There was a flash of green, and then stillness.
Juno's eyes widened visibly from the cockpit, and Starkiller could almost taste her fear.
For Starkiller's hand was outstretched, and the green bolt of energy was suspended in space, mere millimeters from the glass of the throne room.
The Emperor cackled in vicious glee, and Starkiller, power surging, threw the bolt back from where it came, watching as it slammed into the turbolaser and up into the ship.
Explosions sounded silently, the force causing the viewport to crack slightly. Starkiller smirked, waiting for the feeling of Juno's death to race through him, to make him more powerful. But it never came.
An icy vein of fear ran through him as he saw the escape pod jettison. He felt Juno's presence aboard, and raised his hand to grab her, but his energy was exhausted from his earlier feat, and he watched helplessly as Juno kicked the experimental pod's hyperdrive into gear, escaping.
Fear turned to rage as the remainder of the Rogue Shadow burst into a ball of flame that was soon sucked out of existence by the vacuum of space. He would find her. He wouldn't sleep until he had her dead at his feet.
The Emperor turned towards Starkiller, disappointment showing on his warped face.
"In time, my apprentice" he rasped.
Starkiller seethed, grinding his teeth, metal twisting around him as the Force responded to his hate.
The Emperor's mouth twitched in an almost-smirk. The raw power Starkiller possessed pleased him greatly. He proceeded back to his throne, seeming to almost float into it, hands placed on the armrests at his sides.
"For now, I wish for you to retrace your steps. Find all those who would defy me, and end them" he snarled, mouth contorted in a vile sneer. Starkiller brought his rage down to a simmer, bowing.
"Yes, Master." He said, voice low.
He walked across the throne room and down the platform leading out of it. As he passed, he spotted a group of Royal Guards below, dragging away the lifeless corpse of Darth Vader. Starkiller's pride swelled as he saw the remains of his tormentor being dragged away. He may still be a servant, but his Master was more powerful than Vader ever was. And if his act of killing both the Sith Lord and Kota on the same day proved anything, it's that things change.
One day, Starkiller would be his own Master, and then nothing would stop him.
Starkiller made his way down to the hanger, through vast corridors and long, dimly-lit halls until he made it to the tall, imposing doors labeled Hanger Alpha-457. Stepping inside, he glanced briefly down the rows of TIE fighters until he spotted what he was looking for. Making his way down the line, he used the Force to lower the hatch of a Lambda-class T-4a shuttle, traveling up it into the interior.
Before entering the cockpit, Starkiller hooked left, remembering this class of shuttle's insides from the rigorous testing Vader had forced him to undertake in the classification and identification of all Imperial vessels. He entered a small room, with a small closet and folded-up bed inserted along the wall. Opening the closet, Starkiller grabbed a spare Imperial pilot's uniform from inside, folding out the bed and laying it out. He skipped the helmet, the sleek blackness of its surface reminding him too much of his deceased Master, bringing his rage to a low boil as he glanced at it on the shelf.
He began to strip his battle-worn Jedi robes, tearing at them with no thought of preservation. They were a sign of his old life, his weak life. He planned to toss them into an incinerator and watch them burn.
A few moments later, Starkiller stepped into the cockpit, donned in his new attire; standard-issue black shirt, pants and belt, with leather gloves and shined boots, the only break in the black the square panel on his chest, meant to regulate the helmet's oxygen intake, but without it, the panel was merely decorative.
Starkiller sat in the pilot chair, flicking a few switches to prime the engines, and tapping a few keys to transmit the take-off sequence to the control tower nestled in the left corner of the hanger. When his code was cleared, he began to make his exit, carefully sliding the shuttle into space.
He punched in hyperspace coordinates that would take him to Bespin. Garm Bel-Iblis was rallying support for the Rebellion there when Starkiller had arrived to rescue him. He would start his hunt there.
He would kill every last Rebellion-supporter he had enlisted, and then… he would destroy the Emperor.