With his brow furrowed even more than usual, the Emperor scanned the list of the most important Jedi, which he had compared with the casualty list of the clone commanders, while Vader waited in a humble posture for his master to address him.
"You and the clone commanders did a good job, Lord Vader..." Sidious said approvingly.
Vader breathed a sigh of relief. He was embarrassed that the Emperor could now so clearly notice his breathing through the breathing mask. But he also knew that Palpatine knew him too well to fool his new master.
"But what about Jedi Master Shaak Ti? She's been in the temple since Grievous' attack, right? Why didn't you execute her there?" he asked his new appentice inquisitively.
"She … is not with you, my master?" asked Vader, taken aback.
"I asked you, Vader! "So again - where is Shaak Ti?" asked Sidious sharply.
"She fell under Order 69," replied Vader angrily.
"Order 69? What nonsense are you telling me, Vader?!" Palpatine snorted angrily.
"Commander Shade claimed to be carrying out Order 69 when he led Shaak Ti out of the temple. And Commander Appo has confirmed the correctness of his actions. I saw no reason to doubt the statements of the two commanders," Vader defended himself.
"You should have consulted with me, Vader!" barked Sidious angrily. "Either these clones tricked you like they did on Murkhana, or there is something we don't yet know about the clones. After all, Shaak Ti trained and looked after them on Kamino for years. Maybe she had some kind of... reassurance in case something happened," Sidious thought aloud.
"That would be possible, Master. Commander Appo told me that Shade and his men were running an emergency subroutine implanted on Kamino with Order 69. And since this programming…"
"Vader, you will search for and hunt down Shaak Ti!" Sidious interrupted him harshly. "The same goes for Mace Windu, whose body has not yet been found following the incident in my office. And it applies to any other Jedi you come across. There are no exceptions to Order 66, implanted on Kamino or not, except for one."
"And that would be?" Vader asked sonorously.
"If you find Ashla, bring her to me immediately," ordered the Emperor.
"May I ask what you plan to do with her?" Vader asked his master.
"By the way, Darth Plagueis's real name was Hego Damask," Palpatine replied instead of answering.
"Your former friend? Ashla's father – a Sith Lord? Does Shaak Ti know that?" a surprised Vader blurted out.
"Well, it's up to you to find out, my apprentice," Palpatine stated with a meaningful look.
Anakin looked at the Sith Lord in front of him, stunned.
"I will bring Ashla to you, Master," Vader promised, but his Master's look at him was one in a skeptical wait.
༺═────────────═༻
Mace Windu and Ashla sat in an apartment rented under a false name in the lower levels of Coruscant, waiting for Master Yoda to return. Mace Windu finally received the call he had been waiting for. They met a little further away from the temple. Yoda looked worried.
"What happened, Master?" asked Mace Windu.
Yoda told Mace Windu about what had happened on Kashyyyk. How the clone troopers had turned against him. How he had returned to Coruscant to find the Jedi Temple deserted and desolate. Then from his walk into the Senate - into Palpatine's office: "Make the Chancellor pay - I couldn't. Too weak in a duel with him – I was," Yoda confessed to the other two Jedi.
Mace Windu and Ashla supplemented this information with what they had experienced in and outside Palpatine's office.
Unconcealed grief rose in Yoda's green eyes as he told Mace Windu. "Nothing more except hide - do we can. Individually or so that no one as Jedi - recognize us can - until better times will come," the Grand Master issued the new instruction.
"What about Master Obi-Wan Kenobi? "Shouldn't he be on his way here from Utapau?" asked Mace Windu.
"Safe - Obi-Wan is. An order from me - he does fulfill - just like you. Take care of Ashla - you will, in a place where Jedi - never have been," the green Grandmaster gave Mace Windu his last order.
"By the Force - I will make Ashla a Jedi Knight!" Mace Windu promised.
He and Ashla watched the small spaceship, that took Yoda away from Coruscant. Two hours later, their own unregistered ship took off from Coruscant.
"I want Palpatine dead!", Ashla growled angrily. "He acted so kindly to me, Anakin and Ahsoka in his office back then. No, he was so secretly mean to Ahsoka that time, if I remember correctly."
Windu looked earnestly. "In the aftermath, I can see too many hints at Palpatine's true nature. "So what was between Ahsoka and Palpatine that day?"
Ashla shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know his words exactly anymore. But he praised me in a way that made Ahsoka standing in a not so bright light. He planned all of this so that she would disappear from the Order," Ashla explained, while the two Jedi looked down at the capital planet one last time.
"I want to take down Palpatine too. Just like I almost did it the day before yesterday. But you are still very young. And now that the situation has become so unclear and the Jedi Order has become illegal, we must be careful, Ashla!" her master warned her.
"We can't go to my home planet Haruun Kal; everyone knows me there. On yours, however, the Empire's henchmen will surely be waiting for us. So where should we fly to?" Mace Windu asked his young padawan.
"You're asking me?"
Mace Windu's mouth turned slightly upwards. "I have already finished my training. I can complete yours wherever it is safe and convenient for you."
Ashla thought for a moment.
"I'm only twelve years old. Maybe you should take a break from fighting for now. I've always wanted to study mathematics in Weogar on Clak'dor VII," she suddenly blurted out. "The Bith have a very good university there. You could pretend to be my stepfather and get a job there, and then we can continue planning how to resurrect the Jedi later. We've never been to Clak'dor VII before, so if we enter with fake passports, they won't know us there."
"And there weren't any Jedi there, at least as far as I can remember - just like Master Yoda wanted," Mace Windu agreed.
Ashla's black eyes shone. "But first I want to see my mother on Shili again."
To her amazement, Mace Windu had no objection to such a visit. So they headed for Shili. It took Ashla a while to find the street where her grandmother still lived. The now sixty-year-old woman was extremely happy to be able to hug Ashla again.
"You got Ashla pretty late," Mace Windu said to the black-eyed Togruta with large montrals, which were even larger than Shaak Ti's.
"Yes, I was already forty-seven when I got her," she replied.
"What do you know about my father?" Ashla asked her bluntly.
"Oh, that was a once-in-a-lifetime encounter," the grandmother evaded her question.
"What did he look like?" Ashla asked.
"I don't want to talk about it now," said the grandmother seriously.
"Oh, was he that bad?" Mace Windu wondered.
"One can't say that," replied the old Togruta.
"But you must know something about him, mother. I know you're keeping something from me. Now the Jedi Order no longer exists. So you can tell me," Ashla continued, while Mace Windu shot her an askew look because of her words.
"My child, I have never seen him," her grandmother began to reveal the big secret.
"Did you have yourself artificially inseminated?" Ashla asked.
"No, my child. I am not your mother, but your grandmother. Your real mother is my daughter Shaak Ti," the grandmother dropped the bombshell.
Mace Windu and Ashla looked at their grandmother, then at each other, shocked.
"Now I understand everything," Ashla said quietly. "And she always acted as if I was a normal youngling like the others. This is… outrageous!" she blurted out.
"Shaak Ti only followed the Jedi code by forsaking family ties." Mace Windu defended his Jedi sister. "She gave you a chance when your potential was discovered."
"She or Master Plo Koon? It was him, who took me from Shili back then!" Ashla replied defiantly.
"But Ashla, what's that supposed to mean? After all, the other young men also grew up in the temple without a father or mother. And? Did it harm them?" Mace Windu asked his padawan.
"Well, after Order 66, I'm not so sure anymore," she said sarcastically. "But at least now I know who my father was."
Mace Windu and the revealed grandma looked at her in shock.
"It's this Hego Damask that she talked about every chance she got. She even scolded Ahsoka when she said that when she was three years old, she spit on his ventilator mask in front of Qui-Gon. She almost freaked out. You should have seen that!"
"When you were giving birth, my daughter told me that your father was a businessman who she had only watched over for one night. Whatever he and she meant by that."
"Damask financed the clone army, which Shaak Ti later supervised as a trainer and in matters of health," said Mace Windu bitterly. "That's a strange coincidence. I wonder how she died when she was surprised by the clones in the temple?"
"We don't know yet whether she was even killed," Ashla replied optimistically.
"She was very weakened by General Grievous' attack. It would have to have been a miracle that she of all people survived this massacre by Darth Vader in the temple. She was almost only in her room," Mace Windu objected.
The two women remained silent. Mace Windu had the spontaneous feeling that it would be better not to have said his last sentence.
༺═────────────═༻
After two days, Master and Padawan flew on to Clak'dor VII, the home planet of the Bith species. The capital, Weogar, lay under a transparisteel dome to keep the inhabitants away from the inhospitable atmosphere that had become unbreathable since the bio-chemical war the Bith waged among themselves several centuries ago. The university complex consisted of many cube-shaped buildings, which stood in a strictly diagonal arrangement on the precisely square university grounds. After Ashla enrolled, she looked at the mathematics faculty building, studied the notices on the bulletin board, and immediately found an offer to rent a small apartment that would be suitable for two people. When she called, she was lucky. The apartment near the university was still available.
There was also a notice on the bulletin board advertising people to apply for a scholarship. Ashla also did this immediately at the university's holo-terminal. Meanwhile, Mace Windu was looking for work and soon he found a position as a building guard at the Ministry of Justice. There were a lot of off-worlders in this profession and so he didn't stand out among the motley crowd of his colleagues who were also from outside the planet.
After a week, Ashla received a letter. She opened it and immediately rushed to her master in the living room.
"I have been awarded a scholarship from the Rugess Nome Foundation for the entire course of my studies. That's a thousand credits every month!" she said happily.
"Do you know who this Dr. Rugess Nome is?" asked Mace Windu.
"A famous engineer and spacecraft designer during the time of the Republic," Ashla replied as if from a blaster.
"You have informed yourself well," said Windu approvingly.
"Dr. Rugess Nome used to organize business and visionary conferences on the moon Sojourn with my father. Of course I know him," replied Ashla, proud that she now knows so much about her dead father.
"Good grief, back when the last conference of this kind took place, I was still a Padawan. How old was your father when he fathered you?" Mace Windu asked his padawan.
"Ninety-one years," Ashla replied cheerfully, while Mace Windu's mouth fell open at the answer.
"I'll go to the foundation tomorrow and fill out and sign some papers there, then I'll have free time," Ashla explained cheerfully, did a few more math calculations, then went to bed.
The next morning, Ashla showed up at the Rugess Nome Foundation building at eight o'clock sharp. An older Muun woman opened the door for her. Her face was already quite wrinkled, but her green eyes radiated unbroken youth. But what amazed Ashla most was her charisma in the Force. She immediately disguised her own Force presence so as not to reveal herself as a Force user.
"Hello, I'm Vesta Nome. So you're Ashla," the woman asked her kindly.
"Yes, I am," Ashla replied cheerfully.
The old woman gave Ashla a chair at a round table; then she herself sat down opposite the girl and offered her young guest biscuits and tea.
"What school in Coruscant did you go to? I don't see any references here," the woman asked Ashla after sipping her teacup.
"That was the Eixes Valorum High School, which was completely destroyed during General Grievous' attack three months ago. Just like our house. That's why I no longer have any documents," explained the young Togruta.
"Ah I understand. You have stated your father and mother here. Which of the two is the Muun?" asked the old Muun woman Ashla, looking at her overly long index and middle fingers.
"On the form, that's just my stepfather. My real father was the Muun. He died before I was born," said Ashla, who was unprepared for the question.
"Do you know what your father's name was?" the head of the Rugess Nome Foundation asked.
"Hego Damask," Ashla said quietly.
"Then you are my granddaughter. I am Hego Damask's mother and I manage his … friend's heritage," the Muun explained.
"Dr. Rugess Nome died a long time before Hego Damask," Ashla replied to distract from her family, but the old Muun was not deterred.
"Is your mother here on Clak'dor VII too?"
"She lives on Shili," Ashla said in monosyllables.
"How did the two of them meet?," Ashla's other grandmother continued to research. "Hego hadn't told me anything about a Togruta."
"Oh, I don't really know," Ashla replied evasively.
"My child, I sense a conflict within you. You are my granddaughter. You have nothing to fear from me."
Ashla considered. The Muuns weren't exactly known as friends of the Jedi. She couldn't put her master in danger. On the other hand, Hego Damask had certainly been a friend of the Jedi if he had been with Shaak Ti...
"She had been guarding him during a night. And that's what happened. And the next night he was dead," Ashla said quietly.
"Then she was a bodyguard. As far as I know, he always relied on the Echani Sun Guard. There were no Togruta there," wondered Hego Damask's mother.
"She wasn't with the Sun Guard. She was... from another... paramilitary unit," Ashla blurted out half the truth.
"Why did you go to school on Coruscant?" her grandmother asked.
"Because of my stepfather," Ashla explained.
"So your mother remarried after your father died. And yet she is not with him, but on Shili. How come?"
"You..." Ashla lowered her montral-crowned head. "I don't want to talk about it."
"Hmmm," said Vesta Nome, cradling her bald head. "You are very strong in the Force, as I sensed even before I opened the door for you. Have you ever done anything using the Force?"
Ashla kneaded her red hands in front of her lap. "Occasionally, when no one is looking, so as not to attract attention," Ashla replied truthfully.
"Ashla, I feel something is bothering you. It's not just that you hide the Force. You also had someone who taught you that. Like your lines in the Force are also very clear and recognizable, as only found with a certain type of Force user in the galaxy. Are you a Jedi, Ashla?"
"You misunderstand…"
"There shall not be any misunderstanding between us," Vesta Nome said kindly but forcefully.
"There are no more Jedi. The order has been abolished," the girl replied, undecided about saying more.
"I didn't ask about that," Vesta Nome insisted.
Ashla looked at her with a pained look and didn't say a word.
"Do you really think that I would betray you to the Emperor just because you are a Jedi? Or maybe your stepfather, if that's him? I? Your own grandmother? Where Palpatine already killed your father? My own son?"
"What are you saying… what are you saying?" Ashla exclaimed. "How do you know?"
"Because that's what Sith apprentices always do with their masters."
"My father - a Sith...lord?" Ashla asked.
"And now that you know that, would you be kind enough to tell me about your mother?" the grandmother asked Ashla.
"It's Jedi Master Shaak Ti. But my grandmother raised me on Shili until I came to the temple."
"And after the proclamation of the Empire, you fled with your master from there – to here," concluded Vesta Nome and Ashla nodded silently.
"Now that you have told me the whole truth, I will also tell you something about your father. I didn't met Hego anymore since Dr. Nome's death, but I still knew that Palpatine was his apprentice for more than thirty standard years."
"My father – and the Emperor – Sith! As master and apprentice!" whispered Ashla, horrified.
"Yes – more family secrets," replied Vesta Nome, smiling enigmatically.
"May I ask how old you are?" Ashla asked her grandmother.
"One hundred and twenty-five years. And now that you're here, I know that growing old was worth it," Vesta Nome replied with a proud smile.
Ashla signed the papers before she went home to her master. She decided not to tell him the truth about her father for the time being. But she would find out more. She had promised her second grandmother that she would visit her again in a week. Ashla had to admit that she longed for this encounter. She hadn't known anything about her mother until recently. And she never thought she would find another living relative of her father, who was so well known and yet so unknown to her. A Muun relative with whom she could practice their language, which she had once learned in the Jedi Temple from holo-recordings and books. But Ashla also knew that Mace Windu would not be fond of this revelation about Hego Damask to her.
༺═────────────═༻
The hologram of Emperor Palpatine did not bode well, as the Kaminoan Prime Minister Lama Su suspected based on the expression on the man's face, which had suddenly become quite wrinkled.
"What can I serve, Emperor?" he asked politely and kindly.
"What do you know about Order 69?" Palpatine asked bluntly.
"I don't know anything about that. Who should this order apply to?" Lama Su asked back, apparently clueless.
"For the clone troopers of the former Republic, now my Empire!" Palpatine spat back.
"Can I ask why …?"
"Who can give me information?" the Emperor rudely interrupted Lama Su's sentence and the question it contained.
"I'll ask Ko Sai, who was responsible for programming the clones back then," the Kaminoan offered to the human.
"Connect them to me so that we can discuss this as a three-party conference!" demanded the Emperor.
"As you wish," Lama Su replied eagerly and pressed a few buttons.
"My Emperor, what can I serve with?" Ko Sai asked in a particularly amiable manner, her silver eyes sparkling at Palpatine's yellow ones.
"Who installed Order 69 in the clones? Which clones contain this order? And who has access to this order?" the Emperor rattled off his questions.
The tall Kaminoan thought for a moment. She first looked at Lama Su, who nodded in the affirmative.
"Order 69 was initiated before the Battle of Naboo. However, Sifo Dyas did not order it like Order 66, but rather it was a special request from the then boss of Damask Holdings, Hego Damask. At that time, he ordered three special comlinks through which this order can be retrieved by calling the clone commander stationed next. Order 69 states that the person making the call must be taken to safety at a location of her or his choice, without any records being kept of that location, including, of course, verbal confidentiality. Order 69 can theoretically be carried out by all clones that are called with such a comlink. However, only once, because they are all disposable comlinks. And to answer your third question: We don't know who owns these comlinks now. They are not personal. At that time we sent all three to Hego Damask," Ko Sai concluded her report.
"Do you know how many comlinks have been activated by these three so far?" Palpatine asked.
"So far, only one of these comlinks has been activated, according to our data collection," Ko Sai replied calmly.
"Can Order 69 be deactivated centrally?" asked Palpatine.
"No, Mylord. To do this, you would have to delete this programming in every single clone in the army."
"Thank you," Palpatine said, then his hologram on Kamino faded out.
Sidious walked slowly through his office. His confidant Sly Moore sat in the armchair in front of his desk.
"What do you think, Sly? Who did the old fool give the other two comlinks to?" the Emperor asked the gray-skinned Umbaran woman with naturally yellow, piercing eyes.
"I don't think he gave the other two to anyone. They're probably still somewhere in his apartment in Kaldani Tower," Sly guessed.
"I think so too. And they can rot there for all I care," replied Palpatine, laughing a diabolical laugh in which the Umbaran joined.
But as soon as Sly Moore left, he snorted in anger, so that the objects in his office began to shake and shake. His former master had actually put a special arrangement in place for his Jedi lover in order to protect Shaak Ti, who was apparently so close to him, from death by Order 66. Just like the legend of Darth Plagueis the Wise said, which he had once told the former Anakin so credibly. Darth Sidious would never have believed that the legend he had created two months ago to lure Anakin to the Dark Side would turn out to be so true. But the tragedy in that legend remained despite all this. Plagueis, the trusting old fool, had managed to save Shaak Ti from Order 66, but not himself from his own apprentice. This quintessence of tragedy elicited a thin, mean smile from the Emperor.