32 BBY
Sifo Dyas woke up slowly, groggily wincing in pain at the light streaming in through the window of his study. In that moment he would have made any conceivable sacrifice to simply return to sleep, but eventually gave up and pulled himself upright. He had to wait a moment for his stomach to stop churning before he tried to stand up. His toe hit an empty bottle that skittered across the floor clinking loudly on the far stone wall, and stabbing pains shot through his skull at the noise.
Feeling too sick to eat anything, he left his office with nothing in his belly but a sip of water and a headache pill. His bedroom had its own ensuite shower and bathroom, and after washing his old bones started to feel slightly more alive again. The fact that they used actual water rather than sonic showers was entirely down to the Count's demand for luxury, anything he didn't like or saw as unpleasant was, 'Beneath the dignity of a Jedi,' and in this moment Sifo was grateful for the man's high standards.
Sifo was a teacher, and even if he had just one student he didn't want to give her the false impression that he was coming apart at the seams.
After brushing his teeth to hide the smell of bile, Sifo shaved and used the toilet, before tying his hair back in a simple topknot and putting on a clean set of robes. However he felt inside, Sifo Dyas looked at himself in the mirror and all he saw was a professional, experienced Jedi Master staring back who was maybe slightly paler than usual. As long as his mental shielding was up, no one should be able to guess he'd drunk himself into a stupor the night previous.
Popping a few more breath fresheners just in case, Sifo walked across the hardwood and rug floor of his room, out into the empty halls of the Master Level. There was enough space on this floor of the Temple for a dozen Jedi Masters to stay, but so far only two of its rooms were occupied, the other belonging to Narec. Ky, being the responsible young man that he was, was already down in the Training Level working in the faculty office, typing away at his terminal.
When Sifo stepped through the door, he was grateful to see a warm caf-stim already waiting for him on the counter.
"Master Sifo." Ky greeted with a respectful bow.
"Master Narec." Sifo returned, before taking a soothing sip of the brew. "I would have thought you would be sleeping in. What time did you return last night?"
"A bit after midnight." He answered, glancing over at the time. "I made sure all the new children were introduced to their rooms and settled in. Blirtz took the night watch, and I went to sleep so I could be ready for the tour this morning."
Sifo shook his head in bemusement, impressed by the man's consistency and work ethic. Sure, Ky wasn't exactly the best swordsman in the Order, let alone the New Temple, and his connection to the force was a little on the weak side, but he was focused, socially minded, and endlessly patient. For Dooku's collection of ragtag exiles on a most likely doomed attempt to bring civilization to the lawless Outer Rim, the man was very much the lynchpin holding the whole thing together. When the knights wanted something, they spoke to Narec, not Sifo or Dooku.
In many ways, Dooku was the one who set the vision and direction for the New Temple, and Ky was the one who made it actually happen. All Sifo was really there to do was train Dooku's daughter because the Count didn't trust anyone else enough to handle it and had promised the Council he wouldn't do it himself. In his own mind, Sifo was just there to make sure Tan'ya, and by extension the Republic, was ready for what was coming.
"How'd the recruiting go?"
"Well. On Coruscant, I was able to persuade Master Cin Drallig to train Prialla in his methods of teaching younglings, so soon enough the Temple will have its first full time instructor in lightsaber forms."
"That's very good." Sifo congratulated him.
"Yeah, but it does mean we'll be a little short handed until he's satisfied she can teach each form."
"She did always enjoy lightsaber dueling." Sifo thought it was a good fit for her skill set. "Any more knights choose to join us?"
He shook his head. "Not from Coruscant, but I did manage to convince a few dozen agri corps members to come out here and see what could be done about restoring a bit more of Indinor's ecosystem. I also diverted to Corellia, and just one Green Jedi has agreed to come and help us, if only to see what we're doing here."
Despite himself, Sifo was impressed. The Green Jedi were notorious for their unorthodox ways on Coruscant, but in reality just adhered to a very different, strict orthodoxy of their own. To convince even one to part with their beloved Corellia, from whose flag they took their green moniker, demonstrated just how persuasive Ky could be.
"And the Younglings?"
"Well, before we got to Coruscant, Raxus Prime and Secundus yielded plenty of recruits. Not as many who I think will be Jedi one day, but I'd say we have at least half a dozen in there with the potential. Mandalore though..." Ky shook his head. "It was almost a complete waste of time. Even the New Mandalorians are very family focused. I couldn't convince a single mother or father to agree to their child being trained at our Temple, and I got a blaster pointed at me just trying to talk to any followers of the Old Ways. The only recruit we got from the entire sector was entirely due to Prialla."
Intrigued, Sifo took another sip of cafstim as Sifo continued the story.
"She disappeared somewhere in Sundari City, and a few hours later she called me on her communicator. Asked me to come pick her up. From Mandalore's Moon. Concordia."
Having arranged for Mandalorian instructors to oversee the Clone Army's training program, Sifo knew enough about the various different factions of that culture to know who it was that lived on Concordia. "Death Watch? She was abducted by Death Watch?"
"Not quite, thank the Force." Ky shook his head. "Somehow, she managed to get herself baptized in the Living Waters, and hitched a ride to Concordia with a little ultra conservative sect called the Children of the Watch."
Despite his time in the sector, Sifo had never met them, only heard of them in distant rumors. They sounded mad to him even by the poor standards of Mandalore, the absolute epitome of why those people just weren't fit to rule themselves. Somehow it seemed to be a feature of all Mandalorians that they committed absolutely and completely to one kind of radical ideal or another, the New Mandalorians being no exception. A radical commitment to pacifism was almost as bizarre, self-destructive, and impractical as the True Mandalorians' commitment to the SuperCommando Codex, or the Death Watch's deification of the Neo-Crusader movement.
Maybe if Sifo wrote some kind of doctrine appealing to Mandalorians culture, and committing its adherents to some kind of sensible political middle ground and framing it as a new and radical movement, the entire Mandalorian civilisation could be fixed?
Most likely he'd just create another faction for the next inevitable civil war.
"Did the Children of the Watch take her hostage?"
"No, she just realized they were trying to induct her into their religion, and took her helmet off."
"And they didn't shoot her?"
"Apparently not, the Children of the Watch won't hold anyone who wishes to leave against their will."
"Shockingly sensible of them."
"I thought so too when I went to pick her up. Anyway, out of nowhere, one of the uh, foundlings, that's what the Children call their younglings, asked if we could take her away as well. I tested to see if she was force sensitive, and well, she was. Very force sensitive, actually. The strongest youngling I've ever seen apart from Tan'ya. I told her if she got her guardian's permission she could come with me to the New Temple."
"And the Children of the Watch approved?"
"After she ripped her helmet off in front of them, they declared her an exile. So… yeah, I guess after a fashion they did."
"Poor girl." Sifo murmured.
"She was crying, and apologizing, saying she just couldn't live the rest of her life under a helmet. They all just turned their backs on her as she stripped off all the armor she was wearing and hurried aboard my ship."
Shaking his head, Sifo said, "What a strange tale."
"Yeah, Mandalorians, am I right?"
"And how are you holding up?" Sifo asked, allowing an edge of concern to slip into his voice.
"Excuse me?"
"You're working seven days a week, and working from the hour you rise to the hour you rest on each of them. Are you sure you're taking care of yourself?"
Ky's hands froze above the keyboard for just a moment before he resumed typing. "I'm fine."
"Not that I mean to imply you can't take care of yourself." Sifo worried that he'd offended the man. "But as a Jedi Master you do have a responsibility to set an example for others."
Ky glanced over, eyes sliding down to where Sifo's hipflask was pinned to his belt, hidden by his robes. Sifo felt his face heat up with embarrassment, as Ky briefly made eye contact with him before looking back to his typing.
"Perhaps you should worry about the example you set first." Ky murmured softly, and sharply.
Feeling like he'd been doused in cold water, Sifo hurried away from the man's desk and staggered into the hall outside.
He thought he'd been hiding it well. Of course he never drank during the day, and he was careful never to leave a mess anywhere. Ky had spotted it, and the two of them almost never saw each other! Surely others had noticed as well. Did Dooku know? Did Tan'ya?
Now that he was looking at himself, Sifo could almost see a pot belly starting to form. Even with his regular lightsaber training, age and the common symptoms of heavy drinking were starting to show on him.
It wasn't like he had a leg to stand on, either. There was no excuse he could make that anyone would understand. Were people reading him as an old Jedi with bad habits, or did they suspect he was hiding something? Not just bad habits, dangerous ones. Maybe it was unlikely that someone would see him indulging and assume he was trying to drown his guilt for illegally creating an army, or manipulating his student into becoming a perfect weapon, but it was plausible that in a drunken stupor he might divulge something he shouldn't.
Only the Force could know what would happen if someone found out about the army. At the very best, they would have to be persuaded to keep their mouths closed, all too likely Dooku would be forced to make more… permanent arrangements.
Murder. Sifo couldn't euphemise it. The Clones were such a massive secret that was so vital for the future of the Republic that of course it was worth killing to keep.
His constant drinking could easily have ended up with someone being murdered. It was a sobering realization, even in a literal sense.
Not letting himself think too much, not giving himself a chance to procrastinate, Sifo acted. On his way back to the faculty office he dropped his hip flask in a dust bin and didn't look back.
At least not at first.
Shortly before classes were due to begin, the Count arrived along with Tan'ya. Being a diligent and hardworking student, she had completed all the work he'd assigned her over the weekend and didn't complain at all when he immediately gave her more. At the rate she was growing, it would only be a few years before she was ready to formally be his padawan.
He was very proud of her, even as his conscience pricked him.
As the morning wore on, his mind kept returning to that dust bin. That was a perfectly nice hip flask, there was no need to throw it away. Besides, what if some child found it?
He had to fight the urge to tap his foot. Thinking about that flask just being left there was making him nervous, he had to go get it. At lunch, he would wait until lunch then he would retrieve it.
The morning passed at a crawl, Sifo worrying the entire time. Even Tan'ya noticed he was acting strange, shooting him confused looks when she thought he couldn't see.
Finally it was time for their lunch break, and Sifo quickly told her she was doing well and that he just needed to use the bathroom before hurrying as quickly as his dignity as a master could allow. That dignity quickly disappeared once he found the dust bin and started rummaging through it.
It wasn't there.
He felt a small bubble of panic rise up in him that he breathed out slowly to keep under control. Reaching out with the force, he tipped the bin over and arrayed its contents across the floor to make sure he hadn't missed it, and all he found was waste. He returned the contents to the bin and left it upright where he found it, before turning around to find Dooku watching him.
The Count had a sad look on his face as the two old friends made eye contact, before pulling back his robe to reveal the missing hip flask hidden behind his lightsaber.
"Dooku, this isn't what it looks like, I wasn't… I'm not a…" The excuses died on his tongue, and Sifo hung his head shame faced.
"I think we need to talk." Dooku said. "Come, my old friend."
He led them to the elevators and took them to the temple garden where they could find some privacy.
Built atop a granite mesa that rose from barren plains of mud and boulders that covered the world's surface, the New Temple had a traditional shape in most ways with sloping walls that were cut off before they came to a peak. A large, verdant garden was at the top of the building, filled with hardy Serennoan wildflowers and tough grasses; Dooku had envisioned it as a place where the Younglings could play. There was a gazebo with a bench inside for people to sit on and relax, and a single Uneti tree sapling planted in the center. It was small, and would take almost a thousand years to reach maturity, but Sifo knew Dooku had a soft spot for them ever since he was a child.
There were four towers around the exterior of the main Temple building, with small walls of locally sourced stones running between each of them. The New Temple was a small oasis of green, raised up above an endless sea of gray and brown. The view was commanding, even if there wasn't anything there yet.
Wait, what was that? Sifo squinted down at the base of the Mesa, where it looked like someone had built a small structure on the plains below, and tilled a small field around it. Distant tiny figures moved about a little pen with some kind of creatures inside it. Were those grunters?
"Is that a farm?" Sifo pointed.
Dooku nodded. "They're Barabels, their child is attending here. One day this Temple will burrow through the entire mesa, and a child living on a farm down there would only need to walk to the lowest levels and catch the lift up to attend."
"Only if the New Temple grows as large as you imagine. To use up that much space, you'd need numbers of Jedi to rival Coruscant."
"Coruscant itself was originally only an outpost of the Jedi, one that came to outgrow the First Temple on Tython. Such things have happened before, there's no reason they can't happen again." Dooku turned to look at Sifo and considered him for a moment. "You're not looking very good, my friend."
"I'm fine, I promise."
Dooku raised an eyebrow before he took Sifo's flask and casually tossed it over the Temple's edge.
Reacting quickly, Sifo reached out in the force and caught it, just before it disappeared from view. It was only when he heard the disappointed sigh behind him that Sifo realized what he'd done.
"Dooku I-"
"You don't need to give me excuses."
Sifo closed his mouth, shamefaced.
"Alcohol, despites its commonality, is a very dangerous addiction to try and break. It will ravage your body. You may die."
Sifo wanted to say he wasn't that far gone, but he couldn't find a word to defend himself. Anything would just sound like denials, to himself and to his oldest friend.
"You're seventy years old, no one will question it if you retire." Dooku told him.
"I can't retire."
"If the pressure wears you, it may be for the best."
"Dooku, I'm the only one who can build the army."
"I can-"
"No, you can't, Dooku, you have no time left in your day as it is. We need to be ready for the return of the Sith, and I'm the one with the Mandalorian contacts, the Kaminoans trust me, and I've spent my life studying armies and how they're made. No one can replace me."
"Nevertheless, you must be replaced."
Sifo looked away from his old friend.
"I'm sure I can find someone else-"
"No!" Sifo cut across him. "I'm not retiring."
"Sifo, you're old. Even setting aside your problems, we will need someone to replace you soon, anyway."
"I could live to be a hundred. I could outlive you."
"...So then you will continue as you are?"
Determined, Sifo nodded. The army wasn't ready, Tan'ya wasn't ready. There was so much more he had to do to prepare the Republic.
"Very well." Dooku sighed, looking away. "I have a task for you, if you can still handle it."
"What is it?"
"I have lost faith in Serenno's current security arrangements. I want to restore the Serenno Defence Force, and reform the Royal Guard at the same time, and I know no man better to do it than you."
Sifo nodded his head, already familiar with Serenno's current defenders. "To be honest with you, you might be better off remaining with the Trade Federation than trying to strike out on your own."
"How so?"
"Say what you will about the quality of their fleet, Federation rates are still going to be cheaper than building one yourself. Not to mention without the Senate classifying Serenno as a Key Defense Partner there's a hard limit on how large you're allowed to build a Self Defence Force and what kind of tonnage you can add to your navy. I'm not as familiar with the restrictions on Royal Guards, but I'm sure they'll be similar."
"Money is not an issue. Promoting Serenno in the senate can be done."
Despite Dooku's reassurances, Sifo felt a bit dubious of the idea. Serenno had a decent population and rich natural resources, but its economy was tiny and its median income was well below the poverty line. It was very difficult to build and maintain a large army or fleet without a lot of pre-existing wealth to draw from.
Not to mention Serenno hardly had the manufacturing capacity to become a true military powerhouse. All the natural resources in the world would be worthless without factories to convert them into starship parts. Without that, Serenno's military would be dependent on materials purchased elsewhere in the galaxy and subject to the Republic's dizzying array of trade regulations and corporate monopolies. Costs would mount, and Dooku would soon discover that money would absolutely become an issue.
But then Sifo thought of Tan'ya. Real, practical hands-on experience in building and maintaining an army would be invaluable to her in the future. Even if Serenno didn't have the materials to become a key Republic security interest, that didn't mean it couldn't have an effective Self Defence Force. When the Sith did finally return, giving Tan'ya her own fief to draw from would only give her more influence and power.
"Actually, now that I think about it a little more it may be doable." Sifo said. "You probably can't go straight into building your own large war machine, but at the very least you can build up an elite core that can be expanded on later. I'll have a look at the regulations on honor guards and see what those are like."
"Very well." Dooku stood up. "I'll talk to Jenza, and have you made an official consultant." He paused, then looked at Sifo. "And this won't interfere with Tan'ya's training, will it?"
"Oh, no. Not at all." Sifo promised him. "You can trust me old friend, your daughter will be a finer Jedi than you, one day. Mark my words."
"Now, don't set the bar too low." Dooku smiled, before turning to leave. "A greater jedi than I would have cut down the whole Council already."