Twenty-Seven

Kaas City Spaceport, Dromund Kaas

14 ATC

"My lord, I wish I could go with you." Even in hologram form, Talos Drellik radiated disappointment.

Nox smiled. "I wouldn't dream of recalling you from your expedition. It will probably be more fruitful than my endeavors, anyway."

"Perhaps you're right." Talos brightened. "We've already found evidence of structures that once existed all the way out here! It seems this part of Dromund Kaas is not as unexplored as we once believed."

"Any sign of the previous expedition?" Nox made her way up her ship's boarding ramp, balancing her holocom on one palm as she entered the hatch access code with the other.

"No, none. But that was almost forty years ago, and the jungle is quick to reclaim what civilization leaves behind."

"Well, I look forward to your full report." Nox closed the hatch behind her, entered the command to raise the boarding ramp, and headed for the bridge. "And if you see any sort of Force ghosts, run."

"Of course, my lord. But not without taking a few holos, first." Talos sounded quite excited by the prospect.

"Be careful," Nox chided. "I don't want to lose my best archaeologist."

"You flatter me, Lord Nox. Good luck on your artifact hunt."

"And you." Nox ended the transmission.

She sat down in the pilot's chair and sent a request to launch to Docking Control, then prepared the navicomputer to take her to Nar Shaddaa. It was time to get to work.


Sith Intelligence Headquarters, Dromund Kaas

14 ATC

Thaera contemplated the datapad for a long moment, then entered her signature and handed it back to Watcher Twenty. "There."

With that, Kettrien Byrd was approved to begin training as an Intelligence operative. If she passed, it would be time to put Nox's theory about Sith agents to the test.

"Thank you, sir," Watcher Twenty said, tucking the datapad under her arm. "Watcher Forty-five apologizes for not asking in person, but—"

"Asset Acquisition is swamped. I know." Thaera started to turn away, then paused. "Is there anything else?"

Watcher Twenty shifted nervously from foot to foot. "I have a verbal request from the Science Bureau, sir. Doctor Lokin requires your authorization to acquire test subjects for Project Equilibrium."

"Tell him he has it." Thaera frowned as the rest of the sentence sank in. "Why were you in a position to take requests from the Science Bureau? You're supposed to be in Tactical."

"Yes, sir. I was retrieving data from several of the weapons projects."

"Ah. Yes, of course." Thaera shook her head; her long workdays were starting to get to her. "You'd better get back to it, then. Dismissed."

Watcher Twenty saluted and scurried off.

Thaera hadn't even made it two steps in the direction of her office when she was intercepted by Keeper.

"Sir, about the project you started a few weeks ago…" Keeper looked around the bustling Operations room, then leaned in close and whispered. "Preliminary reports are in. We've been unable to find any leads on Agent Eclipse's identity."

"That's bad," Thaera said quietly. "We need this taken care of, and quickly. You have authorization to use whatever measures you deem necessary to resolve this threat."

"Yes, sir."

"Get it done. Was there more you wanted?" The words emerged more abrasively than Thaera had intended.

"One of our deep cover agents in the Republic just sent in a report. I suggest we move to a more secure location."

Thaera suppressed a sigh. "We can continue this in my office." As always, her work was never done.


Korriban

14 ATC

In the distance, an Imperial warship drifted through the orange sky in low orbit. The pale sun gleamed in the cold dark far beyond, its piercing rays lancing through the atmosphere like a lightsaber through armor to blast the bleak, steep cliffs that stood a few kilometers away from the Sith Academy.

A'tro picked her way over the rocky ground towards the cliff's edge, where a familiar imposing figure already stood as implacable as the stones around him.

Darth Marr turned away from the horizon to face her as she approached. In the Force, he echoed the dark energies of the planet around them.

A'tro stopped close enough to talk, but far enough away that she didn't have to crane her neck too much to look him in the mask. She wasn't intimidated by his physical presence, but she hated having to look up at people, and the top of her head didn't even reach his shoulder.

"Thank you for meeting with me," she said. It had taken two months to even have the opportunity; Marr was rarely away from the front lines.

He shrugged briefly, one spiked spaulder shifting. "I wondered when you would ask."

A'tro frowned. "You were expecting this?"

"I expected that eventually, you would see fit to share information with me. Information pertaining to the fate of the Empire."

"That was what I said in my message." A'tro kept her hands at her sides, close to her lightsabers. Something felt off.

"You are very trusting, Wrath." Marr took half a step closer to her.

A'tro didn't move. "How so?"

"You let me choose the time and place of this meeting." He gestured to the landscape around them. "Here, we are out of range of the Academy's patrols and sensors. I could kill you at this very moment, and no one would ever know."

"I'm not one of your rivals," A'tro pointed out, every muscle in her body tensing in anticipation. "If you kill me, that's treason."

If she had miscalculated, and this led to a fight, she wasn't entirely sure that she could win. It was not a pleasant thought.

"Yes," Marr murmured, the filters in his mask turning the last consonant into a metallic hiss. "Treason. That is why you came here, is not? To discuss treason?"

A'tro squared her shoulders. "If wanting to fight for the Empire's future is treason, then yes, that's what I'm here to discuss."

Marr was silent for a long moment. A'tro started eyeing the terrain, sizing it up for tactical purposes.

"Many years ago, I uncovered information that…disturbed me," Marr said slowly. "I sought to take action, but was foiled before my plans reached fruition." A rare note of open anger colored the last few words. "And now, I suspect you hold the final answer to unlock the mystery."

"What makes you say that?" A'tro asked, still wary.

"You are the Emperor's Wrath."

"Yes. I—yes." She took a deep breath, held it, then let it out. "I believe I've learned the truth. About our Emperor's long silence."

"I thought as much." Marr nodded, seemingly to himself. "When the previous Wrath disappeared, I began to wonder. And now here you are, speaking words of doom, as he did."

"My predecessor?" Curiosity began to mingle with her tension. "He knew something?"

"Perhaps. He did not involve himself with the Dark Council as you do, and shared little. He is long gone, now."

"Yes, I suppose it doesn't matter at this point," A'tro muttered. She took another deep breath, steeling herself. "This is what I've learned."

She laid out the facts as she understood them, plainly and without flinching. As she spoke, she watched Marr carefully for a reaction, but he was impossible to read, both physically and in the Force.

When she finished, it was quiet. The sun was climbing closer to the top of the sky as another warship orbited past. Somewhere in the distance, a tuk'ata howled a hunting call.

"I see," Marr said finally. "Then it is as I feared."

A'tro nodded. "Besides the two of us, only Darth Nox knows the truth." And Quinn, but Marr didn't need to know that. "I don't trust the rest of the Council."

"Nor should you. They are too absorbed in their own power struggles to see that the Empire is crumbling around them."

She had the sense Marr was scowling behind his mask. "Nox has told me that she will keep this knowledge a secret, but she has no interest in taking any action to oppose the Emperor."

"Unsurprising. I doubt she will commit until the threat is imminent."

"Then it's just us for the time being."

"Indeed." Marr looked over at the warship on the horizon. "Propaganda may say otherwise, but at the front, it is clear: the war does not go well. We are not losing, but we are far from victory. If our fellow Sith continue to waste resources on internal squabbles, defeat will become a certainty."

"We'll be caught between the Republic and our own Emperor."

"If he seeks to destroy us, he is no Emperor of mine," Marr said grimly.

"He betrayed me," A'tro whispered. "He betrayed us all."

Marr folded his arms across his armored chest. "The Empire will not fall, not so long as I live to fight for it. The two of us must bring the Dark Council into line and break this stalemate with the Republic if we are to have the strength for the struggle that is surely to come."

"Agreed." A'tro kept her voice firm, but inside, a part of her was quailing. She had just agreed to commit treason.

It's not treason, she told herself. The Emperor is the real traitor. You're fighting for the good of the Empire. Remember that.

It still felt wrong somehow, but she had no intention of turning back.