Chapter 3: Blood
"Stormtroopers." Aang said, not stuttering.
"The sith are going to start another war. We need to report this now." Exar said, starting to rush.
"Shouldn't we at least try to stop the production?" Jo asked.
"For one thing: there is no try. Second: I wouldn't see a point in it. Can you see those troopers?" Exar pointed to a small window, and there, they saw group of at least thirty stormtroopers. " They come from that room." He pointed to a doorway on the wall, "We'd have to go over there in order to stop the could spot us going across that room and have us dead within minutes. We need reinforcements." Exar explained.
Aang followed Exar to get reinforcements, but Jo stayed. He stared at the troopers for a second, then gasped. He pulled out his comm.
"Guys, get back here, you should see this." He said.
Only seconds later, they were back.
"Don't those soldiers look the least bit familiar to you?" Jo asked them. It took them a moment for them to see it.
"Oh." Aang muttered.
Beep beep. Aang picked up his comlink and answered, "Aang, here."
"Hey, it's Rye. We sensed a slight shift in the force just now. Is something up?" He asked.
"Um, yes. The sith is, or are, creating another stormtrooper army. And not only that, these soldiers kinda look like you and Erickson." Aang replied. Then there was a moment of silence.
...
...
"How are we receiving a good signal here?" Jo asked, breaking the silence.
"Quiet, Jo." Exar told him.
"Well, have we ever told you about our descendants?" Rye asked.
"No, not really." Aang replied.
"My wife and I have a son and two daughters. Sam, Rachell, and Norrah. Erickson and his wife have one daughter and one son. Brett and Anna. Brett got a job a while back, but never said where. I guess we know now." Rye explained, obviously worried.
"Well since this is Erickson's son, we'll definitely bring him back." Exar spoke into the comm.
"Erickson will be pleased, and disappointed." Rye said.
"Hey, um, are any of your children force-sensetive?" Jo asked.
"Yes, all are. But luckily, Brett doesn't use it much." Rye replied.
"That is good." Exar said.
"And convenient." Jo added.
"Ok. Thanks for the heads up. We'll get going." Aang said, clipping his comlink to his belt.
The team ran into the next room, which luckily didn't have a window. It was a laboratory.
"Okay guys, see if you can find anything good." Exar said. The team searched the room. Jo was just looking at mechanical stuff and ended up finding blaster prototypes, while Exar and Aang were looking through boxes. They found a small one containing two beakers with blood samples in them. One was under 'Brett' and the other was under 'Clone'.
"Lucky find." Aang said, picking up the two samples and giving them to Joe to hide them in his arms.
"Those really come in handy." Exar said.
"Yep. Let's find Brett." Aang said.
The team entered the next room and found stairs. They heard a strange sound emitting from below the stairway.
"That could be it." Exar said.
They descended on the stairway into a control room. Jo ran over to a control panel and pulled up a holographic 'chart' with stats and information about Brett.
"Not bad. Good fighter, works out, he's fairly young. He'd really make a good soldier. Good choice for one to clone." Exar said.
"Guys, next door." Jo said.
They went through, yet again, another door, and saw a newly produced cloning machine. They saw Brett, asleep somewhat, in a containment tube and another identical one next to it. The Jedi trio sensed a dark-force aura, but not coming from Brett.
They saw Brett start to glow for a minute, then it faded. It reappeared in the other containment tube, and a clone appeared in it. Then the tube descended downwards to a room below it.
"Has technology advanced this much and we never knew?" Exar asked.
"Apparently. Galaxy S8's and 3D printers." Jo replied.
"I do not recognize this kind of tech. I know some of the smartest and people in the galaxy and have never seen anything like this. The most advanced they've seen is the machine I've showed you guys." Aang said. "All I can say is... is that this may be from a different galaxy." Aang stated.
'Foreign technology that no one understands. Sounds familiar.' Jo thought.
"We need to get him out of there." Exar said.
"On it." Jo said.
He plugged into a control panel, looking for a way to get him out of the tube.
"Dang, this dude has so many followers." Jo stated quietly.
"Jo! Focus!" Aang ordered.
"Okay, okay. Mr. Bossy." Jo replied before hacking into the diagram. 'Got it.' He thought. "Well, the only way to get him out of there, that was revealed to me, is to pull him out of there. But I'll have to be very gentle and very careful." Jo told them.
"That is nearly the oppisite of you." Aang said.
Jo slowly started pulling Brett out of the tube, then he just jerked his hand back. Brett was woken when he hit the ground.
"JO, HOW WAS THAT GENTLE?" Exar freaked out.
"Exactly." Aang muttered.
"Huh? What! What happened? What did you do?" Brett asked also starting to freak out.
"We, sir, stopped you from doing something that would help start another war." Exar answered, trying to be a smart-alec.
"We'd like to know what exactly you were doing and who told you to do this." Aang said.
"I was doing the master's bidding. If I stopped..." Brett slid his finger across his throat.
"Why would he want to put his finger ac-?" Exar started asking, but was interrupted by Jo.
"Ah! Exar! Don't finish that quote! It'll be too obvious-" Jo said.
"Obvious to what?" Exar asked.
"Nevermind." Jo said.
Aang and Brett were watching them briefly going back and forth. "Charming." Brett said, making Aang chuckle and say, "Proceed with your answer."
"I was kidnapped and forced to do this. I had to tell my dad that I got a job and that I probably wouldn't see him for a while." Brett explained. "I was immediately put to work here." He walked over to the tube and stared. "And was told that if I encountered Jedi, to do this." Brett said, right before pushing a button that made the ground tilt from under the Jedi. They slid down into the room holding the stormtroopers. They all turned towards them.
"Oh darn." Exar said.
"Relax. Stormtroopers couldn't hit a sleeping bantha in a herd." Jo said right before he threw a heavy-gravity detonator towards the group. A few ducked, but one directly shot it.
"Ok I take that back." Jo said.
The troopers cocked their blasters and approached them.
Exar pulled out his double-sided blue lightsaber, Jo ignited two orange lightwhips from his mechanical wrists, and Aang pulled out two green and two blue lightsabers.
Then the light show began. Lasers went flying all over and were being deflected back. There were not many open moments to strike, but when there were, they took them. They swung forward and struck down the troops in front of them. The three split up into three different areas of the room so they could take on the split-up troops easily.
As they split up, the stormtroopers whipped out their Z6 Riot Control Batons and charged.
-Aang-
Aang took a stance and clashed with four troopers. Then he twisted around, knocking them off balance, and flipped over them and swung 360 degree lightsaber spin, striking down all the troopers behind and ahead of him. He looked up, face-to-face with one trooper, retracted three of his blades, and poised with the one he had open.
"This should be fun." He said while laughing.
They charged and both did a downward strike, clashing and holding their blades in place. They exchanged a surprising amount of strikes, vastly amusing Aang. They locked blades again, then Aang pulled out another blade and stabbed his shin, making him stumble down. Aang used the force to make him knock over some of the other troopers.
Aang jumped, just as two troopers were charging at him, making them hit each other, and landed beside Exar
"How you holding up?" Exar asked.
"As well as I can be. I haven't done anything like this in years." Aang replied as they both struck down a trooper.
-Exar-
Exar held up as well as Aang did during the fight.
"How you holding up?" He asked as Aang jumped over to him.
"As well as I can be. I haven't done anything like this in years." Aang replied as they both struck down a trooper.
Aang helped Exar fend off a few troops, then jumped back to his spot.
Three troopers charged at Exar, swinging their batons around. Exar held his stance and waited. As they got close enough, Exar jumped over them, slicing one of the batons in half, spinning and stabbing one of the stormtroopers, and using the force to make the other two pass out. Then he got an idea.
"Aang, Jo!" He called out. They turned and looked at him. Jo, without diverting his gaze from Exar, cut some troopers in half with his whips, which was pretty much all he did in this fight.
Exar held up three fingers and they got the message. As the remaining stormtroopers picked up shields that were hanging up on the wall and approached them, the Jedi outstretched their arms and practically slammed them down on the ground, performing a huge force-repulse.
They waited a few moments and the troopers didn't move.
"Well that was fun." Jo said.
"It felt good getting practice back, but I wouldn't call this fun. It's distressful to me, but I have no choice but to do it." Aang said. "But back in the day, I always did it. This does bring back memories."
"Okay, now we should find Brett and bring him back." Exar said.
They hopped up to the floor above and exited the facility, back into the hallways.
"Jo, can you find him?" Aang asked. Jo nodded and went to a plugin and inserted one of his mechanical fingers into it, and accessed the cameras. He now saw what the cameras saw.
Okay, who the force designed an outlet to hack into security systems?" Jo asked aloud.
"No time for this, Jo." Aang said.
"He just went outside. It's not far." Jo said.
The team hurried down a few halls, tracking Brett's force signature to catch him. They found him trying to escape with his C-Wing fighter.
Jo pulled back a part of his cloak, revealing an extra patch of metal on his arm. The patch detached from him, turned itself upright, and revealed itself to be a drone. It flew towards Brett and started firing stun blasts at him.
Brett noticed it when it almost hit him; he pulled out his blaster and started firing back. Exar used the force to hold him still so Joe's drone could stun him.
When it did, Aang used the force to pull him over to them. He had Brett rest over his shoulder so he could call Rye. He took out his comm and opened his channel, waiting for a response.
"Rye here. What news?" Rye asked.
"We caught Brett and stopped the production of cloned stormtroopers." Aang replied.
"That is good. You may have saved the galaxy from another disastrous war." Rye said.
"I wouldn't get my hopes up. The sith don't need an army for a war." Exar said.
"What would they need one for?" Jo asked.
"We'll talk about that when you get back." Rye said.
"Got it. We'll be back in a few." Aang said.
Brett got placed in his C-Wing. Aang and Joe guarded him, waiting for Exar to return with his starfighter. He came around, a few minutes later, with Jo and Aang's fighters connected, and connected Brett's fighter to the bottom of his.
Jo and Aang got in their starfighters and they all sped away from Kamino.
Exar saw that Joe was watching something, and suddenly got curious.
"What are you doing Jo?" Exar asked.
"I placed a small security camera droid in his fighter and am now watching him." Jo replied.
Moments later, Brett started groaning. He sat up straight and saw that he was in hyperspace. He started freaking out.
"Huh? What? AH! WHERE AM I?! WHAT'S HAPPENING?" He asked aloud.
"Hey you guys, he's up." Jo commed the others.
"Well well. Jo, did you plan something in case that happened?" Exar asked, looking over at the screen Joe had up.
"I did." Jo replied. He pressed a button, and a dart came from nowhere and tacked him, making him pass out.
Exar was staring at the screen for a moment, wide-eyed. Then he turned back and faced forward. "Nice Jo." he said in a monotone.
Brett woke up, strapped to a table. He looked up and saw the Jedi trio and his dad, Erickson.
"Welcome back, son." Erickson said.
"Um... Hi." Brett replied.
"Before I inform my wife, your mother, I'd like to know why you were making a cloned stormtrooper army." He informed Brett.
"I told your Jedi friends that I can't tell you. I thought that they'd tell you." Brett replied.
"They did." Erickson said with a non-changing expression.
'You say 'Jedi friends' as if it's supposed to be an insult.' Jo thought.
"But something worse will happen if you don't confess." Exar said.
"Woah, woah, calm down. Don't need to threaten him like that" Aang said, a little shocked.
"Yeeeah. Show him your true colors, Exar." Jo said, excitedly.
Exar facepalmed, "I meant to the galaxy." He said.
"Oh."
Then Exar reached his hand out and probed Brett's mind.
"You... were forced by a... um... oh! That's not a sith... That... oh no." Exar stopped and stepped back.
"Exar. What did you see?" Erickson asked.
"It was a sith, but wasn't. Not exactly. It's far more powerful. In older days, I often visited an old library. It still stands and is accessible. It contained, might still contain, ancient documents that date back tens of thousands of years. There are some documents that contain information about beings like this. It might contain the answers we need. Let's go." Exar explained, before running off. Aang and Jo followed.
They reached their starfighters, then Rye and Erickson called out, "Team!" The trio turned towards them
"May the force be with you." Rye said.
"You too." Aang replied.
They jumped into their fighters, lifted off, connected, and entered hyperspace. The biggest journey of Exar Sunrider, Aang, and Jo, had just begun.