Chapter 3

Doing a brief check on the Rogue Shadow has helped me incredibly.

Like Ahsoka once said, there's always a bit of truth in Legends.

In my check of history in the built-in datapad on the Rogue Shadow, I have decided to investigate the baby Ludi case, about how the Jedi were sued for claiming a child without the permission of the mother. It may seem a helpless, but it can tell me if some things happened as I thought they did.

Seeing the report coming up, I feel a thrill of success. Okay, so the Jedi were actually sued in galactic history, and the Emperor even had spread that old case to bring about propaganda on one of his many Empire's days seven years after Revenge of the Sith to paint the Jedi in a far more negative light.

EU Palpatine is indeed more devious and powerful. Despite how many others try to tell me, I just couldn't see Sidious the same as I once saw him in Rise of Skywalker, and to be fair the same could be said for Dark Empire. But given the Plagueis novel retconned the Dark Empire, that story was amendable.

Expelling the thought about how horribly his return was dealt with in both the older variant of the EU and Disney Canon, I did a report on Ahsoka Tano. The 2008 Clone Wars definitely contradicted much of the EU, but them - season 1 through 6 - were much of Lucas's work. It was an untold rule amongst Star Wars fans that anything Lucas referred to as Canon was Canon, regardless of that incompetent company's shitty retcons.

Once yet again the report comes up, I see that her last known sighting was on a Venator, having been gunned down during Order 66.

I did another one on Maul who also disappeared at the end of the Clone Wars, though there hasn't been an actual confirmation of the Zabrak's death.

Okay, so George Lucas's Clone Wars it is, and while I may have disagreed with some things, its his project that deserved respect - that much I shall give him always.

On that note, does Star Wars: Rebels still play a factor?

Doing a check on the names: Kanan Jarrus and Ezra Bridger, I see that they both are confirmed enemies of the Empire and there are heavy bounties on their heads. Okay, so they exist too. In some ways, I could have been sent to dispatch both of them.

However, given Vader has been toying with them and only held back due to events & when he sensed Snips, I can understand why that didn't happen.

That corporate company can actually do some things right after all, whenever they were not making pointless contradictions against the true continuity.

I thought about researching the Emperor's Hands as I was a massive Mara Jade fan in my other life, but most likely Sidious wouldn't have a report about them given they are a secretive organization sent to dispatched. Sidious needed Dark Side adepts for his own and they need to be completely loyal to himself and to do task. He wouldn't want Vader to gain some advantage to overthrow him during his journeys during his missions. They also served as someway a spy for Vader and any Rebel cells. After all he doesn't want Vader find a powerful Force artifact that could potentially best him. Sometimes, one of the most powerful Sith Lord needs an absolutely loyal and powerful Dark Side adepts to do some work for him.

Their nonexistence would make Sidious just a complete and utter fool, two qualities that he simply would never be, given the old bastard managed to twist the Old Republic into a Galactic Empire, and completed a 10 century Grand Plan.

Damn it, this musing I have a tendency to do is not helping my case in the slightest, not with the coexisting knowledge of the Expanded Universe and Disney Canon, but fuck all I'm trying!

There has to be some way for me to find out which continuity I mainly am in. I know I am Galen Marek but still the events of the Force Unleashed don't exactly contradict Star Wars Rebels.

Wait a minute, has there been any sign of the Vong?

George Lucas helped with those books after all.

I once read about Maul once killing a Vong a year before the Naboo's invasion, yet I highly doubt there is any report on that. Why would Sidious boast about his failed Sith Apprentice in public knowing that it would raise unnecessary complications?

That didn't prevent me from checking the Mandalorian Wars, Jedi Civil Wars, Dark Wars, and countless other conflicts of the EU past. Of course I know that history that long ago can't be all too accurate with how they happened but there are still reports. Revan, Bastila, and the crew of the Ebon Hawk exist, as do plenty of events from the Old Republic. The Padawan massacre. The sacking of Coruscant. And so much more.

Yeah no, not reading all that aside from the common summaries on the very top.

Does it really matter currently? Given what I am planning to do, I am going to be changing the future already. It is irrelevant really about which continuity I'm in and I have a feeling this happened for some reason. I may not understand it all, but it just has to be.

With rationality striking me the size of getting run over by a garbage truck, I walk to the cockpit where Juno is sitting in the pilot seat. She's refreshingly light despite how loyal she is to the Empire. I can't say the same for myself. I try to be a good person, but I do have dark qualities in general, and the Dark Side pulsing around my fingertips is not helping.

Can the Dark Side be controlled, or would I have to renounce it entirely for some semblance? The Ying-yang approach written in fanfiction was quite common among Star Wars fans, but this is reality, and it feels like this darkness wants to suck me over completely, only held back by my own will to keep fighting - reminding me of when I went through addiction struggles throughout my teen years.

Them assholes at school didn't quell my dark instincts.

If my other self ever sees those fools who I thought were my friends again... well hopefully he can contain the darkness within, prevent it from overwhelming him...

Shutting down those thoughts now, I decide to make myself known to my favorite pilot as I walk to the cockpit, the door opening.

"Juno-"

"Captain." She corrects pointedly, keeping her composure.

I arch an eyebrow.

"It's Captain Eclipse," she continues in the same tone.

"Only in public. In private, I prefer we be something more than just allies." I reply.

"You're Vader's agent. It would be insubordination if I refer or view to you as anything else aside professionally." Juno replies tightly.

I walk up and shake my head, gently turning the chair around with the Force. I'm getting use to this! "I have a different tolerance than Vader." Deciding to clue her in to lay out some form that contributes to the seeds of our future companionship, I tell her by getting closer and now I am practically towering over her. Oh fuck.

Something powerful shoots through me, and I can feel nothing but an adrenaline rush. She's outright hot and I definitely can understand why the original Starkiller would have fallen for her. I can even see a bit of her cleavage behind the black jumpsuit.

Instead of giving into hormonal thoughts, I put my hand on her cheek. Not yet. "My real name is Galen Marek."

"Galen," she tastes the name on her lips, evidently shocked how much I am revealing about myself. She makes a little sniff that I would have perhaps found irritating from any other girl in any other life. "It's fitting for you."

"It was the name denied to me throughout my training. Vader was persistent I shed my former identity." I declare, and there is actually a hint of bitterness within me, directed at the Sith. The shadows of whom I claimed this body from have a deep-rooted anger to Darth Vader.

"He actually trained you to be like that?!" she exclaims, evidently shocked and even a bit of outrage. Juno by nature is a very good person. Many Imperials are, despite believing in the Empire, at least in the EU continuity...

"I have had doubts about the Empire for quite a while to be frank with you, captain," I reply with a shake of my head. "The reason why I'm telling you all this is because I can sense that you don't agree with everything that the Empire do."

"The Empire fights for a better galaxy," Juno emptily protests like a drone instead dog a human. "Any insurgents who fight against the Empire are terrorists and they must be dealt with accordingly."

"The Empire is far from the system it makes itself out to be," I declare, stone-face.

"Are you not to carry out assignments for the Empire?" She questions pointedly.

"Hardly for the betterment of the system. I have massacred innocents who hardly posed a threat." I admit with a slight scoff, a memory coming to life about the original Starkiller killing a helpless whelp with a Force choke at only the age of thirteen many years back. "The Empire is a tyrannical system, and even the loyalist senators would not even try to hide that much."

Juno opens her mouth only to close it again, unable to come up with any response at this point in time. Fortunately, she didn't have to, for PROXY walks in at that moment.

Moving away from her, I move to the back and find the droid's deactivator and turn him off before PROXY ever even realize what hit him.

"What are you doing?" Juno asks, surprised by my actions as she stands up, hand traveling to her blaster on instinct alone.

I smirk. "Are you seriously thinking about shooting at the person who you're assigned to assist, my lovely lady?" My expression becomes more serious. "PROXY serves Lord Vader and would continue to try to kill me. It is in his programming, but I plan to alter any threat to me. Inform me when we arrive to Nar Shaddaa."

Juno obviously is lost for words but with a brief wink from myself she decides to not argue even further as she has her duties. In the meantime, I would have to reprogram PROXY to be my loyal droid as HK-47 was for Revan.

Fortunately, being an apprentice to Vader has left memories of myself about engineering.

I would have to subtly handle whatever trackers Vader may have put on this ship as well.