Chapter 4: More Chaos at Jabba's Palace

Jabba's palace

Evening - Five hours later

The attempted poisoners were revealed to be from a smaller "Business" rival of Jabbas. Needless to say, both the rival and the attempted poisoners was dealt with quite harshly. But the Republic still needed to bring Jabba's son back to him.

After saving Jabba's life, my team and I were good in his books, however that still wasn't enough to give the Republic access to Hutt space. Jabba was thankful enough to give the Republic an extra planetary rotation to bring his son to him, though.

"Mighty Jabba, I bring news of your son's whereabouts," I said, "Jedi knight Anakin Skywalker and his apprentice have retrieved him from a Separatist held facility on Teth and are on their way to Tatooine."

Jabba spoke to his protocol droid and it said, "The mighty Jabba thanks you for this update."

"You're welcome, mighty Jabba," I replied, "General Skywalker should arrive within the next few hours with your son if there are no more complications."

In retrospect, I should have known that there would be more complications. Starting with the Seppie shuttle that had just entered the atmosphere. Oh goodie, here come some traitors.

What I wasn't expecting was for Count Dooku, the leader of the Confederacy of Independent Systems, to be in that shuttle and send his greetings to Jabba with a request to land.

After wasting a precious second being surprised by his hologram appearing in Jabba's throne room, I ordered my squad to take defensive positions in a surrounding maneuver for when he stepped into the room.

"Mighty Jabba, be prepared to leave if this turns into a fight," I warned him and he pressed a few buttons on his control panel, "Now where did General Void go off to?"

General Void's POV. . .

I was meditating in the room Admiral Patton had reserved, when I felt a dark presence. I recognized it as something I had felt during the battle of Geonosis, Count Dooku's force presence.

This wasn't good. There was no way that I could fight him off without help, and the Clone commandos wouldn't be enough. Still, I needed to get to Admiral Patton to warn him.

Back to Admiral Patton. . .

"Admiral Patton," General Void yelled as he ran into the sand colored interior of Jabba's throne room, "I've sensed a dark presence arriving. It's Count Dooku!"

"Took you long enough," I said, "We saw his shuttle enter the atmosphere a few minutes ago, the commandos are in hiding spots to encircle him if he attacks." I pointed to the hiding spots of my clone commandos.

"The clones and I won't be enough to defeat Dooku," General Void said.

"I know, that's why Jabba's sent his best bounty hunters and guards to get some new gear from his treasury to protect himself." I reassured him.

"To protect himself," General Void pointed out.

"Stop complaining, General. The Count's here."

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Count Dooku was a regal man, with a lightsaber on his belt and his head held high. He was flanked by two commando droids and trailing behind them were 6 Magnaguards.

"Mighty Jabba, I bring you news of your son," Count Dooku said gravely with a light Serrenian accent. He put a holo-projector on the floor in front of Jabba, which showed Anakin and commander Tano stuffing the Huttlet into a backpack.

"Will you just let me do it?" Commander Tano asked impatiently.

"I hate Hutts." Hologram Anakin grumbled.

Oh, this looks bad. The Huttlet was crying and whining, when Count Dooku shut the hologram off.

"As you can see, it is the Jedi who have your son and are plotting against you." Count Dooku lied to the Hutt.

Jabba cursed the Jedi in Huttese, but still looked unconvinced. After all, I had saved his life earlier.

"My droid army has already initiated a rescue," The Count said, "Rest assured, mighty Jabba. Your son will be saved."

"Lies!" I yelled, officially announcing my presence to the people in the room, "The Republic found the Huttlet on Teth, guarded by battle droids of the Separatists!"

"Admiral Patton, General Void," Count Dooku greeted us calmly as we walked into the light. Then his communicator rang, and his assassin's holo-form popped up.

"The Republic had too many clone troopers, my lord. By the time we were able to find Jabba's son, Skywalker had already. . ." She paused for a moment, as if contemplating what she would say next, "killed him."

"Most unfortunate," Dooku lied, "This is a very unexpected turn of events. I take it you at least defeated the Jedi?"

"No master," The female assassin replied, "The Jedi escaped and are headed to Tatooine."

"I'm sure you did the best you could." Dooku narrowed his eyes, "We will discuss your failure later."

"Yes, my master," the assassin replied, and the hologram shut off.

Jabba spoke to his protocol droid and it said, "Glorious Jabba demands to know why the Jedi would dare come to Tatooine."

Count Dooku said as if it was obvious, "To kill you, Jabba. The Jedi plot is quite clear now." Jabba raised an eye at this. "They only promised to rescue your son to win your trust. Now Skywalker is coming here to finish his true mission. . . To wipe out the entire Hutt clan. If it pleases you, mighty Jabba, this time I will deal with Skywalker personally." Count Dooku said as his magnaguards stepped forward and ignited their electro staffs.

I applauded slowly, stepping forward even more, "A wonderful presentation Count, but the Huttlet is on his way here. Mighty Jabba, perhaps you could send in some of your trusted men to see if the Huttlet is truly in our ship? I believe it is a Correllian G9 Rigger class light freighter."

Jabba spoke to his protocol droid and it said, "The wise Jabba agrees with you, Admiral, and will send two of his best men to confirm that the Republic has his son. He will see who is telling the truth."

"Then you leave me no choice," Count Dooku said as he and his droids prepared their weapons and attacked.

"Open fire!" I yelled to my commandos, who surrounded the droids. Jabba flipped a switch and his throne descended into a tunnel and a ray shield activated in its place.

Jabba's palace erupted in a flurry of blue and red laser bolts as General Void engaged Count Dooku in a heated duel.

I took out my DH-17's and blasted the commando closest to me, rendering it crippled with a few shots to the head. 18 more commando droids appeared from around us and ran through Jabba's mercenaries, slashing with vibro-swords as they went. I put one of my blasters away, picked up a. . . Cortosis Blade?! Parried a slash from a commando droid, and then shot it in the head.

My clone commandos had thrown droid poppers into the center of the room and the initial wave of droids was completely incapacitated. Jabba's men were down to 5 in number and Howler Squad's men had been injured and herded back to Jabba's throne by the 12 remaining commando droids.

I dropped the sword, shot the droids lying incapacitated in the center of the room, so that they wouldn't get up later, provided suppressive fire to relieve some of the tension on my men and dived behind cover just as the commando droids returned fire.

The E5 blasters chipped away at the table I was hiding behind. I had distracted a good third of the droids from my men. General Void was rapidly losing ground to Count Dooku and was practically running away from him when a blue lightsaber ignited behind a droid on the left flank and a green one on the right. General Skywalker had arrived.

He and his Padawan laid waste to the remaining commando droids and Anakin joined the duel. His Padawan ran back outside.

Count Dooku realized that his situation wasn't good and ran away with surprising speed for an old man, cutting through two of Jabba' remaining men, and running out of Jabba's palace.

He blew past Commander Tano, who was just walking in with the Huttlet.

"Well," I said, "That was fun."

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Jabba's palace

Fifteen minutes later

A few minutes after the battle, Jabba resurfaced with his throne and twenty heavily armed Gamorrean guards came rushing into the room. His protocol droid popped out of a corner and Commander Tano returned his son to him.

Jabba spoke to his protocol droid and it said, "The mighty Jabba thanks you once again for saving his life, Admiral Patton, and the rest of you as well." Jabba spoke again and the droid said, "The Republic will have unhindered access to the Hutt hyperspace lanes from today onward."

"One more request, mighty Jabba," I asked, "May I keep this blade?"

He spoke and his protocol droid replied, "The generous Jabba will allow you to keep your blade as a reward, Admiral."

"Thank you, now General Void and I will head back to Coruscant to deliver a fuller report."

Jabba's protocol droid put on a holo call from Coruscant. "Mighty Jabba, you have received a call from your uncle, Ziro."

Jabba told the droid to open the call and a hologram of senator Amidala popped up on screen.

"Padme?" Anakin asked.

Senator Amidala paid him no heed and said, "Greetings, honorable Jabba. I am Senator Amidala of the Galactic Congress and I have discovered a plot against you by one of your own. Your uncle will admit he conspired with Count Dooku to kidnap your son and frame the Jedi for the crime."

A hologram of Ziro the Hutt popped up and Jabba spoke to him in Huttese. I couldn't understand what they were saying but it looked like Ziro was pleading for his life, then he blamed Count Dooku in Basic.

Ziro's hologram was cut off and Senator Amidala reappeared. Jabba's protocol droid said to her, "Ziro will be dealt with by the Hutt family most severely." Senator Amidala thanked him for opening up the hyperspace lanes to the Republic and her hologram shut off.

"Whelp, I guess we're done here," I said to no one in particular, as I looked at the newly blacked walls of Jabba's throne room.

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A/N Any feedback at all is helpful. You can expect frequent updates during this month. 11/1/23 update #3