistress telling them what had happened. Shaak seemed to glare at him for a moment, knowing full well that HK had probably done the bare minimum necessary to appease her sensibilities. However she still listened intently to the way that HK described the fight and the lizards.

"Arms lizards. I recognize them, though I've never had any dealings with the race myself. They were one of the races involved in the Stark Hyperspace War, and are known as a warrior culture." Ranma's eyes lit up with interest and Shaak held up a finger. "…And xenophobic to a frightening degree Ranma, sorry. Can you get a scan of their faces HK?" She asked, turning from the communication screen to open up the Hypercom relay.

HK did so, and Shaak fell silent for a few seconds while she ran the image through the Jedi Temple's database and through it the Senates. "Accredited Bounty hunters, they call themselves the Triad." She reported to. "Vio Del, Vis Col, And Vir Tolnar, cousins of some kind it says here, though I doubt that is a direct translation and their ship's called together the Certain Executioner. It doesn't say anything here about them having their own fleet however."

"Hopeful tone: Should I wake him up to answer your questions mistress?" HK was thinking about the number of ways he could do so, and make certain the lizard meatbag was

"Just a moment…" Shaak said, her fingers clicking on controls, thankful the Order had given the ship their ship a Hypercom uplink. "Let me see what the regular Hypernet has on them."

A second later she nodded. "Here we go. It turns out those three apparently stole several ships from other bounty hunters at the bounty hunters Guild in Refrack it says here. They're wanted for that, though it's a bring them in alive so they can pay the penalty sort of thing."

"There's just no honor among thieves or at least bounty hunters," Ranma said with a dramatic sigh. "What has the universe come to?"

"Joyful response: Good times master and getting better. What should I do with the meatbag in question?"

"How much damage did the ion cannons do HK?"

"Analytical statement: This ship isn't going anywhere without a total refurbishment master," HK replied definitively.

"Tune, does that surviving yacht have a tractor beam on it?"

"It does master, though one of us would have to go over to manually operate it."

Shaak frowned. "What are you up to?"

"Heh, you'll see. HK, carve as many insults into that ship's outer hull as you can. Things like better luck next time, bounty hunters 0, Ranma and Shaak going on 500, that kind of thing. I think that I can trust ya to come up with something appropriate?"

After HK answered joyfully in the affirmative, Ranma turned to Shaak. "First, we're going to drop that ship and the survivingNikto off with his ship just like that at the end of the Refrack system, just let it coast in, maybe find a way to power it's emergency beacon or something. Then we're going to head on to Kashyyyk with the ship you're in. It should fetch a pretty penny if we sell it to the Wookies."

"Making enemies really is an art form for you isn't it?" Shaak asked shaking her head. Of course, with the size of the bounty on a Ranma's head, she doubted that any incentive added to it would matter at all to them greed propelling bounty hunters. The fact that they had slagged so many ships, killed two of the lizards involved, and were now delivering the last back to the tender mercies of his guild, would also be a factor in future engagements. I don't like the use of intimidation, but when it can be used to stave off actual physical conflict, I'm willing to look the other way.

OOOOOOO

Bo Katan Kryze sat back with a sigh, putting her feet up on the table in front of her for a moment. She looked around the small Spartan room that had been Vizla's office on the Death Watch base on Concordia before looking back at what she held in her hand. With a snap hiss she turned it on, staring at the gently thrumming dark energy blade.

It was a kind of lightsaber, though it didn't look anything like any other kind of lightsaber out there. The blade looked almost solid, some kind of black energy of some kind with sort of cracks of white light appearing through the blackness of the rest of the blade. It was quite pretty in a dark, deadly sort of wary, which called to Bo Katan's sense of aesthetics.

"They say this thing was created by the first Mandalorian to ever be inducted into the Jedi Order," she said, looking over at the 10 men in the room with her. Eight of them were squad captains of her new, as yet unnamed faction or heirs to various Mandalorian clans. "Not certain I believe that, though judging from where he kept it, Pre did. I have to wonder why he didn't bring it with him on the mission against Ranma and Shaak Ti."

That question was directed at one of the two remaining men, the most senior of the Death Watch who had come over to her side during the battle on Yavin 4.

He shrugged his shoulders, looking at the weapon. "Honestly, Pre felt it was more a symbol of the Mandalorians defeat by the Jedi then a symbol of his authority. He hated it, he hated lightsabers in general. He could use it, in fact I think he could've put up a lot better fight than he did if he had that, Pre Vizla was an excellent swordsman. But sometimes he let his emotions get the better of them."

"Odd, but his loss. It's mine now," Bo Katan said flicking the lightsaber this way and that watching the dark blade cut through the air with the normal thrum and hum of a lightsaber. I wonder if this would let me fight Shaak Ti on a more even footing? I know I would still not be comfortable with Ranma's female form enough to get into a real relationship with him, but kriff if it wouldn't make me feel better to kick her artagh (ass) just once!

"Even if were not going to be called the Death Watch any longer?" the man asked archly.

"That name died with Pre Vizla," Bo said bluntly, pushing herself to her feet fluidly and moving around the table to stand in front of the men as her equals rather than a commander. "The glory and honor of the Death Watch was nothing more than a lie anyway, you've all seen the records my former boss kept here, you all know that to be true."

In fact, Bo Katan had gone one better than showing outsiders those records. She had organized several teams of kill squads and sent them out to various places in the galaxy where the Death Watch was involved in criminal activities with orders to wipe any group that they been involved in out to the bedrock. The Black Suns remnants were about to get another severe jolt to their system, as were several major drug dealing cartels, and one slaving band called, for some reason she didn't want to think about, the Sado Kids.

Mind you, she thought as she went through those numbers again that slaving band won't be alone in having a very, very bad year. The Jedi Orders campaign against slavers and both the legal and illegal slave trade had spread even out here. Indeed it was winning them quite a few enemies among the rich and powerful in the Core worlds which allowed that like Kuat, Thyferra or Brentaal.

"We've also talked to the people involved with the battle on Yavin 4, and agree that you're not like your predecessor at all," said one of the clan heirs, shaking his head. "But that doesn't mean that we're willing to sign on with you just yet. You need to present your ideas for the future in front of the clan conclave, and then, heh, you know what you have to do." He smirked at Bo, But she matched his smirk and raised him a sneer.

"Take on any challengers, beat them down, show my way into the future is the strongest, and possibly take the helm of the Mandalore." Bo Katan said, her eyes lighting up eagerly. Though I don't know if I'll take the helmet myself, I actually think that Ranma would personally be a better choice. After all, it's his techniques skills and an alliance with him that I'm using here to solidify my position, not just our discussions about the nature of honor. "How long will it take to set up a full conclave?"

"All of our clan heads are willing to meet with you immediately. There are fifteen holdouts of the pro-conquest faction, and six others we know won't agree with whatever you say who backed Vizla through money and troops when they could, and another twelve that will always hold the Death Watch moniker against you. The others, the majority of the clans, they are undecided and will wait and see what you have to say. Still, we should get most to at least come to the clan conclave. Say four or five days?" said another heir, whose name was Kimrek Valhoun of clan Valhoun.

"That's fine for the full meeting, but let's set up a smaller meeting with just your clans and the clans who are most willing to move against the New Mandalorians. I don't want anything started there just yet, and no violence, not yet." Bo ordered. "As much as I'd like to, throwing out the New Mandalorians through violence would only cause more problems down the line.

"We'll set it up," Vimrek said, exchanging nods with the men all around him.

As the others all left Bo walked them to their shuttles before turning around and making her way deeper into the base. The Death Watch's base here on Concordia was based in an old strip mine set up here to mine Beskar ore centuries ago. The mines had been worked out long before even the New Sith Wars. The Death Watch had been forced up here after their part in the Great Clan war was exposedwith a lot of its backers, an exile from Mandalore that was their punishment for the terrorist campaign they had waged against the New Mandalorians. It had been the sole surviving base after Jango Fett's single-handed assault on them, and Pre Vizla had rebuilt the Death Watch from the ashes from this very room.

Bo Katan hoped to eventually leave this place behind along with the Death Watch name, hence why her warriors no longer wore the dark grey of the Death Watch, wearing instead the jungle camo they had on Yavin 4 like it was a badge of honor, which it was. Right now though she had something else on her mind.

One of the larger tunnels had been converted into a mechanics bay, and was currently the home of the Bes'uliik that Bo had brought back. Seventeen of her faction, the Reborn, were currently working on it, repairing what they could, replacing what they couldn't.

Already the mechanical beast looked almost back to fighting trim. Its claws had been replaced, it's optics cleaned and its other sensors replaced, the torn or dented armor removed so it too could be eventually replaced. The interior servomotors had been washed of grime and rust, but the Bes'uliik still needed more work there before the armor could be reinstalled, and the Bes'uliik's guns also needed to be replaced. Their energy cores however were still there, recharged.

The beast looked up as Bo entered, it's voice a low grumble of pleasure and Bo moved forward quickly, patting it on the cannons that served it at as it's nose. "Hello to you to great beast," she murmured, then looked at the chief engineer. "Will you have it ready to go in a week you think? When the real conclave meets I'll want him with me."

The Bes'uliik was at present a sort to secret. Many of the Reborn had joined Bo Katan's faction based on rumors of her having found one of the ancient war machines, but they hadn't shared the reality of it with anyone. Unlike her crush gaunts however, the Reborn lacked the ability to reverse engineer a machine of the Bes'uliik's size. And even with the crush gaunts they lacked the materials to make many.

"He'll be ready, though we might have to rush some of the armor fitting. What color will you want him painted?" the other warrior replied.

"Cobalt blue and burnished silver." Bo said, her lips trying to twitch into a grim smile. The man looked shocked, before barring his teeth in an approving grin.

Mandalorian armor was routinely colored to either make a statement or denote a specific goal. The color scheme she just named was used when someone was trying to make a monumental change in the Mandalorian culture, up to and including changing the very Resol'nare that their belief system was based on. It was a bold move to declare that, but Mandalorians favored bold strategies after all.

"We'll call you when we're ready to fit the saddle to you and the final imprinting though that doesn't seem to be necessary. This beastie likes most of us, but it doesn't sit down and wag its nonexistent tail when we enter the hall." The man said ruefully.

"Of course it imprinted on me, I'm the one who brought it home at last after all." Bo said softly, looking at the Bes'uliik in the optics and thinking of how long it had followed its silent vigil of its former master's remains.

Bo spent several moments helping the techs with certain portions of the Bes'uliik, then left them to it hoping to get an early night of it. She had to mentally gird her loins for politics after all.

A hand carrying a vibroblade coming out of a shadow of the tunnel to her side jolted Bo out of her thoughts, her only warning being the sound of the knife as its energy coils came online. Even so one of her gauntlet covered hands swung back and down, forcing the sudden attack to miss, and Bo turned toward her assailant, only for another attacker to attack her from the direction she had been going, racing around the dip in the corridor. This one too wielded a larger than average vibroblade.

Bo struck out with a kick, sending her second attacker to the ground as he almost impaled himself on her foot. Using the momentum of that kick Bo flipped herself in midair to land nearby, where she paused, one hand going down to her blaster, the other to the Black Saber on her shoulder. The blast of a handgun forced her choice, and Bo ducked to one side, letting the bolts pass by her save for one which struck her shoulder plate.

The armor held and she rolled slamming into the side of the tunnel, but Bo ignored the pain propping her blaster on the ground, cutting down a third attacker who had come out of the dark with his blaster firing. That left her open to another slash from the first attacker however, and he jumped on her, slamming her down onto the rock of the tunnel floor, one arm pressing into the back of her head the other raising his knife to stab. "Die aruteii!"

That was the plan anyway, but Bo had not been training for weeks with Ranma without anything to show for it. She bucked off the ground with one hand, the other grabbing onto the wrist of the hand trying to hold the back of her head, crushing and hurling the man ahead of her. He crashed to the tunnel floor, screaming in pain from his crushed wrist.

"Kriffing Chakaar (bitch)!" The second attacker, who Bo had thought had gone down permanently, came forward, a short vibro sword in hand, but Bo met him with a snarl, faster and stronger then he had anticipated even now. She dodged his short economical thrust, noting almost absently the man knew how to use the blade. Then her fist rocketed out into the man's armored chin, staggering him, and a low kick shattered his kneecap.

He fell and she activated the Black Saber cutting him in two before turning, resting the point of the gently humming, almost solid looking blade. "So, di'kut (fool) what the hell was all this about?" Bo asked conversationally, her split lips twisted into almost amused grin.

"You, you don't think all of us are happy about you throwing off the Death watch name do you?" The man replied, gasping in pain from his wrist. "We are Death Watch, you can't change our colors as easily as the paint on your armor!"

"Blood seems to be able to, and if I have to, I will keep using it di'kut!" Bo sneered, as the sound of pounding feet reached her ears from both directions. The ambushers quiet ambush had gone bad almost at once, and the noise had drawn a response. "The Death Watch is dead and gone, its dishonorable history will be buried with it, just like your friends here."

Despite the attack on her the next day Bo Katan descended to the planet to the city ofKeldabe, Mandalore's historical capital city, though it no longer held that title, having been replaced by Sundari. The New Mandalorians had raised their bio-cube city on the spot of one of the cities annihilated during the Dral'Han, which the Republic called the Excision. The old capital however was nearly as important as the new in terms of industry, and was a important trade city for the rest of the planet, though Sundari was more so in terms of off world trade.

Bo got a lot of stares for her jungle pattern armor, but since her visible weapons were all peace-tied, the police couldn't do anything but glare at her. Even here the idea of outlawing people going around armed would have caused a revolt. Of course the police were getting a lot of practice at glaring today given all of the clan heads, their heirs and bodyguards which had arrived in the city.

Twenty-nine of the seventy clans had come to the Hall of Resol'nare. The hall was both meeting place and gladiatorial arena, Mandalorians sometimes using single combat in order to decide who was strongest or whose plan would be followed. It was built around a triangular open area whose floor was soft sand where the speakers stood, surrounded by raised stone seats on all three sides, with no wall between the seats or the speaker. No clan had a special place for their clan, it was first come first served, the only way to avoid messy confrontations.

These were the clans Bo Katan had already been in contact with, a few others willing to listen already like clan Rogn and others. Two clans she knew weren't officially interested but were still here for reasons of their own. A few others were undecideds who wanted to get a feel for what Bo Katan was selling quickly, chafing under the New Mandalorians policies for various reasons, many of which might not even be connected to their pacifist policy.

They sat all around her men and women both, mostly humans but a few scattered nonhumans here and there, their helmets off and placed on the stone tables in front of them. A few were armed, but more weren't than Bo would have expected. Of course, she wasn't a Mandalorian politician. If they went around armed all the time like many wanted to, there would have been a lot fewer of them at this meeting.

These days, the Council of clans didn't actually have all that much political power. Most clans were small, and the conclave's power had been broken by the New Mandalorians via laws and injunctions during the Great Clan War as the Mandalorians knew it, when warriors decided to follow this or that faction rather than the old organization of clans. But the clans were still important in terms of industry and particularly farming and the clan heads still had numbers if they could be brought together.

Bo Katan hoped that she would be able to get them on her side. But she really should've thought that the New Mandalorians would be aware of so many clan heads coming together here in one of their strongholds. Before she could speak, the doors to the clan conclave opened again after having been formally closed for this discussion. "If this is a meeting of the clan's heads, then why was I not invited?" asked Duchess Satine as she strode into the triangle as if she owned it.

Bo Katan turned growling angrily, "Hello sister," she drawled sneering at the older woman. "And you weren't invited because it's your government that is in question here."

"Then I should be invited to perform a rebuttal at the least should I not?" Satine said coldly, narrowing her eyes at her younger sister.

Though there were only two years between them, looking at Satine and Bo Katan together like this most would think at least 10 years or more separated them. Bo Katan was taut with a wiry warrior's frame, under her armor, her skin marred by scars but no other blemishes. Bo-Katan's short-cropped orange hair was fiery in the light, and she moved fluidly, with no sign of the bruises she had taken the night before save her split lip.

In contrast, Satine was dressed in regal finery. Her face was thin, her complexion pale as was the current fashion the Republic over. Her blond hair was tied up in a severe bun, which coupled with her overall appearance and the fact she was thin rather than athletically trim made her appear far older than she was. She was still attractive, but not in the lean, lioness manner Bo resembled.

"That is true…" said one of the other clan heads rather reluctantly. "Yet I find it amusing to note that you are siting clan conclave law, when you New Mandalorians have done so much to try and take that power away. If you are going to spit on all of our traditions, turning around and trying to use those traditions to gain entry to this body is rather foolish isn't it?"

"We did not spit on those old traditions we turned our backs on the way of brutal conquerors and killers!" Said Satine, her voice rising and falling, the cadence and range of it showing her skill as a public speaker. "The clans kept all of our people alive, served the Tuang and our human ancestors well in ancient times, but the clans did not have a vision for Mandalore. We did, and it is because of that vision that this city remains as it is, a shining beacon of industry and energy to the rest of our ravaged planet."

One of the younger clan heads looked over to Bo Katan. "Is she really the clan head of Clan Kryze? You're a small clan I know, but surely there's someone else in…"

Bo shook her head. "It's just the two of us now our ancestral lands don't even have any other people on them, most of them joined other clans or the New Mandalorians during the Great Clan wars. Our father is long dead too, though no doubt he's been rotating in his grave for several decades now thanks to my older sister's actions." She smirked as Satine glared at her, having brought up the apparent difference between the way they looked with ease.

"I suppose I could technically challenge her for the leadership of our clan anyway," Bo went on still looking at her older sister, her smirk turning into an evil grin as Satine stiffened. "But then kinslaying is rather frowned upon…" she sighed theatrically.

The clan heads all looked at one another then leaned back, even Bo's supporters and a few who were actually supporting Satine, despite their warriors wanting to follow Bo. The idea of watching these two have it out was rather amusing for all concerned, and if they also learned what Bo Katan was really trying to sell, all the better. Many of them had seen the reports of the battles on Yavin 4 and even talked to those who had taken part, but even so…

"Very well," said one of them looking at Satine. "We'll allow her entrance, and will even allow you to keep speaking Bo Katan despite the fact that as you're not head of your clan you shouldn't be allowed to here. Consign yourselves to hard facts please, no personal attacks."

One of the younger head's whispered to his neighbor. "If they start to actually fight, I vote we put them both in lingerie. Cat fights are the best…" His neighbor smacked him upside the head, but thankfully for his continued ability to breathe, neither of the women on the floor of the triangle heard his derogatory comment.

"All right then," Bo said, immediately going on the attack. "Fine, my sister has had her say, or at least the start of one, but I wonder if you even know what we're here to meet about? The Death Watch is gone sister! That little terrorist group that your government went so far to ignore the existence of has been utterly destroyed. But instead of there no longer being any alternative to you and your new Mandalorian faction, I think there is a new one. A new way forward for our people. We call ourselves the Reborn."

She looked around the clan heads. "I'll be the first to say it here. In the past, despite our attempts to keep to the Resol'nare we Mandalorians became something that could've been called evil. We conquered, those weaker than ourselves. We thought we were winning glory, but in so doing the actual meaning of that term changed. It changed for the worse.

"So I see you have come to see the truth of our past then?" Satine asked, looking and sounding surprised.

"Yes and no." Bo replied, a hard edge to the voice even as her words through her sister off balance. "Victory meant glory, not who we were beating or how. We stopped caring about the challenge, only our own power. That is not in keeping with the Resol'nare, nor of honor. Defeating a powerful enemy, taking his planet away from him, the challenge of that is an honorable one. Defeating a weak species, forcing them to slave away for us, is not. We do ourselves no favors or honor by pretending that everything we Mandalorians did was in keeping with the Resol'nare we inherited from the Taung.

"But that is in the past, and it has nothing to do with a simple fact: we Mandalorians are warriors, our entire culture is based on that. We cannot change who we are, any attempt to do so is doomed to failure." As Satine frowned, Bo went on. "Instead we need to change the direction of our warlike tendencies. We must take up the honor of the defender, the warrior who searches for opponents to challenge herself against instead of simply trying to expand their influence or to fight for no reason."

Satine began her rebuttal the moment it became clear Bo was done speaking. "You speak of acknowledging our pasts mistakes yet you refuse to learn from them. How we acted in the wars of expansion were not the problem, the wars themselves were. The boot of a conqueror will always lie heavily on his victims, no matter how gentle the conqueror in question. Just look at how every other system we conquered turned their backs on us as soon as they were given the ability!

"Further if we had followed the war mongers, the Excision could well have been worse than it already was. If we had followed the Resol'nare's tenants of always seeking redress, we would have died as a people. If we had let the clan leaders at the time try to decide the future or our race, Mandalore would never have survived the chaos and anarchy that followed the Excision seven hundred plus years ago."

Satine whirled to face her sister directly, her voice rising, and even her detractors had to admit the woman was both passionate about the topic and a master of oratory. "Our warlike traditions are outmoded, unnecessary in this time of peace! Who would you fight now? What single goal would you use to rally our people if not peace? And do not forget that we are still trying to heal the wounds left over from our past wars. The industry of this planet was brought back under the auspices of my party's government, the political moves my predecessors made to assuage off-world fears the only reason any of us are alive today."

From there she pointed out specific clan leaders, enunciating the problems their lands and people had faced, problems that her party had helped them survive. After that, she took potshots at Bo Katan and the Death Watch, who had been behind a lot of the atrocities committed in the chaos following the Excision. Despite the fact her continued use of the Republic term for the Annihilation irritated many of her listeners, the message was understood: Bo Katan's working for the Death Watch, even if said sect was no longer around, was against her here.

She then went on to speak about the good will the New Mandalorians had won from the Republic, the aid they had received from following the path of peace. "We have no need of warriors now, no one of equal skill to challenge ourselves against unless of course you imply we should fight the Republic, in which case our planet would not survive the all too obvious conclusion. Especially since they would not even need to attack us, they would simply need to withhold aid, and make certain the few planets in the sector with intact economies do the same."

"Do you even hear what you're saying?!" Bo Katan said incredulously. "Ask the Republic for aid? Rely on the Republic for protection? The same Republic whose attack we call the Dral'han seven hundred years ago? You're not talking about just pacifism, duchess, you're talking about weakness, about letting the conquerors, who you've just derided, call the shots through your party!"

That won a few rumbling nods from their audience and Bo Katan went on quickly, knowing that she had just scored a point. Satine had thought to emphasize the fact that her government had Republic approval and the stability they had created, but that last line had been a mistake. "And I have made no mention of who we would measure ourselves up against, or how. Instead of concentrating on making war, we would follow the Eshani ideal, of personal strength and ability. That is the way forward, personal betterment in that form of honor is it's own reward!"

Bo Katan knew now was not the moment to bring up Ranma or how he had basically promised to help them learn some of his techniques, especially given his threat if the Mandalorians who did turned around and went back to their old ways. Bo hadn't taken it personally then, but few of her audience here would see past the threat or his connection to the Jedi. Yet again as she thought that, Bo had to fight back a spurt of jealousy at how personalthat connection was.

Shaking it off Bo attacked Satine from another angle as she had through the Death Watch name. "You call yourself a duchess, a noble leader from a royal family. But we Mandalorians don't have any royal family and a clan like ours sure as dar'yaim wouldn't be it if we did! The leader of the Mandalorians is the Mandalorian! Not a duchess, queen or any of that poodoo! Your party simply created that title in an attempt to ignore our histories, the way of the Resol'nare!" she shouted, amidst the loud clanking of fists against seats, signifying that she had scored a major point.

"You are right, our planet needed time to rebuild, it needed time to figure out a new way forward, but pacifism is not the answer going forward anymore! We cannot simply change who we are. Peace is fine," she went on "but it needs defenders! That is what I want for our people, the way of the shield instead of the sword, the Guardian at the gate rather than the barbarian battering it down!"

"Yes, we would expand our influence, but only to defend those who cannot or are not in a position to do so themselves. Our honor would be the defender, the martial artist who strives for personal perfection of combat rather than glory on the battlefield. In this manner we can keep to the Resol'nare, changing it and changing ourselves and our legacy among the ka'ra!"

That did it. Bo's words called to her listeners on many levels, mingling personal ambition, glory and a call to the ways of the warrior with her new beliefs on how it could be done without becoming simple conquerors again. It might not have been very detailed, but in this audience that wasn't necessary. Later on she would need to defend her new concept of honor from people who wanted to know where it came about but not right now.

Satine waited until the applause died down staring at her sister, her eyes hooded, yet thoughtful. "Your words are persuasive, but they are your words. Who is to say 10 years from now or 20 years from now that our people once again walking the path of warriors would not turn to our old ways? You said yourself, things change, people change. How many millions of us, how many billions of other people will die for that kind of a mistake?"

The meeting hall fell silent save for mutterings in the background as Satine's words took the sails right out of Bo's more emotional call to arms and the two sisters glared at one another. They were so different, so bizarrely opposed to one another not only in their worldviews but in their personalities and body types that more than one watcher wondered if they really were sisters at all. But the Kryze sisters knew they were, and there is no hate like that which siblings can feel towards one another.

"You ignore all of our traditions, all of our pasts deeds. I'm not saying they were all just or good, but they were our pasts! How can you call yourself a Mandalorian if you can't understand where we have come?" Bo Katan said in a low tone. "Our father…"

"Our father died while on fighting against a faction of warlords the Death Watch you eventually went to serve was backing at the time," Satine said coldly. "Do not speak of him to me. As for how I can call myself a New Mandalorian, that is precisely what I am, a New Mandalorian. You cannot always create a new building on the foundation of the old, you sometimes have to throw the old foundation out entirely. And that is what we are about now sister what we New Mandalorians are. We are builders, thinkers, we are no longer warriors as you would wish us to be."

The two of them continued to glare at one another, though Satine's comment on her father's death had hit Bo Katan where it hurt the most and she looked away, running one hand through her orange hair. She'd only recently discovered that, but it seemed as if her sister had been in the knowledge about how her father had died for years. "When did you find out about that?"

"I tried to tell you several times, but you always ignored my calls, you always ignored me. So certain of yourself, so superior that you followed in our father's footsteps! Never realizing that you are following the very people who killed him." Satine shot back. "Whatever you might think sister, I know our father would not have wanted the Death Watch's vision for our people to succeed."

Bo's teeth ground angrily, but she didn't respond. Whatever she said to defend herself, to distance the Reborn from the Death Watch, would fall on deaf ears here.

Even as her sister's teeth ground however, Satine had turned her attention back to the clan heads as one of them called for recess. There would be more meetings following this of course, but both sides had scored some points in this argument today. What Satine was looking for however wasn't who agreed with one or the other speaker. She was looking for those clan heads who were trying to hide their reactions entirely. Mandalorians did not make natural politicians, hiding their emotions was very tough for them outside their helmets and anyone who was might well have more than emotions to hide.

She saw a few of the neutrals had been swayed this way or that, but a few of the diehard reactionaries who had come to this meeting hoping that Bo Katan would be able to convince the other clans to go back to the old ways looked angry. Satine knew why. They wanted to expand again through conquest, defend planets they take surely, but the idea of becoming some kind of sector police or security force as Bo said she envisioned them becoming was not something they saw as honorable or in keeping with the Mandalorian tradition.

Her sister seemed to be blind to that, but Satine wasn't. Whatever else happened, Satine would not see her people go back those old ways, cursing themselves and others to death.

Part of her ability to read the audience of course was based on the full dossiers on each of the clan heads she had already memorized before this meeting, while it was obvious Bo Katan did not have as good an idea of the men and women she was facing. The rest however was the fact that, and Satine was surprised actually if realize this, but Bo's enthusiasm seemed to have gotten in the way of her ability to plan. She was truly enthusiastic about this idea that she had composed, Mandalorians as defenders rather than conquerors. Whoever this Ranma fellow is has definitely had an impact on her.

But Satine knew several of the clan heads and their clans would not go with it. No, this looked as if it was going to be a round of faction fighting once more, possibly even open conflict. Satine hadn't realized how widespread the disfavor of her government was outside of the cities and bio cubes but now that she saw it in even this small a sample size, she was beginning to get very worried about what it might mean. I hope that the Republic's intervention team will be able to help me stop the disaster I can all too clearly see coming now…

OOOOOOO

"Kashyyyk space control, this is Wild Light, greetings. Please direct us down to the temple's landing area." Shaak said into the intercom.

A moment later Ranma began to guide the ship down into the green, blue and brown planet's atmosphere, following Shaak's translated directions. It was fun too, pushing the speed of the ship to zoom through the wroshyr foliage. With Shaak watching him Ranma was able to guide the ship down deep into the foliage, without crashing into anything. "You're getting better at piloting Ranma," she said smiling at him as they disembarked.

"Only way to go was up since I was starting at zero," Ranma said with a grin then looked over at HK. "Think we should take him with us?"

"Affronted interjection: Master, if you're going to talk about me as if I'm not here, could you at least wait until I'm powered down to do it?"

"I think not, let's leave him here for now. This might be difficult enough without his brand of diplomacy. Instead HK, why don't you have Tune connect you to the local space control systems. I doubt anyone would be stupid enough to attack someone here on Kashyyyk, but there's always someone who is stupid enough to do anything." Shaak said, rolling her eyes at the last word.

"Mollified affirmation: True enough mistress, and many bounty hunting meat bags seem to have been bumped off the conveyor belt when the common sense was being installed."

"Ooh, I like that one, I might have to borrow that sometime HK." Ranma chuckled, getting out of his chair as Shaak did the same. They stopped in the sitting area for a moment, just hugging one another, and gently exchanging a few kisses before turning to exit the ship. While Shaak had convinced the council to let her enter this relationship, she had no wish to rub that into anyone's noses, and as she had said about HK, this was going to be tough enough without that added to the discussions to come.

Exiting the ship, they nodded at a few of the locals who were scattered around working on a few other ships, two starfighters and a Consular class, scattered around the hidden hanger bay. The fact they were so spread out in hanger bay, which was embedded into a branch of wroshyr tree, struck Ranma as somewhat surreal, putting the size of the trees into perspective once more.

There was no delegation here to meet them, which was a good sign in Shaak's mind. Though she had actually honestly thought Master Yoda at the very least would be. "Odd that, I would've assumed he would feel our arrival, but I suppose he might have been held up somewhere else."

"Heh, or maybe the old frog's finally feeling his age." Ranma quipped, and Shaak rolled her eyes, this time at the antagonistic byplay he and Yoda acted out, despite generally speaking being fond of one another.

Eventually the two of them made their way up the tunnel, with no crisis hastening them along this time. It was only when they came out onto the small open area in front of the Jedi Temple that their progress was interrupted. "Knight Ti!" shouted a small voice, a bare millisecond before an equally small body barreled into Shaak's midriff, almost taking Shaak off of her feet.

She rocked backwards, staring down at the little head turned up to her with a beaming smile on its Togrutan features, the white marks on the other girl's eyes looking more like a tattoo then an actual marking as they did on Shaak's covering her eyes and most of her forehead as they did. "Hello to you too," Shaak said calmly, one eyebrow raised in what Ranma knew was amused surprise. "Is there a reason why you are running like that, or are you simply that happy to see me? I'll warn you, if it's because you think all overrule some of the other Masters when they assign you penance, you will be bitterly disappointed."

"I'm just happy to see you is all!" the little face said, and Ranma recognized her as Ahsoka Tano, the little girl that Shaak had said she would take as padawan when she reached the age to become one, and the girl who along with Anakin had led the prank war against him. "I felt you coming, I was meditating, stretching out my senses, and I felt you coming!" Ahsoka said, still beaming.

"While I am quite proud of you for that, daughter of clan Jedi, running and turning to greet me like this is not how a Jedi youngling should comport herself in public. We need to be able to project an air of tranquility and proper comportment at all times, though admittedly you are young yet for that." Shaak said in the native Shili tongue, her town a mix of teasing and censure.

As the girl nodded sheepishly Shaak finally allowed herself to smile, reaching down to gently rub the girls tiny montrals. "It is good to see you child," she said warmly, leaning down to put an arm around the little girl's shoulder.

She looked over at Ranma, and he smiled in understanding. "I'll go get some food before we head to the temple, you two look as if you have some catching up to do."

"Thank you. I think young Ahsoka and myself will simply take a walk through the training areas for a time. I imagine there will be a messenger waiting at the entrance to the Temple Ranma. If you could just tell them where we are going?"

Ranma nodded and headed forward towards the temple, as Shaak took the little girl's hand. "Come with me, and tell me what's bothering you." She stated, having sensed there was more to the girl's eagerness to see her than having simply felt her coming like that during one of the younglings 'free' meditation times.

A moment later Ranma passed on the message to a somewhat startled looking messenger. The young man didn't seem nearly as stuffy as the guy who had been serving as the council's gofer on Coruscant and simply shook his head looking abashed. "I didn't even see the youngling pass me, ugh, back to the meditation hall with me I think."

"It's those little bodies man," Ranma commiserated, before turning his feet toward the commissary.

However he stopped when he heard a voice he vaguely recognized addressing him. "Greetings young Ranma. It has been quite some time since I last saw you."

Turning, Ranma saw a tallish Kel Dor standing there, wearing masks the species always needed to when off their own world on the lower half of his face. "Koon, right?" Ranma moved over to the man, who shook it, while Ranma noted the surprising amount of strength in the other man's grip, and the metal covering his fingertips. "Yeah, haven't seen you since right before Shaak and I left for Dac. How are you?"

"I have been well, though not nearly as busy as you have been," the other man replied, his translator giving his words n odd timbre to them, almost reverb effect. It went well with his sardonic tone at present. "However that state of affairs might well be changing in a few days, which I believe I have you to thank for. But given that Knight Ti is not with you, I imagine that discussion can wait."

Ranma shook his head. "Lowther and the others already share what went on?"

"That, and the New Mandalorians have asked for Senate-backed Jedi arbitration of their ongoing disputes with what they term rogue elements." Plo Koon replied dryly. "We will need to discern the truth of that of course, but it will be interesting to hear your opinion on this Bo Katan woman. For now however, why don't you tell me about this training room you have installed here? I have heard many a knight or master groaning in pain after leaving its clutches."

"Ah, the repulsor toughness training system." Ranma winced. "Yeah, that is kinda painful, but it works. Come on, I'll show you…"

OOOOOOO

It turned out that young Ahsoka was simply having trouble fitting in, having issues with learning the difference between a Clan and the Jedi Order, how the adults acted in others things of that nature. She had been found a few years older than most younglings were when they were brought into the Order, and had fully absorbed the Togrutan sense of community based on emotional attachment to everyone in the community and the idea of the clan as family. The lack of emphasis on emotions and attachments and the hands off parenting the Order used was very hard for her to get used to. It had gotten better at times, especially during the prank wars against Ranma but since then it had somewhat gotten worse.

Shaak listens to her problems, calmly helping her through some of them and giving her hope for the future as well as explaining why the youngling's instructors acted like they did. She also gave Ahsoka her a few tricks in terms of fitting in, that might help her further there, looking to the other children for emotional support rather than the adults, which would allow them to become firm friends later in life. Shaak hadn't had that issue, being a very rare bird in terms of Togrutans and being perfectly happy with solitude even on the emotional level at that point but she understood Ahsoka's problems.

"to be a Jedi is to join a new tribe, a new tribe with new ways of looking at the world, new ways of looking at the term 'tribe' itself," Shaak finished simply. "I understand it can be difficult, to move from one culture to another. I myself still have trouble reconciling my own personal wish for solitude, our Togrutan instincts and the needs of the Order. However do not mistake your teachers standoffish manner for a lack of support, or the fact that you are given so many punishments as a sign that you are not welcome here. That could not be farther from the truth. Apply yourself to your teachings, and you will go far."

Ahsoka nodded, and the two walked back then through the temple's doors still holding hands. There Ahsoka gasped, pointing ahead of them. "Master Plo!"

"Master Koon" Shaak said with a smile, reaching forward to holding up a hand in greeting as a smile crossed her face as it did Ahsoka's. "I did not know you would be here on Kashyyyk."

"I was recalled from a diplomatic mission to take part in a mission out to Mandalore with the two of you and Knight Kenobi, Master Ti." Plo replied formally, holding up his hand as well even as his face seems to shift slightly, in the way that Shaak knew noted that he was smiling behind his mask.

She wondered why he had called her a master, but Plo had already turned aside, looking down at the young girl by her side. "I see you have already found young Ahsoka, good. I would have recommended her to you in the future if you had not. But little Soka, is there a reason why you are not with the rest of your clan in their studies?"

Ahsoka looked down, but Shaak smiled rubbing at her tiny montrals once more. "She will just be joining them, she had an Togrutan issue she needed another perspective on, and she apparently felt me through the Force during one of their free period meditations."

"Truly, that is excellent" said Plo, kneeling down in front of the short girl and reaching out a hand to her. "And that kind of thing occurs more often than you might think. Certain species do have trouble fitting in with the Order occasionally, which as a matter of organization needs to be one size fits all. Nonetheless, you should return to your classes. Come, I will talk to your teachers about this, and then I think I would like to see what you have been learning. Are you able to move all the air globes yet?"

Ahsoka willingly took the older man's hand, and he let her off, still smiling as was Ahsoka now, though she chance to look glance back at Ranma and Shaak, waving goodbye to them.

"I like him," Ranma said with a smile. The two of them had an interesting discussion about the Living Force while Ranma was eating as well as the philosophy based around the same name, and then simply talked about their homeworlds, sharing jokes about people they had known. Though it was not as obvious as Micah Giiett's Plo Koon had a very good sense of humor.

"He is one of the best of us I feel." Shaak said smile which segued into a frown. "but judging from what he said I take it that our news has gone before us at least on the Mandalorian issue. This is going to get very complicated very quickly."

"Probably, sorry. Still I've eaten and you've talked, so does that mean were ready to face the music, or should we just switch those around and I'll go look for someone to talk to while you eat?" Ranma asked hopefully. He wasn't looking forward to explaining that he might end up backing the Mandalorians, a group almost as anti-Jedi historically as the Sith, in both returning to their roots and becoming even more dangerous.

"I think not," Shaak said with a sigh. "I'd like to check in with Aayla and Luminara, but for now telling the High Council about what we ran into on Yavin 4 as well as what Bo Katan and her faction might mean going forward is more important. No matter how irritating it will turn out to be."

Moments later, Ranma and Shaak were ushered into the Kashyyyk temple's council room where they found several Masters already physically in attendance, including Master Yaddle physically. The Hypercom holograms were not on the present, this was to be a smaller meeting then Ranma had feared, and Shaak smiled slightly, before she vanished the expression as she stepped forward, putting her hands in her Jedi robes and bowing formally to the mall. "Masters, I come to you with a tale to tell, and information to impart."

For a moment the masters remained silent, looking at the two newcomers with their Force senses as well as their physical ones. More than one of them had almost expected to, if the tale of Exar Kun's ghost was true, to see a hint that said ghost had actually conquered Shaak Ti instead of the other way around, and was somehow hiding within her. There was no such sign, indeed what they sensed was the exact opposite of that.

Before leaving Kashyyyk after the Naboo conflict, Shaak Ti's force presence had been that of a knight, a powerful one for certain, but still that of a knight: somewhat more naïve, somewhat less balanced, somewhat less in control, without the sign that she had gone beyond the tests of knighthood and met or looked inside her and defeated the temptations of the Dark Side that the Force presence of a master showed. That was no longer the case. Her aura had matured for want of a better word. As Plo Koon had said, she was a master now, regardless of her not having trained a padawan to knighthood. This gave a lot more credence to the idea that she had been able to banish Exar Kun's ghost.

Eventually Yaddle spoke up. "Heard already we have about the conflict on Yavin 4. Many points we have to discuss. The ghost of Exar Kun, first topic we should discuss."

"As far as I am was able to determine, the ghost was indeed Exar Kun," Shaak said serenely, moving forward to stand in front of the council only to raise an eyebrow in surprise as Yoda waved her into a free chair. Ranma did not enter the circle, instead moving over to lean against one of the nearby walls its wooden surface rough under his back. He spoke up occasionally, but when it came to Exar Kun and her battle with it, this was most definitely Shaak's area of expertise not his.

After Shaak finished Yoda was the first to speak, his eyes still closed as he did, only to slowly open them as he went on. "Dangerous was and risky, used yourself as bait you did. If taken you over, dangerous Exar Kun would have been, a way off Yavin 4 he would have had."

Yoda held Shaak's gaze, and she bowed her head humbly at that, but said nothing and he eventually nodded. "Knew this you did, calculated risk it was, clear-sighted choice rather than one made through arrogance. Yet show us this Force Light you will. Prove the rest of your story that ability and your own aura will." If Exar Kun was anywhere within Shaak Ti, she would be unable to use Force Light.

Shaak nodded, and concentrated for a moment, bringing out the Force and pushing it out around her hand which began to light up with Force Light.

Yaddle hopped forward, circling Shaak as she probed at the Light both physically and with her Force senses. Yaddle eventually nodded, her tiny green hands hovering over Shaak's own, immersed in the light she was creating. "Force Light it is to for certain. Vanquished Exar Kun, Shaak did with this technique," Yaddle said simply, moving over to rejoin her fellows in their chairs.

The Council room fell silent as the Masters all exchanged glances. Even if someone had known the technique to create Force Light, even if someone had known enough to try to create a mental version of it, defeating a Lord of the Sith with the amount of power Exar Kun had upon his death or even after so long was an amazing feat.

But it wasn't just the fact that Shaak could defeat the mental equivalent of a physical assault that surprised the Masters around her. She had after all been training with Ranma, and even before that she was noted as one of the better lightsaber duelists among her peers. Her physical abilities now were so far beyond the norm for the Jedi Order it was almost astonishing.

No, what was most surprising to all of them was the amount of mental fortitude it would've taken to ignore Exar Kun's blandishments. Exar Kun was known to have twisted several Jedi to his side with his voice alone, and his mind and ability to plan had made him far more dangerous than his lightsaber skills alone would have been able to. He was good with his signature double bladed lightsaber, but it was his charisma and his voice and the looks which made him more dangerous.

"Very good indeed," Yoda said quietly, staring at Shaak. "Well you did Master Shaak Ti."

"You're the second person to call me a Master, Master Yoda, yet you surely know I have not trained anyone padawans just yet. Without seeing an padawan elevated to knighthood, I cannot be a Master." Shaak replied, looking between Yoda and Plo Koon quizzically. The Kel Dor had entered the council chamber a few minutes into her tale, exchanging a nod with Ranma before seating himself within the council circle.

Yoda and Yaddle both chuckled that, shaking their heads while the other Masters smiled. "Other ways there are of becoming Master. Strength, insight, the ability to read the occurrence of the Force. All of these, just as important as the ability to pass on learning is. A Master you are, proven by facing not only your internal darkness but an external darkness." Yaddle replied.

For once Shaak's balance deserted her, and she gaped around at the council. "Master I cannot, that is, I am not…"

"Master we have declared you, your acceptance welcome but unnecessary," Yaddle said kindly, while she probed Shaak's mind for a moment. Shaak was truly humbled, stunned by this accolade that she had no thought to be ready for just yet. There was no sense of pride in having defeated Exar Kun, only a sense of relief that she had, and happiness that a Dark Side user of such strength was banished now beyond his own death.

"Talk further about Bo Katan Kryze and the Mandalorians we will when Obi Wan arrives tomorrow." Yoda remarked, wishing to give Shaak some time to meet with her friends. She had earned it after all, and pride filled him for the Jedi in front of him. But he also didn't want the council to be swayed by that part of the tale when it came to talking about the Mandalorians. "Anything more you have to say now?"

Shaak thought for a moment then nodded slowly, which surprised Yoda. "I do have a bit of an observation Master Yoda." When he nodded to her to continue she went on. "I have never been involved in a campaign like this before, so stop me if this is already known, but I was surprised and dismay by the, the effect of the ongoing deaths and sense of combat had on me."

She paused gathering her thoughts for a moment before continuing. "I realized some of this could have been caused by the sense of Exar Kun, always there but just beyond my senses. I will further admit to enjoying the challenge of combat, I would not be who I am without the desire to prove myself in that fashion. But the feel of the deaths, the anger and hate the dying felt, it built up. It wore down on me, and made me realize something."

Looking around the room, Shaak made a point of looking into each master's eyes in turn, and was pleased to see approval in Yoda's expression, as well as acceptance in Plo's. He had been involved in the Stark Hyperspace War and understood firsthand the effect she was talking about.

"Jedi, even Guardians, are not soldiers, we lack the mental training for that. We act as police, upholders of the law rather than soldiers who must withstand the stress of constant warfare. The difference between the mindsets needed is jarring, and alarming. If the battles had continued for much longer, I might well have had to pull my Force senses in entirely in order to function. All of these points we need to be aware of, with more and more violent conflicts popping up these days." Shaak finished, her voice solemn.

The Masters all listened intently, and one or two of them nodded agreeing with her points. "What would you recommend then?" said one of the ones Ranma hadn't been introduced to. "I'll admit that there does seem to be a trend of late towards solving conflict through violence. Are you saying that we Jedi all need to get more training?"

"I am saying there needs to be more mental training if the mission calls for such high levels of combat." Shaak said simply. "If you are going to go on a mission where there will be significant loss of life in a combat situation, you need to be mentally prepared for it, able to push past it, not ignore it or desensitize yourself to the loss, but to be able to function further. Tactics and strategy would also be a help. Sending Consulars into a situation like that which we faced and assuming they will be able to survive would not only be wrong but criminally foolish. It is something the Order needs to be aware of."

"Good points you have raised," Yoda said formally. "Talk with Mind Healers we will, discuss this in great length with Guardians upon the Council we will." None of the masters present were Guardians. Plo Koon was a Consular, as were all the others save Saeaee Tiin. "No decision upon this point we will reach now. Your concerns, addressed they will be."

Shaak nodded. "That was all I had to say Masters."

Yoda nodded once more, smiling at her. "Go, rest, speak to your friends. The both of you, back here answering further questions you will be soon enough."

Ranma rolled his eyes, but Shaak simply bowed her head once again, and get got to her feet fluidly, the two of them walking out the door without further preamble.

After leaving the council and still somewhat bemused by being acclaimed as a Master, Shaak followed Ranma as he moved through the temple to the series of rooms that Master Luminara and Aayla had inhabited the last time they were there. They still were thankfully, and she entered with him after he knocked on the door frame, smiling at the two other women.

They both looked up from their meditation poses, and Aayla flipped herself backwards into a crouch before shooting to her feet quickly, smiling at her friend. "Well, you've been busy haven't you Shaak! Wow, a Force Ghost, and over a dozen merc bands wiped out, huh? So what're you going to do for an encore?"

"Don't give Ranma ideas please!" Shaak reached forward, the two women clasped forearms as Luminara rather more sedately got to her feet to join them.

As she did Luminara began to slowly feel out her friends Force presence, and was astonished to find not only the amount of power she did, but the same depth of power and tested strength the council had felt earlier. She smiled gently, shaking her head. "Welcome back Shaak."

Aayla of course couldn't care less about what her friend felt like in the Force, she was just happy to see her. "How are you doing? And I have to say while the idea of setting an ambush like that for the Death Watch was a good idea, it sounded as if you bit off more than you could chew. Was it that bad from your perspective?"

"Yeah, it was," said Ranma for both of them shaking his head. "I hadn't realized how many people would come after us all at once like that, I'm still getting my mind around how huge the Republic is as a whole, and of course how big the underworld is too."

"It is unfortunately a sign of sentient nature that crime will always be with us. Even planets like Alderaan or Chandrilla have criminal elements." Luminara said with a faint sigh. "But come, tell us about your adventures from your perspective."

Shaak nodded, and she had Ranma took turns telling them about the fight. That discussion went on for the rest of the day as Shaak and Ranma learned that Aayla was coming along quite well. If the progress continued as it did, Master Luminara estimated that it would be another week or two before Aayla was up to taking on missions once more. She and Luminara, who had already formerly taken her on as padawan of course, would ease into the process, to make certain of that.

Later that day, Ranma left Shaak there to return to the Wild Light to talk to Tune about getting some more proton torpedoes in their lockers having used several of them in that last engagement. This proved to be a good idea the second he left, as, despite being Jedi both Aayla and Luminara were women. Inquisitive women, whose friend was currently in a relationship, something they both were clinically interested in, even if the idea also repulsed them in other ways. It wasn't so much the physical side of things they were interested in, but the emotional, the romantic aspect, how it felt to be on dates, that kind of thing.

Shaak found herself sharing much of that aspect under their questioning, thankful that her two interrogators did not ask questions on the physical sign of things. If the blushing she did when talking about her and Ranma's dates were any indication she would have passed out via the blood loss. Eventually however she decided to end the discussion making for the door in order to find a computer she could use.

She had some things she wanted to look up in terms of her and Ranma's relationship: specifically some idea of how to take things to the next level in as romantic a way as possible. This was one area her training and limited knowledge of her own people's courtship rituals was not helpful in at all, and it made her somewhat sad that she had never looked into it when she had returned to Shili.

It wasn't long before she pushed away from the computer, and if she was not a Jedi, Shaak would've been flushed with both embarrassment and shock at the sheer number of different opinions on the subject there was. All that out on the Hypernet for anyone to see! I did not realize there were that many, that many perverts out there! And all that about just human and Togrutan relationships, by the Force, I don't know whether to be encouraged that so much has been created on the subject or appalled by how, how impersonal most of it is. Ugh.

There was more than a bit of truth to that. The sheer number of… images and video clips completely swamped the search function blotting out the few essays or other writings on the subject that was actually helpful. Some of it was however, and certain aspects were helpful enough to have made the time worthwhile.

Sighing she shook her head. I will just have to go with it and hope. She had found numerous ideas, some certainties and a few ideas for later, but nothing she could use right now. But most of them either would occur later on in the relationship, at significant temporal moments, or take too much time to set up. So, no equivalent of a promise gift, no mating mark, just a ring when they were ready to proclaim their courtship is nearing its end and they are ready to wed. That is the only idea that seems normal in almost every human culture, darn it.

Ironically while Shaak was dealing with finding out that the Hypernet was for porn, Ranma had decided to do some actual footwork to see if he could find any information on the same sort of topics. Not so much pushing their relationship forward physically, but Ranma was determined to have at least one more actual date without any interruptions.

To that end he moved through the Wookie's capital city looking at various meats and spices with a link to the dissatisfied HK for translation. He found a few spices Togrutans might like, as well as one helpful translator droid on an errand for his employer that had worked on Shili before this. That gave him a clue for a present, and he went in search of some of the hunters that habitually set off further down from the city into the more dangerous portions of the planet's ecosystem.

He found a group of four Wookies preparing to set off from the lowest reaches of the city and hailed them quickly. The quartet turned in his direction and the apparent leader, a heavily scarred and older looking example of his species nodded at Ranma in as friendly a manner as he possibly did anything.

"Bored tone: the furry meatbag greets you as a Jedi, and asks what they can help you with. He also mentioned something in there about not wasting his time, but alas it was not enough of a derogatory remark for you to take offense at given my information on your previous actions." HK's voice translated from his waist.

Ranma was tempted to once again correct the assumption that he was a Jedi, but he decided it just wasn't important, not just at the moment but on Kashyyyk entirely. "I need your help, I want ta go hunting for something with a fur or hide that can be turned into clothing, but I've only seen one species on this planet beside you lot that have fur. Any ideas?"

OOOOOOO

Frowning angrily Sidious glared at the strategic combat droid that his master had designed decades ago. The Sith were very good at what they did, but even one such as Sidious couldn't concentrate on everything. The droid was necessary to keep abreast of the overall Republic military situation and everything that went into it, from ship design, trends, logistics, pirate activity, militaristic societies, etc.

Of course that was relatively simple these days, with so few planets actually having any actual military force beyond patrol craft. One out of every fifty planets might have a military beyond orbital defense stations if that, thought the glaring exceptions to that rule stood out all the more because of it. But that didn't mean that the droid was useless.

"Repeat that last analysis," Sidious ordered.

"It would appear as if the Nova Guard is close to forming a military alliance with the Jedi Order. There is nothing formal up about it, but they have certainly been in discussion with them about learning from this new data anomaly." The droid said with a slow, lyrical Alderaanian accent.

Plagueis had programmed it with that voice when he was an apprentice. He'd found it amusing at the time to use the accent associated with the most staunchly pacifistic planet in the Republic for a droid whose entire purpose was to analyze the statistics of war.

"What is the probability that this maneuver is directly in conjunction with the anti-slaving campaign that the Order has been on of late, and will end when it does?"

That campaign had cost the Order three members, out in the Outer Rim but it had shattered several hundred illegal slaving bands, shut down over a four dozen pirate bases, and had the entire criminal underground scattered around the Republic in something approaching shock. Not anger, but shock and fear. Groups that could were jettisoning their slaving bands as quickly as possible for fear of further Jedi reprisals, and they had even roped in a few Ord patrol fleets from the Colonies region of space, the Republic navy's most scattered units, into the act here and there.

That was well and good, he wanted the Ord patrol fleets to start flexing their muscles, it would be make them easier to manipulate later on. Sidious also didn't really care about the effect it was having on the criminal element. His own contacts there were far too numerous and of far too little import to the Great Plan for him to care about one or other dying here and there, even if his plans to cultivate the Black Sun's Falleen faction was now dead in the water. But if there were longer implications of the Nova Guard and the Jedi Order moving in tandem…

"The data is inconclusive," the droid, which had never been given a name, said simply. "Given the Nova Guard is known to deal harshly with anyone who double-crosses them there is a 40% chance that this maneuver has more to do with their own personal dealings with Gardulla the Hutt than anything else. However, I discount much of that datum simply because the Nova Guard are not known to react in such a broad manner. Yes they would have acted directly against Gardulla if she was still alive but as she is not they would not have cared overmuch about sending any further message. The fact they are acting in such a way is indicative of a longer-term goal. Further there is a report of a squadron of them working with the Data anomaly personally. They were first spotted on Eshan."

"Get me all the reports we have from Eshan," Sidious ordered. "Then go over any information we have on the Nova Guard's numbers, and in particular its space going capacity."

Those numbers brought Sidious some comfort. The Nova Guard simply did not have the number of ships needed to project force, nor the numbers on the ground. And they lacked the resources to acquire such at any point, not having the industry to build their own ships.

However, their military capacity if they could land on any planet was dangerous. Sidious had never looked at them for the trainers for his clone army because their numbers had never made them that large a threat, and they had never really fought the Jedi Order or been forced to develop the same flexible tactical doctrine the Mandalorians had. However, if they could learn to be that flexible, then they could be a threat especially if they allied with the Jedi against me.

However, looking over the data on the Nova Guards sociological profile Sidious had to smile. Their desire to follow the strongest would make them easy to manipulate later on and told him why they were acting in such a manner. The Jedi Order was flexing its muscles, showing its strength in a way that it hadn't in centuries at the least.

And it was allied with the Chaotic Locus, whose physical strength no doubt made the Nova Guard believe he was the strongest out there. Looking at it from that perspective, the Nova Guard are not so much following the Jedi Order, as moving in lockstep with them due to their interest in the Chaotic Focus. It then supposes if I can remove the Chaotic Focus, or at least remove the focus' alliance with the Jedi Order, we will weaken both him and them at the same time.

Hmm, there is a strange corollary here. The Nova Guard, Naboo, Kashyyyk, even Dac. The Chaotic Locus has been on each of those planets, and they all decided to upgrade their military powers or flex their military might. Whatever else, the Chaotic Locus is not in favor of disarmament or perhaps pacifism at all if he has given even a limited promise to back this Reborn faction of Mandalorians.

Musing about that he continued to reread the information the combat analyst droid continued to feed him about military strengths and dispositions the Republic over Sidious began to smile evilly. Oh yes, fear is possibly the greatest motivator of all time, and it could be used to not only break the Mandalorians, but to do so in a way that would cause the Jedi to lose face, and for Ranma to no longer be considered their ally. It would take some doing, but it is possible. It is time for him to let Vosa out to act on my behalf, with a few very specific orders. And perhaps I should stack the deck further in my favor…

OOOOOOO

The next day Obi Wan arrived, his hastily repaired Sprite starfighter touching down as Ranma, yawning, came out of the Wild Light. He had decided to bunk down in the ship as a personal favor to the head teacher, who didn't want the pranks to start up again unless Ranma was going to stay for a few days and bear the brunt of them. Since he wasn't, Ranma had no problem with bunking in the ship though Shaak stayed up in the temple for the night, a decision she made because despite her being lauded as a master now Shaak knew better than to give her detractors more fuel for accusations of favoritism.

This had also made his self-appointed task of trying to both craft a gift for Shaak and hide that he was doing it from her easier. He had in fact been out hunting late last night hunting down a large furry animal who resembled nothing so much as an overlarge koala with the teeth, claws and temperament of a tiger. It hunted in packs only at night, and its dens were guarded by the members of the pack who couldn't' hunt for whatever reasons.

Ranma had tried to hunt them, only to be stalked in turn by a den guard and nearly ambushed. The guard in question had shockingly white fur however, which while obviously making him unsuitable for actually hunting on his own made him beyond perfect for Ranma's needs.

Obi Wan jumped out of the starfighter's cockpit, pausing as he noticed Ranma. "Ah-ha! So you are involved in this mess?"

"Yaawwn, meh guilty as charged if you're talking about the Mandalorian thing," Ranma said, yawning once more. Then he paused, looking at Obi Wan critically. "You look like shit."

"Thank you very much for that brutal yet accurate description. Let's just say that going to Mandalore again brings up memories best left buried." For a moment, Obi Wan wondered if he should confide in Ranma the reason why he was looking so harried in detail, but decided not to.

While Ranma of course would not care about his romantic entanglements, that didn't mean the younger man would have any advice for him, or be willing to listen to him. Further, Obi Wan was a Jedi and had taken the New Oath, he and Siri had yet to talk about retaking their oaths as Shaak had to before formally beginning her relationship with Ranma. Obi and Siri were not quite ready for that, or the enhanced scrutiny it would bring them if they were even allowed to do so at all.

"Sorry to hear that man, but if you've got some knowledge of what it's like on the ground there it'll help hugely when we get there. But I meant the stubble you've got there. Don't go that route until you can grow a beard, it's coming in uneven." Ranma replied, shaking his head.

Rolling his eyes, Obi Wan moved into step with Ranma shaking his head. "My Sprite lacks a refresher station and I was on an undercover mission, the stubble helped with that, though the itching I think is enough to try even a Jedi's patience. I most definitely want to stop off and get a shave and a shower before meeting with the council."

About an hour later found Obi Wan, showered, shaved and with a new far less stained robe standing in front of the council as he listened to what had been going on in terms of the Mandalorians, the Reborn, and everything else. Shaak and Ranma took turns doing so, explaining what Bo had told them, how they felt about her, and her faction's aid against the Death Watch. "It is no exaggeration that without the Reborn faction we might well have lost eventually." Shaak finished in a soft tone.

"So our mission will be to bolster the New Mandalorians correct? That is both what the Republic Senate will no doubt want us to do, and what the Order will no doubt decide is the correct action." Obi Wan said as Shaak finsiehd speaking, looking around at the masters physically present and taking part via hologram.

"You know that's interesting," Ranma said his brows furrowing as he tried on his best Dooku impression. "I could swear I just heard a Jedi decide that he's going to back a government that may or may not have the backing of its own people?"

"It's not that simple Ranma." Obi Wan reproved, shaking his head, while around him many of the council nodded. While he and Shaak had won a lot of respect from the council members physically present it did not, as Yoda had planned, extend to this topic.

"The Mandalorians are a threat. They're one of the few military forces out there that can really match the Jedi in terms of combat ability. Admittedly not many of them can do so one-on-one, but they don't have to. You don't understand the amount of concern their history gives us whenever we think about something like this."

"You're right I don't, since that history you're talking about is at least a thousand years in the past and I thought it was Jedi who were supposed to not let their fears and worries guide their actions." Ranma said shaking his head as he mentally girded himself for what he was going to have to say here. This wasn't going to be good.

"It is not fear, but duty," Plo Koon said mildly. "We have a duty to the Republic's people to protect them. How can we say we are doing that if we allow the Mandalorians to go back to their old warlike ways?" The Kel Dor shook his head. "That is essentially the main thrust of our mission I think: to discover whether or not this anger at the New Mandalorians is as wide spread as Bo Katan Kryze said. If it is, then our problems become how to deal with it. If it is not, and she is either being misled or has misled you, then the solution is somewhat easier."

Obi Wan started at Bo's last name, only now realizing the woman must have some familial connection to Satine.

Before he could speak however Ranma shot back. "But if they're willing to change, who are we to say they can't try? Besides, as far as I can figure out, and I've actually looked this up, the New Mandalorians are part of the Republic. The planet and most of the rest of the sector actually isn't."

"What?" Obi Wan said cocking his head in shock.

"The New Mandalorians are not actually a representational government of the planet," said Adi Gallia, kneading her forehead. "They have Senate approval and can act as the world government, because there actually isn't one in place. But if a world government is set up with a majority of the populations approval, then they don't even have to ask the Senate for approval to change over to this new form of government, they simply oust the New Mandalorians which opens up another kettle of fish."

"This is getting more complicated by the moment," Obi Wan muttered.

"Regardless of what anyone thinks, if the Mandalorians become a warrior culture based on defending others like Bo Katan wants them to, or if splinter groups start lashing out like the Death Watch, it will effect the planets all around them in that sector." Said Master Windu from Coruscant. "I do not believe we can stand by and let such upheaval occur."

"How do you know if the change will be a bad thing? From what I have seen in our records no Jedi has been into the sector since Obi Wan and Master Jinn were there." Shaak objected, looking over to where Jinn was sitting, his cane beside him. He was not part of the High Council or even the Council of Reassignment, but he was here to give any input he could. Despite that, he had been silent thus far, asking no questions not speaking up during her and Ranma's tale or now.

"No we haven't, but the planet Gargon is a member of the Republic in good standing. It's a major exporter of phobium, it's certainly benefited by the lack of Mandalorian power. Surely the rest of the planets in the sector did the same," said Master Koth.

The offhand way he said that made Ranma's skin crawl, bringing to mind forcefully what he wanted to say here, but before he could, Shaak spoke up, returning to the original topic. "Bo Katan was being sincere when she said she wanted to create a new faction that would allow her people to return to the Resol'nare and also change. I think we must at the very least acknowledge her sincerity."

"She is still a Mandalorian warrior, and we must take the long view," Master Trebor said, shaking his head. "The Mandalorians were bogeymen for thousands of years, the Republic will not stand for them going back to their warlike ways, whatever the reasons. I respect and can understand the changes to their personal code of honor this Bo Katan woman espouses, but I cannot see her society willing to take on those changes alone. Instead they would simply use it as an excuse, and we would be faced with another interminable war."

"Like the war you made on them that you lot call the Excision?" Ranma asked, his voice a low growl. Holding up a hand he glared around at the council, choosing his words carefully as he went on. "I mentioned the similarities between the ancient samurai and the Mandalorians, their wars of expansion and the war my country of Japan waged. What I didn't tell Bo Katan or even Shaak was how that war ended."

He looked around, but everyone, both those physically present and those on Coruscant were looking at him intently. "Japan was losing the war, we had been pushed back and further back, losing nearly all our ability to be an offensive power, but we were an island nation, and we were a united people who followed a warrior culture. Any kind of invasion would have caused hundreds of thousands of casualties, casualties our war-weary enemy could not ask it's soldiers to pay. So they decided to use atomic weapons on two of our cities in order to cow us into surrendering."

Nuclear weapons were no longer used in warfare by any spacefaring race. Not because they were so deadly, a orbital bombardment could do far more damage than a single nuclear weapon after all, but because of the long term impact. Even so, the idea of one power based on a single planet using a nuclear weapon against their equally planet-bound enemy was appalling to many of Ranma's listeners.

"It worked too. The old, I suppose you could call it a military government was thrown out, and replaced with a more peaceful government." Ranma glared around at the council. "But there are major differences between that and the act you call the Excision."

He held up his fingers, counting down as he locked eyes with Yoda, the only Jedi save perhaps the distant Fay who had been part of the Order at the time of that act. The old Grandmaster face was sorrowful, but he did not look away. "One, we were in a war at the time, a war that had gone on for years, exhausting both sides. When you and the Republic launched the Excision, you and the Mandalorians were at peace, and had been since the end of the New Sith Wars. You acted preemptively against a supposed threat and did so using orbital bombardments that wiped out civilian and soldier alike. You acted out of fear, something that the Jedi Order seems to do far too often for an order that's not supposed to feel that emotion, let alone let it guide their actions."

Shaak winced, leaning somewhat away from her paramour as many other council members stirred in their chairs. She had heard this before, but when they had talked, Ranma hadn't let that biting contempt enter his voice as he did now. Even so she didn't step in and stop him, nor did any of the others stunned perhaps by the emotions swirling in Ranma's voice.

"Further, afterward, the Americans helped us rebuild our economy and government. They even entered into a pact with my nation to defend us. I won't say it was always a pleasant relationship or an even one, but it was there. You lot never did that, instead pulling out of the sector you had just ravaged, leaving behind a vacuum, only taking interest in it when the New Mandalorians rose to power and began to reach out to you and the Senate instead. You have no idea what's going on out there, no resources to call upon to find out. And you think you still have the right to say what is best for that sector of space?" Ranma scoffed, actually spitting to one side. "Don't make me laugh!"

For a moment the council was silent, each member dealing as best they could with the cold contempt in Ranma's voice. None of them of course had been involved in the decision leading up to that act, even Yoda had barely been a knight at the time, nor had he been involved in the act itself.

Even so, to have the Order's actions questioned in such stark terms, to be told bluntly that the Order as a whole had acted wrongly was a position few there knew how to deal with. Koth, Gallia and Trebor in particular looked as if they wanted to reject Ranma's words out of hand, but could not. They really didn't have any kind of moral high ground here, and that fact left them unbalanced.

Eventually Plo Koon spoke up, his translated voice soft in the silence of the meeting room. "Ranma is correct. While I cannot say I would act any differently, in hindsight the acts of the Order during the Excision were not just. We as Jedi must serve justice, not law first and must never act out of fear. To that end, we must have more information here. I recommend a short survey of those planets. How they are getting on, what do they think of the Republic, the New Mandalorians and the Mandalorians in general."

He looked at Obi Wan, who was staring at Ranma as if the younger man's words had made him rethink his opinion of the martial artist then around at the rest of the council. "The Senate wants us on hand to start mediation within the week correct? But we can get into that sector in a bare day or so."

When Gallia nodded the Kel Dor went on. "I recommend we spend three or four days surveying the different planets in the sector, and then head to Mandalore. Obi Wan can make contact with duchess Satine, while I go undercover to get a feel for the general populace. That way we can take an informed position. But Ranma is correct: we Jedi do not have the right to force our way of life on someone else, or to enforce a societal change on a people unless they are a clear and proven danger to the peace of the Republic here and now, not one based on extant fears from the past. If they prove to be a threat we can act, but not before."

The rest of the council did not look happy about this, especially Koth, Dooku, and a few of the others for various reasons. But they could not argue the point unless they wanted to completely throw out the idea that the Order was a force for justice rather than the status quo.

For his part Ranma nodded firm agreement with Plo's position but then he had a horrible thought. "The clans will know the New Mandalorians asked for Jedi mediation right? I mean, it would be really bad if you just showed up, right?"

"I have a sudden premonition of doom." Shaak muttered, one hand gently stroking her lekku thoughtfully. "I think we should probably call ahead at the very least. Bo knows Ranma and I will be arriving, but not any other Jedi."

"I am still uncertain about the rightness of backing such a societal… semi-return to type? I am uncertain how to even describe this Bo Katan's ideas and how it would change the Mandalorian warrior code. But nor do I know enough about the Mandalorian on the street as it were to know what they themselves want. I just hope we will be able to live with the consequences down the line whatever happens." Obi wan said, shaking his head.

"You can only do the right thing now, whether or not that causes problems later is a problem for later. Live in the now, and let the now decide the later." Ranma said.

Obi Wan actually blinked in shock as did more than a few other masters, as Ranma almost paraphrased something Master Qui Gon Jinn had said several times. He looked towards Master Yoda, who was smiling faintly as he said silent in his chair. He'd not said anything throughout the discussion, simply watching and listening, but now he locked gazes with Obi Wan, and Obi Wan realized what the Grandmaster was trying to say. He bowed his head, agreeing to do just that in this instance, though he was also concerned about one other very personal matter about this mission. Satine is not going to like this.

OOOOOOO

"WHAT!?" shouted Bo through the hyperlink connection, followed by much cursing and her suddenly glaring into the pickup at Ranma. Once more back in the Reborn's moon base she had been hoping for a relaxing evening after a full day of talking with clan heads and playing politician, and also, again, running into her sister numerous times. "You and that kriffing Jedi of yours owe me big for springing this on me."

"Would you have preferred Plo Koon and Obi Wan just show up out of nowhere then?" Shaak asked archly as Ranma rolled her eyes.

Bo glared at the both of them then her lips twitched into what even the most charitable could not have called a smile. "I want a sparring match with both of you when you get here. I think I might be able to surprise you then just as you did me just now." With that she disconnected grumbling under her breath about meddling Jedi.

"Well, that went about as well as could be expected." Shaak muttered as Ranma laughed.

OOOOOOO

So as to use their time in the most efficient manner it was decided that Plo Koon and Obi Wan, much to the very carefully hidden delight of Ranma and Shaak, would not journey to the Mandalore system on the Wild Light. Obi Wan instead would slip in as a passenger on a liner, first travelling to Gargon then from there on to Mandalore.

Plo Koon would openly travel to the same starting point, but make his way quickly elsewhere from Gargon via his Sprite starfighter. Shaak had Ranma would avoid Gargon altogether, starting with a few known frontier class worlds, worlds that supplied resources and people to other planets rather than having any industry of their own. Traveling into the Mandalore sector by the Hydian Way it would take them only 12 hours to get into that area of space, and a few more hours from there to the first planet they would be visiting. Working under something of a time limit all four of them left Kashyyyk later that day after coming up with simple call signs and being given a few short range communicators just in case.

Ranma took one look at HK still asleep in the main sitting room and then turned to Shaak shaking his head. "I'll put him up in the cockpit, but I think we should probably leave him off for now. I don't know about you but even turned off its kind of creepy to have him just standing there like that."

"While I wouldn't say it's creepy, keeping him turned off until we next run into a battle situation would no doubt be what HK wants anyway," Shaak said, kissing his cheek briefly before heading towards the cockpit herself to get the ship ready for launch while Ranma followed, now carrying HK. Getting to the Hydian took them two short jumps, and then they were off, leaping thousands of light-years in a single leap rather than from one system to another. That jump would take around eight hours, but it was nonstop and Tune could handle the ship's controls easily.

At first Ranma spent time in his room ostensibly sleeping, but in reality wanted the time to finish his gift to Shaak. She in turn was busy in her room, meditating and looking over the most recent information they had on the Mandalore sector.

Which, Shaak was forced to admit, wasn't nearly as recent as it should have been. The Mandalore sector was a typical Outer Rim sector, with over fifty systems, though most were known frontier systems, or uninhabited. There was more information about the planets important to the Mandalorians, but even there the latest information they had was from Obi Wan and Qui-Gon's mission twelve years ago. The rest outside of Gargon, the only planet beyond the New Mandalorians which was an actual member of the Republic, they had no information about that was more up to date than seven hundred years ago.

Later that evening the two of them spent their time practicing together then Shaak spent a few hours trying to teach Ranma how to read Galactic Standard, a process that was far slower than teaching him how to speak the same language. After that they went to bed, and Ranma woke up to Shaak once again making breakfast a bare hour before they were due to leave hyperspace.

Moving up behind her silently, he was about to put his arms around her when Shaak spoke up, turning off the kitchen unit at the same time. "I know you're there you know. You of all people should not try to sneak up on a Jedi without being encased in that 'quiet thief technique' of your. Your pillar of Living Force makes you quite obvious to anyone who is even remotely paying attention."

"Well there goes that idea," Ranma laughed. Putting his chin on her shoulder and leaning his head lightly against hers, Ranma felt the pressure of her back lekku against his chest, the gentle rub of one of her montrals against the top of his head. Little things like that still sometimes startled him, reminding him that Shaak wasn't human. It didn't bother him, it just reminded him.

He trailed kisses from her collarbone from her bared shoulder to her collarbone, licking and biting it lightly causing her to shiver. A second later however she thrust backwards with her rear, forcing Ranma away. "None of that, I just finished making this, let's eat before it gets cold."

"A woman after my own heart that's you love," Ranma said, grinning and kissing her once on the lips before turning away, not noticing how her cheeks had flushed, her skin lightening noticeably at his words. Despite the fact that they had said they loved each other on Yavin 4, they hadn't actually used that word since, and the sheer spontaneity of the moment just now had taken her breath away.

Moving into the sitting area, she put their food down, some of the Order's special spicy bread, a small plate of fresh fruit from Kashyyyk, and a sort of sliced and diced radish equivalent that was quite tasty once pickled. Shaak then sat next to Ranma, leaning up very slightly and kissing him on the cheek. "I love you too you know."

To her delight Ranma flushed as she had earlier, stuttering slightly before turning his head and kissing her meaningfully on the lips.

But after a moment Shaak sighed leaning away and moving further down the sofa to put some distance between them. "There is one thing we should probably talk about." She looked worried, staring into Ranma's eyes for a moment trying to get across the seriousness of the moment to him.

Ranma bit into a chunk of the spicy bread, before setting it down turning to stare at her fully. "All right, lay it on me Shaak."

"There is no easy way to say this, so I'll simply say it." Shaak replied, breathing in deeply and wishing to get this out of the way quickly. "Togrutans and human relationships are not incredibly unusual in parts of the galaxy. But there is a major problem with them becoming long term. Our races can't breed. Humans can breed with several other races, but we Togrutans cannot breed with any other race, including humans."

Ranma nodded slowly, looking at her seriously, marshalling his thoughts to get the words out so there was no room for misunderstanding. "I can I understand that would matter to a lot of people Shaak. Do you… want children at some point?"

Honestly, Ranma was sort of surprised that if everything lined up right they couldn't actually have children, but then again he had been somewhat surprised at times by how technology here in this new dimension worked. Sometimes a lot of it was really high-tech, the hyperspace thing, the communication network and all the droids. But in some ways, it was very primitive. As far as he knew medical technology was based around the use of bacta, replacement robotic prosthetics, but otherwise wasn't so far beyond what Ranma knew in a lot of ways, though admittedly he was no expert.

Shaak frowned thoughtfully, leaning back in that sofa and picking up one of the fruits for a moment chewing as she thought. "I… don't think it does bother me all that much. Truthfully speaking, the Order doesn't really like to acknowledge that sometimes master and padawan bonds become like parent and child rather than mentor and student. I could easily see myself doing something like that with Little Soka for certain.

"Would I have eventually wanted children of my own? I don't know. I don't know the difference between that and the bond which can form between master and padawan. Is there some kind of added connection there that I just don't have enough information on? I don't think it matters to me," Shaak said. "That could be ignorance talking, but I don't think it is. I am happy with you, so long as children does not matter to you, which is what I was worried about, it does not bother me."

Ranma shrugged. "It'd be a few decades before I'd even think about having a real kid of my own anyway."

"Decades Ranma?" Shaak laughed. "You'd want to have a kid your 50s? I can just imagine someone Qui-Gon's age dealing with what are they called, those diaper things that babies have to use?" Shaak couldn't remember anything of her own childhood, having been brought into the order when she was around 1 1/2, and she had never served in the crèche which watched over the babies which the Order brought in when they tested positively for Force powers.

"No, I mean…" Ranma paused, holding up a finger as his brows drew down. "We've talked, er, that is I'm certain I've mentioned…crap," Ranma muttered, slapping his face with the same hand he'd just been holding up. "Right okay. We haven't had this discussion yet…"

"Ranma, what are you talking about?" Shaak asked, her eyes narrowed. She had been happy with Ranma's reaction to the news that they couldn't have children, but this looked as if it was an entirely different topic and possibly just as serious.

"The Living Force, well, you call it that anyway I still prefer to call it ki…"

"Ranma you're stalling," Shaak ordered. "Stop it, breath and tell me what you are talking about."

"You remember me mentioning Happosai right?"

"Yes the little perverted creature who thought he was your master at times." Shaak replied, wondering where this was going.

"He had this trick where he could siphon energy off women's undergarments and stuff like that, I've told you about that too." Shaak nodded and Ranma went on. "It did more than just help him regain his strength, it retarded the aging process or well not so much retarded it at that point as… stopped it entirely I think. And there was Cologne too, same age as he was, but she'd built up her ki strength to a level which did the same thing without needing to be refilled like Happy's."

'What?" Shaak asked, her face going entirely blank.

"Yes see he was apparently really, really old by the time he learned how to use his ki effectively, and he was always a pervert, so he combined the two, into a way to rebuild his ki reserves, at least that's what I think anyway. He was over 400 years old at least, still alive and kicking, kicking really hard too sometimes." Ranma said, still somewhat babbling. "And um, he was already old when he built up enough ki to use consciously. When I learned about that and I was around 19. These days, I'm a hell of a lot better at it than I was. And I'd bet that anyone who starts using the Living Force as much as I do or you do now… you um, you won't age as fast as you would if you age at all."

Shaak stared at him, her eyes somewhat unfocused. "I'm trying to remember how many dark Lords of the Sith became such or died during a quest for eternal life. Exar Kun was not the only one, believe me. And you're saying that if they could have learned how to enlarge their own Living Force reserves they could've done that?"

"Maybe," Ranma said with a shrug, looking away for a moment. "I don't know where the line is there, but yeah, the connection is pretty strong."

"That is interesting," Shaak said with a nod slowly pulling out of her shocked state. "But you're not certain?"

"I am pretty sure," Ranma said with a frown. "I can't imagine any reason why that wouldn't carryover between my home dimension and this one."

"I see." Slowly Shaak got over her shock, which had she had to admit rather ruefully had been most un-Jedi like of her. But the idea of lengthening your normal lifespan like that, that was beyond anything she'd ever heard of, though admittedly the idea of reaching inside you to your own Living Force had also been an entirely new idea when Ranma had introduced it to her.

Shaak had read records of Sith Lords who could drain the life energy of someone then use it to power their abilities, even to give themselves the semblance of youth for a time. But Ranma was talking about something permanent! "This is, I, the implications, I… how do you know? I mean you are right that you're young, you're younger than me actually, which I admit had bothered me at a time or two…"

"Shaak, I know I don't know yet, if I still look like this in four or five years time, then we'll know. And I'll have to admit to being a little irritated." Ranma replied, smirking now.

"I'll bite," Shaak said with a faint smile, shaking her head as she finally regained the last of her equilibrium. "Why?"

"Well that'd mean I haven't grown taller or broader in the shoulder. I'd like to be a little taller than I am now at the very least, y'know?"

Shaak laughed shaking her head, then looked seriously at Ranma. "It doesn't bother you?" she asked one last time, returning to the previous topic. The implications of Ranma's revelations were such she had to talk to Master Dooku about them. He was the only one besides herself who had taken Ranma's training beyond the toughness training and begun to meditate, reaching inward as well as outward to the Force. As such it could be set side for now, and Shaak had to admit she was somewhat happy to do so.

Ranma laughed quietly, reaching out and pulling Shaak into his lap. He leaned his forehead against hers for a moment, staring into her eyes. "It doesn't bother me Shaak. I've never been good with kids, couldn't ever be a disciplinarian or real authority figure you know? I've never really thought about being a father, and did it doesn't really interest me. So long as you're all right with it so am I."

Pushing forward with her forehead against his for a moment Shaak smiled happily before tilting her head to the side and leaning forward, kissing him on the lips. They sat there for a time sometimes reaching over to grab a bit of food tenderly feeding one another once or twice, an act that was shockingly intimate Shaak would muse later.

The idyllic moment ended as Tune's voice came over the intercom. "Master, mistress were about to come out of hyperspace."

"We'll be there in a second Tune," Ranma said, standing up with Shaak still in Ranma's eyes for a moment, holding her in a bridle carry for a moment until he sat her down on her feet as she laughed, and the two of them moved into the cockpit area.

The first two stops they made in the sector were boring as all get out. The first was the sight of an ancient mining colony, one of the largest sources of metals and other material in the sector during the New Sith Wars. It had been entirely destroyed during the so-called Excision. But there were no livable planets in the system, simply four asteroid fields. Since there was no local source of people, rebuilding would have cost trillions in credits and an existing work force to match.

No planet or group in this sector had that, and no major corporation or Core World could have moved into the area, the logistics of such a move would have been both obvious and alarming to anyone who used the Hydian way's waypoints in this sector. Shaak had made certain the Senate and the Order had no information on any such thing just in case.

(Of course, what no one seemed to realize was that this system was one of hundreds of such systems scattered around the Outer Rim, many of whom were known only to a few. So even the Sith had never bothered with this one. Besides, trying to move in would have, even now, brought them into conflict with the Mandalorians.)

The second jump was to a system with a single habitable planet called Ordo. Here they found a normal frontier planet, with a few orbitals and a working if small economy. The people here also had strong ties to Mandalore, the government being run by a Mandalorian clan. They even had regular traffic to and from Mandalore in the form of liners carrying people and cargo haulers bringing in refined goods and taking out various goods, in particular wood and a key ingredient to ferrocrete.

The Wild Light spent a bare few hours in system as Ranma and Shaak met with the locals in the space station, getting a feel for the planet and the fact they had survived relatively well since the Excision. They had issues occasionally with pirates and other raiders, but the biggest issue they had was a lack of local industry.

Jumping out of Ordo toward their next target however they ran into trouble. That next jump had been along the same route ships from Ordo used to reach Mandalore as well as the next stop on their list, the planet Hrything. And when they came out of space, they found a battle going on.

"Master, mistress, we have a liner, the Grock Hauler, a large and ancient type of passenger liner out of the Corellia yards originally, under attack. The ship could carry as many as six hundred people in relative comfort for short amounts of time. Two ships have docked with it, medium freighter class. We also have Sixteen Uglies spread out around the boarding action." Tune reported crisply. He was getting a lot better at this whole combat thing.

"Wake up HK!" Ranma ordered, strapping himself in as Shaak took the controls this time and he began to operate weapons.

"We have four more Uglies incoming from directly astern Master and we are also being hailed." Tune reported.

Without prompting Tune opened the communication, "Incoming patrol ship, this is Grock Hauler, we are being boarded by pirates. Please assist!"

"Patrol ship?" Ranma asked even as he nodded to HK indicating he should take one of the quad lasers.

"Once we bring our shields up to full power I imagine our power reading does make us look more like a patrol ship rather than the small freighter the Wild Light is based on." Shaak mused, pushing the ship forward at speed.

"HK, take out our trailers, I'll concentrate on the group at front," Ranma ordered. "Let's not use our torpedoes or ion cannon here. Unless you think we should try to capture some of them for questioning later Shaak?"

"I don't think so, no." Shaak said shaking her head. "But it's a good idea to keep our main weapons a secret out here, since I doubt the news of them will have reached this far. Tune, reopen communication with the Hauler, ask them if they need assistance to repel the boarders."

"Gleeful amusement: Ah master, this is precisely the way to wake up, not five seconds back online and already in combat. The only thing that would make it better would be if it was face to face. You truly are the best master, of all time."

A second later HK killed two of the Uglies, cobbled together barely spaceworthy starfighters, into pieces. The third ship seemed to come apart of its own accord in its efforts to keep up with the Wild Light's last twisting maneuver, and the fourth kept going, trying to rejoin it's fellows as they all regrouped around their prize, only to die to Ranma's fire.

"They report they might need help soon master. According to the captain they have three Mandalorian warriors aboard who seem to be holding the pirates for now, but there are at least two hundred boarders."

"Got it," Ranma grunted and for the next few moments that was the last anyone said, as the quartet fought their ship, forging forward. The pirates didn't seem to have any missiles or torpedoes, and even grouped together their fire only could make the Wild Light's shields dip into the yellow somewhat. Some of them were surprisingly good pilots, but they lacked enough of a punch to do much to the Mon Calamari designed ship.

Five more Uglies died before the pirates seemed to realize this, and most of them began to pull off, leaping into hyperspace. Two more died, then the Wild Light was near enough to take the two freighters docked with the passenger liner under fire, riddling their engines, the rest of the pirates dead or fled.

Shaak coasted the ship forward until Tune told her they were lined up with one of the liner's docking clamps. The other ship quickly extended is airlock's umbilical cords, and with the droids on both sides working in tandem the hookup occurred quickly.

Ranma and HK led the way into the ship the moment the connection was secure, bursting through a short corridor into the long restaurant/casino that dominated the center of the liner quickly. There they found a running gunfight already occurring. Five Mandalorians warriors were on one side, using their rockets to jet around the interior of the room from here to there. Two of them were injured, unable to move but still laying down covering fire like pros.

On the other side of the room and trying to force their way towards the front of the ship were over two hundred or so pirates, just as Tune had predicted. They seemed to have just been joined by a few more of their troops, probably the crew left behind on their modified freighters after Ranma and Shaak had destroyed their ship's engines. Now they had to take the liner intact or they might well be stuck here even if they won.

HK and Ranma had come out of the small side passages leading to individual rooms and resting areas nearer the pirates than the Mandalorians, but both sides saw them at the same time since there was no cover blocking their entrance into the main area. "Gleeful announcement: Ho lovely, my favorite type of environment, a target rich one!"

With HK's pronouncement the two of them opened fire, as Ranma raced forward, trying to get in close with a few dozen pirates taking refuge behind an overturned roulette table. HK zoomed forward on his repulsors ducking under a heavy weapon of some kind, it's energy bolt a darker color than most of the others before taking a large clump of pirates near the back of the room under fire with his special slug thrower.

Seeing their chance the three mobile Mandalorians jetted up into the air over the pirates fire as the pirates became confused as to who they should all be targeting, their disorganization costing them any kind of unity now. One of them slammed down into the middle of the same group Ranma had charged into. She began cutting this way and that with paired vibroblades that had snapped out of her gauntlets. Ranma had learned how to spot the curve in the chest piece.

"Yo," the Mandalorian woman said from within her helmet. "Name's Tess Von Dere, of clan Dere. You?"

"Ranma." Ranma grunted, punching a pirate so hard the pirate, a Gammorian was lifted off his feet and smashed bodily into several other pirates. "You wouldn't happen to know Bo Katan Kryze would ya?"

"Heard of her, and her new Reborn faction why? Wait, you wouldn't happen to be the Ranma that was involved in the Yavin 4 fighting right? Rumors said there was some warrior from an unknown sect and his Jedi minder involved in that…" Tess' voice trailed off as Shaak joined the battle leaping out of the same hallway HK and Ranma had come from. Her lightsaber was on and flashing, blocking blaster bolts and directing them back into the pirates who fired them before slashing out in her own attacks, carving the pirates near her into pieces.

That seemed to take the fight out of the pirates, who tried to retreat, only to find the Mandalorians, HK and Ranma had no interest at all in letting them go. Not fifteen minutes later it was all over, and Ranma called in Tune to help with the liner's repairs while the other passengers came out of hiding near the front of the ship to help the cleanup.

It took Tune and the small freighter's original astromech about an hour to fix the liner's damages even while everyone else pitched in as well as they could to clear all the bodies. "Thank you again for this, ," Tess said, shaking her head, running one hand through her hair, wet with sweat after the battle and the exertions to repair the ship. "I still can't believe pirates are willing to strike this far out from Hrything or Gargon."

"Hrything being involved with pirates I can almost understand given its history as a smuggling den during the New Sith Wars. But why did you mention Gargon?" Shaak asked, cocking her head. She too was somewhat sweaty, though Togrutans did not perspire as much as humans did in similar circumstances. "Gargon is the only world in this sector outside of Mandalore itself that we have any information about."

"Ah…" Tess trailed off, glaring at the Jedi for a moment before once again almost visibly setting her status as a Jedi aside. "Gargon might be the only planet in the area that's a 'member in good standing' with the Republic, but that doesn't matter a bit. All the republic cares about is that it gets its precious batteries and that the spaceport looks good whenever the nearest Sector Senator wants to stop by. Outside of the spaceport there's about a dozen gangs all vying for control of the planet. Most of them have off-world elements too, though I've no idea how many."

She shrugged, sneering a little at Shaak's look of dismay before going on more seriously, directing her words to Ranma rather than the Jedi. "As for Hrything, the whole planet's operated by a Black Sun splinter group run by someone called Lazlo, though no one I've heard tell even knows what he looks like. He's got the whole planet under wraps, nothing happens there he doesn't know about apparently. You'd need an army to break his gangs grip on the planet."

Ranma nodded, filing that away as useful information for later. After all, the Reborn might require an initial target after rallying their people, right? Before he or Shaak could ask further questions however, HK's voice came over the intercom. "Bored tone: Master, Mistress, Tune and this other trash can say they are done the repairs to the computer. This junk-heap is ready to jump." A second later his voice went on clearly as an aside. "Lofty tone: I'm calling you a trash can, trash can."

"Well that's that then. You ready to go Shaak?" Ranma asked, looking over at Shaak who nodded and he turned back to Tess. "You think you'll have any trouble from here to Mandalore?"

"From here it's a single jump, and it would be a remarkably moronic pirate that tried anything in the Mandalore system. We'll be fine," Tess replied dryly. "And I will definitely see you there Ranma if you were telling the truth about being involved with the Reborn faction."

"Yep," Ranma said with a nod, not noticing how Shaak was now watching the other woman. "See ya then."

Tess smiled and walked off. But if someone would have looked at her as she rounded the corridor back into the transport ship's main sitting area they would have seen a strangely sinister smile on her lips.

As the Mandalorian walked off Ranma turned, only to pause as he caught Shaak's look. "What?"

"Oh nothing, just thinking that I might have to beat Mandalorian women off you with a stick," Shaak replied, shaking her head. For just a moment Shaak had felt something that made her uneasy, but it was gone just as quickly, too quickly for her to put it down as anything more than the feeling of once again having to deal with another woman being after Ranma.

"Oh Jeeze, seriously?" Ranma groaned, shaking his head. "I didn't think she flirted with me or anything like that?"

"How can you be so quick to see what your enemy is doing in a fight but so slow to notice body cues outside of it?" Shaak said with a faint laugh, joining Ranma as they made their way back to the Wild Light.

Moments later the smaller ship disengaged from the passenger liner, moving off quickly and jumping to hyperspace on a line that would take it to the Ordo system. The liner turned far more slowly, its larger engines spiraling up just as quickly for all the liner's lack of maneuverability.

As the ship jumped, Tess Vandermere was alone in her room, where she allowed her eyes to glow yellow for just a brief moment.

OOOOOOO

Knowing now that going to Hrything would be pointless at best that only left one more planet/system on their list to check in on before setting their course for Mandalore. And since Master Koon's starfighter was too small to have a Hypercom uplink like the Wild Light, they could not communicate their concerns about Gargon to him. Despite that Shaak was certain the Kel Dor master could look after himself, and the best thing they could do was to continue their own part of this mission.

That meant heading to the planet of Vorpa'ya. From what little information the Jedi Order had passed on the planet was supposedly an agricultural world. It was not a major food exporter like dozens of worlds in the Mid Rim and Colonies segment of the galaxy of course, but a planet that was simply known to have an economy based on agriculture rather than industry.

This meant that it did not come as a surprise to find that the planet had no space control watch and no orbitals. They didn't even have a set landing port and no real capital city. The Wild Light spent some time orbiting the planet as their scanners tried to find the planet's largest city, figuring that was a good sign of what the capital would be. But the largest concentration of buildings and people were little more than towns.

Ranma was interested more in the local geography than the lack of people. The planet was dominated by wide grass plains, looking almost like Mongolia in a lot of ways. There were a few grassy hills here and there, and a range of mountains rearing out of the equator that made Ranma think of the Himalayas. But this planet didn't have the oceans of Corellia, Eshan or Earth. Instead it had massive inland lakes scattered around it's grassy plains, and an even larger water basin set high up in the mountains. Ranma supposed they were interconnected somehow, but they could only see a few dozen rivers during the time Shaak spent looking for the capital.

"I am not having much luck here." Shaak muttered. "I think we are going to have to simply wander around to get a feel for the people here. This is a true frontier planet, no centralized government at all I don't think."

"Incisive comment: perhaps it does not have one now, but if you'll look at the datum on the space near the planet you will see that might not always have been the case." HK interjected.

Ranma and Shaak looked at the sensor readings but all it told Ranma was there was some junk in orbit over one of the planet's poles. Shaak however nodded. "That looks like the remnants of a space station, and we did see some other debris coming in from the hyperspace limit. Yes, that makes sense. No doubt the Mandalorians kept a small caretaker government here at some point in the past."

"Which was targeted and destroyed by the so-called Excision," Ranma said shaking his head. "At least here we're not seeing any sign of orbital bombardment." Shaak winced but said nothing and Ranma turned away, directing the ship down into the atmosphere.

With Shaak's Force powers it took them very little time to find some of the locals. Most of them were humans, but with a spattering of other races. All of them were rugged frontier types as might be expected, and went around armed. There were apparently cattle rustlers, brigands, and nasty local animals that thought the settlers were just delicious as one wag informed the two newcomers.

Their arrival made little noise among the locals when they landed on the outskirts of what looked like a massive cattle market. Only instead of being cows or sheep or whatever it would have been on earth, here the cattle were massive banthas. Indian elephant sized animals covered with heavy fur and with large horns they mewed and lowed throughout the market in large enclosed areas separating one herd from another, the largest of which was fifty strong or so. Here and there was a local horse equivalent called the Vor'daln. It had heavy fur along its neck and thews and a tail with a hidden poisoned barb, along with broader than normal hoofs.

HK took one look at the animals and shook his head violently. "Affronted mutter: No, no, no! I have a most acute olfactory sensor, and I refuse to be anywhere near such beasts. You two are on your own."

"Agreed, I'm afraid. I've been around banthas before, and while being rather nice, docile animals they are also quite smelly, unless their owners keep their fur cropped close. Which these people alas do not seem to do," Shaak agreed, sighing.

"So let's park the ship a ways away and walk in, I don't want the smell to get into the ship any more than you do." Ranma suggested, a course of action they promptly followed, lifting off and moving about a mile downwind of the market. With that done however the two exited the ship, leaving Tune and HK with orders to defend the ship.

"Bored drawl: Why yes Mastress, I will just leap into action to defend the ship from the tiny rogue animals they no doubt think are dangerous on this planet. Bah agrarian worlds, you can keep them."

"Yeah that whole combining master and mistress thing, still not clever," Ranma quipped even as he and Shaak exited the ship.

The smell of the cattle hit them as HK and Shaak had known it would the moment they reached the outskirts of the market. Ranma held his nose trying to breathe through his mouth as Shaak used a Force trick to shut down her sense of smell. It didn't stop her from breathing through the nose, but it made her mind not detect the actual stench. They stood there for a few moments as Ranma got used to the stench, but he still looked pained as they made their way forward, never quite getting used to it.

For several hours the two of them moved among the people in the cattle market, learning what they could of the planet in passing and by asking a few scattered questions. It wasn't difficult to get a feel on the planet's current state, which seemed to be both bucolic and insular. They had no interest in off world affairs, though as Shaak looked closely, she could see a few signs of degradation. Technology of any sorts was sparse, the guns were mostly local made slug throwers, and most of the clothing was locally made. There were examples of technology, mostly heating, medical gear, and useful items like cattle prods, but they were not made on planet.

"According to one man I spoke to offworlders come and go freely, but with no set schedule. They trade odds and ends for food, fur or to just buy whole animals. The Bantha herds here are the best of the bunch, breeding stock, and most of the herds are hundreds strong. The offworlders can sell a gun or a small crate of heaters for enough food to feed hundreds of people." Ranma said, shaking his head. "There's no set system of exchange it's just straight up barter though if the offworlders try to take rather than deal the locals are able to stand up for themselves. At least they are if the pirates don't simply use their ships to attack them from the air."

"Indeed. I cannot tell what the opinions on the Mandalorians are, memory here is brief, and I haven't found anyone who even knew about the space station let alone could remember when off world visits were more routine. I cannot say that their lives would be much better with a stronger sector presence and the Mandalorians guarding them, or even that the locals would welcome such, but I think they would be. Certainly the pirates these people deal with would be at least forced to pay what the food is worth by even a small fleet presence."

Ranma nodded, staring up into the evening sky. It had gotten dark as they were exploring the cattle market, and he smiled at the play of colors in the sky. "Yeah. I think we're done here, but we still have a day to go before we're due to show up on Mandalore to meet Plo and Bo." He snorted, shaking his head. "Damn if that doesn't sound like they're a comedy team, though I don't know how much laughing we'll be doing when they meet."

Shaak actually giggled at that, shaking her head. "Yes, that promises to be an interesting meeting. I think though that Plo took your words about needing to make decisions based on fact rather than past fears to heart however. So long as Bo can stop her faction from attacking him the moment he reveals himself Plo will be able to at least keep the peace."

The two fell silent then as they heard some kind of band or other start up nearby. They looked at one another, then nodded and moved in that direction as one. The Mandalorians could wait a night at least.

The song was sung in the local dialect of course, but Shaak was able to translate it easily thanks to her Force powers. The lyrics however made Ranma smile. "Run away with me, lost souls in revelry. Running wild and running free, two kids, you and me…" Laughing the two of them danced the evening away under the stars, moving back to the ship as the party behind them, about some kind of birthday or other, continued on.

As they made their way to the outskirts of the market they had to part briefly to let several drunk revelers through, pressing themselves against the makeshift yurts on either side of the trail. They were then nearly run over by a bunch of teens chasing what looked like some kind of small pet. It was a small, six-legged felinoid of some kind and it leaped onto Ranma's face before Ranma could move.

Suddenly the good, warm feelings Shaak had been feeling vanished as her lover began to radiate fear and backed away. Not just fear, but fear for the time Shaak had known him, cloying desperate pain-filled fear. Turning she reached out quickly. "Ranma what is…"

But Ranma didn't see her, turning and racing away with a scream of panic smashing through the walls of a yurt to one side before leaping away into the night. Shaak stared in shock, having felt Ranma's personality disappear for a moment there, subsumed by first the fear, then by something else, something animalistic. Shaking her head Shaak raced after him, using the Force to empower her speed and legs.

Neko-Ranma was confused. The smells of the area were confusing, painful, irritating, drowning out even the scent of the horned mate, she of the red skin and good teeth. Neko Ranma wanted to attack the large smelly things, but there were too many of them, and too many man-things too. He had to get away from the smell before he lost control. Neko Ranma knew the horned mate would not like that, females were odd about such things.

It took Neko Ranma no time at all to leave the scent of the giant smelly things behind, and he purred, arching his back as the smells and sense of nature filled his lungs. Normal cats would have been confused and wary of being in an unknown place but Neko Ranma was an Omega, his territory was where-ever he was currently. Staring out over the grassy plains he smelt small furry creatures out there. Standing still for a second, he sniffed the air then bounded towards them. The horned mate would probably appreciate a treat after all.

Several moments later Neko Ranma was moving through the tall grass, his nose close to the ground, his form entirely hidden by the grass as he stalked forward towards the group of five large forms in the distance. They looked like dogs almost, but with heavy manes, and far larger teeth for the size of their mouths. Neko Ranma knew these were predators but that was fine by him, Neko Ranma was the top cat here, and he would prove it.

Before he could pounce however the wind shifted and a form landed behind him. Its sudden appearance caused the four predator creatures to notice him, but instead of attacking Ranma and the newcomer they bolted away, yipping and squealing in fear. Neko Ranma turned, unhappy at the halt of her hunt, but he immediately began to purr too. The horned mate had found him!

Shaak stared at Ranma crouching there. There was no intelligence or understanding in those blue eyes of his, it was like looking into the eyes of an animal. "RanmOOOFF!" Shaak gasped as Ranma pounced forward, smacking into her and taking Shaak to the ground she was so surprised. She glared at him, but Ranma simply purred like some kind of feline, rubbing his head against Shaak's chest as he curled up in her lap.

"This is definitely in my top five weird things to occur since we met Ranma, possibly number two on that list right up there with how I found out about your curse." Shaak shook her head, amused, but still wary of the way Ranma's mind had seemed to retreat, letting this animalistic other mind take over.

Sighing faintly she began to scratch Ranma's hair like he was the cat he was acting as, causing Ranma's purring to redouble. However even as her hands were busy with that, Shaak reached out with the Force, touching Ranma's mind and pushing in a small probe. If Ranma had been in his right mind he would have felt this intrusion and possibly ejected it if he couldn't' discern it was Shaak doing it. But that would have been a conscious act; his animal personality had no such ability.

She felt the underlying feel, a few slivers of memory, of pain. A dark pit of some kind, and a previously trusted person pushing Ranma again and again into the pit. Pain, pain, pain, fear, hopelessness. This was not a fear on the scale of Aayla's trauma but it was close both because of how young Ranma was in the memories and how much pain was wrapped up with it. Shaak also understood that for someone like Ranma being helpless would be almost as bad as the actual pain. So he had given up, becoming in part the thing that had dealt so much pain to him.

Slowly Shaak did what she could, soothing Ranma's mind as best she could, as she had for Aayla occasionally, as she had seen Luminara and Fay do. This wouldn't fix the problem, but it would bring Ranma out of his animalistic state. A moment later, Ranma's face twitched, and his whole body shook before he looked up into Shaak's eyes. "Shaak?"

"Ranma." Shaak smiled, leaning in to kiss him on the lips, her arms going around him. she was relieved he was back to himself, but also wary of him trying to get away from her. Ranma had shared how often his weaknesses had been turned against him or used as excuses to make fun of him in the past, and she had no doubt this odd state of being could have been used in a similar manner.

To her joy however Ranma's arms went around her for a moment before he moved to sit next to her on the grass of the plain, taking one of Shaak's hands in his. Leaning his head against her shoulder Shaak saw in the starlight that he was no looking down at their hands. "So I guess I owe you an explanation?"

"That would be nice yes Ranma. But remember this, whatever that was, I will not reject you because of it!" Shaak said fiercely, hearing the quaver in Ranma's voice. "I love you remember, that means whatever this is, we will face it together."

Ranma stared into her eyes for a long time, then leaned forward and kissed Shaak softly, tenderly on the lips so much emotion in the act that despite the worry and concern she felt it took Shaak's breath away. Then he leaned back whispering against her lips. "I love you too Shaak Ti." Then with a sigh he looked away and began to explain about the Neko-Ken.

When he finished Shaak Ti breathed in and out several times as she dealt with the anger the story evoked, releasing it slowly so it couldn't fester. When she spoke her voice was soft, but clear. "Ranma your father was a child abuser of the worst sort, and it makes me very happy he is back in your old dimension lest I would be too tempted to act out a punishment that would surely fit the crime."

As Ranma chuckled, Shaak went on, standing up and pulling Ranma to his feet. "We will deal with this somehow, when we are back on Kashyyyk I will talk to Luminara, or perhaps we can see if we can find Master Fay and get her to help you. This fear is not something you need to be embarrassed about Ranma, it is simply an issue that needs to be overcome."

Ranma nodded, somewhat stunned at how well Shaak had taken his damned reaction to the furry demon things. "Thanks for that Shaak, that, that means a lot to me," he said quietly.

`Shaak simply smiled at him, and the tow walked back through the tall grass toward the Wild Light. As they came within sight of the ship however Ranma stopped perforce pulling Shaak to a stop. "Close your eyes Shaak." He said softly, squeezing her hand in the clasp neither of them had made any move to break.

Looking at Ranma for a moment Shaak wondered what he was up to before obediently closing her eyes.

Ranma moved away slightly and Shaak's hearing, enhanced by her montrals picked up rustling like clothing almost then something that sounded like fur. Then she felt a light weight settle on her shoulders, and opened her eyes to look down at her body as Ranma finished clasping a loose cloak over her. The cloak's collar and shoulders were lined with fur from the creature Ranma had fought on Kashyyyk. The fur was a white with almost a silvery tint to it in conjunction with a only slightly off white fur cloak that Shaak instinctively knew would set off her red skin and her own white markings to good effect.

"I, I looked it up on the Hypernet, that um, that your, that is that Togrutans generally give promise gifts to one another when their relationships become serious. Er my own nation used promise rings sometimes, don't know where that tradition came from if I'm honest, but it um, it seemed like a good idea." Ranma stammered his way through the words, something that Shaak idly thought simply made the words, and the emotions behind them seem more sincere. "I also wanted to try to try my hand at some of the traditional Shili foods but none of the meats I could get on Kashyyyk would match, even if I was able to find the spices."

As Shaak stared at Ranma her thoughts a mushy jumble, Ranma went on, stealing himself so that the next words would come out without the stutter. "We talked about the future but we never talked about marriage, but I Love you Shaak, and I would like our relationship to become a permanent thing. So this is my promise to you that one day, hopefully soon, I will marry you in the eyes of your people and the universe." He falter then, one hand reaching up to pull at his pigtail self-consciously. "That is if I'm not being too forward?"

"Oh Ranma if I did not wish to spend my life together with you, whatever the label, I would never have told you I love you. And I do love you, my wild unpredictable, chaotic, man!" Shaak said laughing and throwing her arms around Ranma, pulling him into a hug and a kiss that made his toes curling his shoes.

Warning Lemony Content ahead! Read at your own risk!

Pulling back, Shaak looked into Ranma's eyes and a wicked idea occurred to her. I wanted to make this somewhat romantic if I could, but I didn't think Ranma would do it for me! With a small shiver of excitement Shaak took Ranma's hand with hers, pulling him along as they moved into the Wild Light.

Thankfully for the mood, HK was up in the cockpit, shut down unless called upon by Tune. Moving around the small table Shaak pushed Ranma onto the coach. Then she stood back, letting her new cloak fall from her shoulders in a cascade of white cotton and fur to pool around her feet. Then she pulled off her undershirt, revealing her bra, one of the silky black numbers she had bought on Coronet.

Reaching behind her, Shaak unclasped it with some difficulty, her muttering of "Good gracious, how do normal women undo these things?" almost but not quite breaking the sheer sensuality of the moment. Ranma's lips twitched and he was about to speak up from the shock her actions had driven him, but then she finally got the bra unclipped, dropping it to one side and all thought fled Ranma for the second time that day, albeit in a much more pleasant manner.

Shaak Ti was a statuesque, extremely fit woman, with a perfectly flat stomach below high perky breasts that were at worst a C-cup as Ranma understood things, with not a hint of sag in them. Her red skin gleamed in the light of the sitting room, and her large nipples and areolae were chalk white, standing out even more against her red skin. Her lekku now fell down to either side of her breasts twitching with her heightened emotions, the white and blue stripes of them drawing further attention to her chest in comparison.

"God's you're so beautiful," Ranma said, his words simple but filled with adoration and love.

Licking her lips Shaak Ti reveled in the look Ranma was giving her, feeling more powerful, more of a woman than she as a Jedi had ever felt before, had ever allowed herself to feel before even when they had been together and had made one another climax. There was something about bearing her body to him like this that went beyond those more spontaneous moments.

Then Ranma reached for her, pulling her into his lap, kissing her hard on the lips, so hard it drew a moan from Shaak as their tongues began to twine around one another. Shaak began to move her hips grinding against Ranma's waist. "MMmmmmm…. Ranma…" She moaned, as he broke the kiss then gasped in anticipation as he began to work his way lower, nipping at her chin, neck, collarbone, the side of her lekku. That last caused her to moan again and even close her eyes. "MMmmmmmmm, by the Force…"

So her eyes were closed at first when Ranma finally reached her breasts. "AAHHH!" She gasped, her eyes opening wide as Ranma reached them, laying gentle kisses up and all around them lavishing attention on her red skin, finding that it tasted as always of some kind of spice he couldn't' quite name. Then his tongue flicked out, licking at Shaak's chalk white nipples.

Already stiff with arousal the nipple twitched under his touch, and Shaak humped her hips down again as Ranma licked and nibbled then sucked at first one nipple then the other. His ministrations drew moans and groans out of her that Tune would have heard up in the cockpit if he hadn't shut down for routine programming maintenance. "Ahhh, ahhm,,, Ranma!"

For his part Ranma was practically lost in this new sensation. For some reason this act called out to the most primal parts of Ranma's mind, and he found himself hungry for something he couldn't name. Only continuing to lick and kiss the flesh under his mouth could appease those instincts, and he did so with alacrity.

He even slowly began to read Shaak's responses to his ministrations, finding out that she liked it slightly harder than he would have thought, in terms of squeezing her breasts, but that her nipples were a little too sensitive even for light teeth play. Committing all this new information to memory, Ranma eagerly continued to drive Shaak wild.

Shaak hadn't realized it, but her body had been primed and ready to go off before they got back to the Wild Light. Moreover, Ranma had learned several of her more sensitive area. While his mouth was busy with this new delight, one of Ranma's hands had moved around her body, keeping her in his lap and gripping her rear hard enough to possibly cause bruises in someone who hadn't gone through the toughness training. His other hand switched from playing with the breast his mouth was not busy attacking to trailing up and down her lekku, stroking, kneading, and then pinching the end of it.

It didn't take more than a few minutes of these tender ministrations to set Shaak off like a bomb. "AAHHHH Ranma!" she shrieked, before pulling Ranma off her nipple and crashing her lips down onto his so hard their teeth clacked together, her tongue invading his mouth as her hips spasmed.

Ranma would've grunted if his mouth had been free, his own hips arcing up to meet Shaak's but he hadn't had enough stimulus just yet to finish himself, but after a few seconds Shaak pulled back from the kiss, her eyes hooded, her purple lips sore, her breathing coming in gasps. She leaned away, unconsciously bringing Ranma's attention back down to her chest for a moment. Looking down, she smiled then pushed off his lap, gently batting away his hands as Ranma reached for her.

But instead of getting to her feet, Shaak slid to her knees between Ranma's legs, reaching down to pull one foot then the other up, pulling Ranma's shoes off and tossing them aside. Ranma watched this quizzically, still breathing hard himself, trying to figure out both what she was doing and what he should be doing right now. It was only when Shaak reached up to his crotch unzipping it that Ranma realized what she was doing. "Sh, Shaak, what, um, are you sure?"

"Positive Ranma," Shaak murmured, winking at him. "I've actually been wondering what you looked like down here for a while actually, and since you just, what is the phrase, got me off? Since you just got me off, I think it only fair I return the favor."

"Shaak…." Ranma began trailing off as her hands undid his pants, pulling them down exposing his underwear. His boxers were marked by the images of some small animal or other, and Shaak giggled shaking her head as Ranma looked away embarrassed for a moment before he twitched as Shaak finished pulling down his pants and his cock sprang free of its confines and out the slit at the front of his boxers.

Shaak found herself staring at the appendage in front of her for a moment, unconsciously licking her lips. Seeing it in person is very different from seeing it in anatomy texts or even those Force damned images on the Hypernet. Ranma's cock was larger than average for his species Shaak felt, about an inch and a half in width and possibly as large erect as her lightsaber hilt. It was somewhat intimidating but also more than a bit of a turn on for some reason, calling to Shaak's most base desires.

Reaching forward she grasped it, giving it a slight experimental jerk watching Ranma's face for a moment, astonished to find her fingers only just meeting around it's width. She kept jerking both her hands now up and down its length astonished at the feel of it, like silky smooth skin covering solid bone, with veins here and there. She noticed that something was building on the tip, and leaned down to lick the liquid away.

Ranma gasped, bucking his hips up as his dick twitched in conjunction with her tongue and Shaak leaned back slightly, tasting the liquid for a moment. it had a meaty sort of flavor, with some kind of orange-like fruit mixed in. It was certainly somewhat tasty however. Leaning down again, Shaak began to lick and kiss the sides and tip of Ranma's cock letting her sharp teeth trail up the bottom of it for a moment until she came to a stop right above the tip.

"Shaak, um are you sure that's a good idea? Your, um your teeth…" Ranma stammered, but his eyes were scrunched together in pleasure locked on Shaak's face as she looked up from where she was now hovering over his crotch, his dick so hard it actually hurt right under her mouth.

"What's the matter Ranma, I thought you liked danger?" Shaak quipped, her own eyes hooded with desire, before she leaned down, opening her mouth and taking the tip of Ranma's cock into her mouth. She couldn't take more than two inches into her mouth, but that was enough, and her tongue went to work, lathering the tip from every direction while her hands went back to pumping the rest of his shaft, this time even more vigorously. Occasionally her teeth also touched it, their sharp points trailing up and down as she worked her mouth up and down.

Ranma was as primed as Shaak had been earlier, so it took barely a minute of Shaak's ministrations before he was ready to go over the edge. "Shaak watch out I'm gonnaAAA!"

That was as much waring as Ranma could give his paramour, but Shaak did not pull away. Instead she clamped her mouth down harder on the tip of Ranma's cock sucking harder. The rod under her hands convulsed almost, pulling back and shooting forwards like an ancient cannon, flooding her mouth with shot after shot of cum.

Shaak pulled back quickly, gulping down as best she could, humming as she did so which sent a vibration through Ranma's cock that made him twitch and spasm another dollop of cum into Shaak's mouth. For a moment she thought she would choke, unable to keep up with the deluge, but the tumult subsided quickly, allowing Shaak to pull all the way back as Ranma's cock began to flag.

Licking her lips Shaak smiled, licking her teeth, still humming her appreciation of the treat. Pulling away she looked up at Ranma as she sat back leaning against the table. "That was surprisingly pleasant. You taste rather good Ranma."

Above her Ranma looked down, his breath coming in gasps much as hers had earlier. "Hah, hah, I, I hope to say the same when I return the favor."

End Lemony Content!

Shaak shivered at the idea but shook her head. "Not right now I'm afraid I'm feeling a little too sensitive for more fun today." Ranma nodded at that, feeling drained in a way that sort of reminded him of how he sometimes felt after really tough fights, if in a different way. Shaak shakily got to her feet, followed quickly by Ranma who caught her for another tender kiss before letting her go, moving toward the cockpit only to stop and watch appreciatively as Shaak got dressed. She turned, making certain their eyes were locked as she pulled on her new cloak luxuriating in the feel of the fur against her lekku and neck.

"I promise Shaak," Ranma said seriously, not looking away from her eyes. "One day soon we are going to make this relationship of ours permanent, I promise love."

"I know," Shaak said, reaching him and luxuriating as his arms went around her. "I would not have asked, but I have to say that I am most looking forward to placing our claims on one another without any ambiguity."

Ranma laughed and turned as Shaak stepped out of her hug entering her room as Ranma moved toward the cockpit. Shaak hung up her Jedi robe in her room before joining him. She would change into it when they reached Mandalore.

By the time she was in the cockpit, Tune was online and already making the jump calculations. It turned out that jumping directly to Mandalore from here would take them through a black hole. So they would have to make a series of small jumps around it until they had a straight line to Mandalore from a dead system, one with a brown dwarf star and no planets. This meant it would take them around thirteen hours to get to Mandalore from here.

Shaak and Ranma exchanged a glance, and Ranma nodded, his hands reaching for the controls, his eyes twinkling at Shaak as a grin split his face. "Let's go then. This little tours been educational on many levels, but it's time to move on."

Laughing Shaak sat down across from him over Tune's domed head, leaning over to kiss him gently on the check before looking over the scanners as the Wild Light made for space.


End chapter

… This was not the chapter I thought it would be. I had thought I would be halfway through the Mandalorian arc here, but then I began to read into it, and decided the issues were a lot more complicated than I had been making allowances for, so I needed to expand it immensely. On the other hand, I was able to drop a lot of little hints here about how the future is beginning to change, while also hinting at some things that are still the same. In the next chapter we deal with the Mandalorians and a few other issues start to crop up.

Anyway, hope you all liked it and if so please review! And if anyone sees any SW info I got wrong, leave that in your review please. But the thing about Togrutans and humans being unable to breed is spot on - Lucas has come out and said he felt that no races could interbreed in SW, but there are a few characters that look like crossbreeds in the expanded legends that is simply false. None of them are half-human, half-Togrutan however, and since I will be introducing Little Soka here as younger sister figure in the future, I see no reason to use that angle.