A/N: Hi everyone! Got a pretty big question for you guys, but we'll talk about it at the end of the chapter. Here it is!

Interlude #1: a Mando and a Matukai

P.O.V. Nyra, only one month after her and Anakin's first meeting.

A lot had changed for Nyra in the past month. To be honest, she had been in a bit of a rut before coming to Tatooine. Back When she first started her Matukai training she been grateful for the routine, the simplicity of it. It had helped her shed the broken dreams and insecurities left after her departure from the Jedi, and gave her a much needed sense of stability.

But after graduating the basic training and becoming a full fledged member of the order, she felt… lost. While she had discovered through her meditation and training that her overlarge ambition and thirst for attention and accolades was one of the things holding her back, now that she had acknowledged and mostly overcome this flaw, she found herself on the opposite side of the spectrum. Without a driving goal, without a purpose.

The path of growth stretches ever longer to the horizon, and the tasks of life don't change no mater how enlightened you are, so she had accepted this feeling as her next trial and set out into the wider galaxy to gain greater understanding of herself and the universe, to push herself and her training to new heights of challenge and depths of understanding.

She had visited many different planets with harsh environments before Tatooine, braving many challenges and setbacks to deepen her connection to the force and herself.

And while her skills and resilience increased, she also felt like she wasn't really learning anything deeply new. Drifting aimlessly like a leaf in the wind from planet to planet with no goal and little money had only taken her so far.

And then came the day she met Anakin. That whole experience, the canyons, the cave, and the crystal, had restored some piece of herself she had long thought lost, and her subsequent meditation and writing of the Matukai training text had gifted her with new understanding.

The composing and recording of the different lessons, forms, and philosophies of the Matukai allowed her not only to gift her knowledge to another, but also to retrain herself in the basics from the ground up, which led to the fixing of many flaws, and the development of much greater progress. While she hadn't been able to meet with her student every day from sunrise 'til sunset like she would have preferred, they had been able to meet every few days for an hour or two, which had allowed Anakin to ask questions and gain clarification of concepts he didn't understand, which in turn forced her to contact her elders and do research to answer his question satisfactorily, and several times she found herself gaining new perspectives and insights on topics she had long assumed she had fully mastered.

And now, at the end of her sojourn here on this desert world, the datapad in her hand as she waited for Anakin to meet her and retrieve it's final version (reviewed and approved by the masters of the Matukai order, whose sincere praise and genuine excitement at her teaching a pupil had put a tear in her eye), she admitted she would miss this place. Not the people, no, certainly not, save Anakin and a few other individuals, the vast majority of the sentients here were the worst kind of scum. But she would always appreciate what she learned here.

What she hadn't realized until now, was that there can only be so much peace and joy that you can derive from helping and working on yourself only. To find true meaning, she also had to reach out and help others as well.

She now knew this about herself, and realized it was one of the reasons she wanted to be a Jedi so badly in her youth, to cruise about the galaxy helping people and being a source of positive change in the republic and beyond.

She found she quite liked being a teacher, and wanted to explore it far more than she was currently able to. She wished she could take Anakin as a full time pupil, to take him away from this world and Have him join the Matukai order, but she could feel in the force that his destiny was far greater than that, that his goals of joining the Jedi were far more than childish enamorment, but genuine foresight.

He needed to free himself, and as much as she grumbled to admit it, he needed to join the Jedi. Whether he would stay with them was anyone's guess, but she felt his path in the force, and knew that the Jedi order would be an integral part of that path, for good or for ill. She just hoped it would be the former.

She was drawn out of her musings by a familiar child sized figure in Jawa robes turning around the corner. Ha! 'Speak of the devil and he shall appear'. She smiled at the sight, and strolled over to him to give him the datapad and bid him goodbye.

Up on a rooftop a few blocks from the pair, an armored man in a helmet with a T shaped visor spied on their meeting through a pair of macrobinoculars. As he zoomed in on the two figures, he paid special attention to the Jawa, specifically the gun on its hip.

Tapping a few times on the screen of his vambrace, he pulled up a still frame on his hud from the helmet recording of his previous confrontation with the Jawa. Comparing the captured footage of the gun with the one he was currently seeing on the small being's hip, he was certain it was the same weapon. It couldn't even be argued that it was just a similar model, because it was very clearly a custom job built out of scrap.

Finally! He had the little fucker, and he'd make sure to get payback for being electrocuted like a nerf prodded by its herder!

Daring to stalk a little closer, he got within range of the macro's advanced microphone and listened in on their conversation.

"So when are you going to stop using that mind trick field and learn actual nimbleness and physical subtlety?" The woman asked, her voice a mix of smug teasing and genuine advice.

Mind trick?! Of course! That's why his osi'kovid of a partner hadn't seen or heard the little shebs'palon, it was a Taungdamned Jeti! And this woman must be it's master! He grit his teeth in hatred as his vision tunneled, and he quickly pushed back memories of sabers, explosives, and blood. Pushed back memories of betrayal, death, and cowardice. No! This is why he had fled here to the ass end of the galaxy! To get away from all this!

Now far more keyed up than a simple observation job should have made him, he ground his gritted teeth as his heart pounded in his ears. Curse them! He made up his mind then and there to kill the both of them.

As soon as the decision solidified in his mind, the woman tensed, her eyes glancing around for the source of the danger signal. Haar'chak! Had she sensed him already?!

She quickly ushered the Jawa on its way, bidding it goodbye, and the voice of a human child responded as farewells were exchanged. Not a Jawa then, but a child in disguise.

Before he could do anything with this discovery, the woman vanished in a blur of motion.

Frantically he adjusted his macros, trying to find where she had darted off to, and nearly jumped a foot in the air when he heard her voice from behind him, on the other side of the rooftop. He quickly rolled over from his stomach onto his back, his hand hovering by the blaster pistol on his right hip.

"That's quite a lot of malice to be throwing around mando, you should be careful who you challenge. You might bite off more than you can chew." She said with a stoic calm.

Not bothering to get up from his prone state he drew his blaster from its holster with speed faster than most sentients could even perceive, only for the woman to blur forward and kick the weapon from his hand before he could fire a single shot.

Embarrassingly enough, this stunned him.

Both the speed and accuracy of his hip fired quickdraw was noteworthy even among other mandalorians, and for her to move her entire body across the multiple meters that had existed between them, in less time than he could move just his hand 20 cm, wasn't something that he had considered possible.

She scoffed, breaking the tension. "Get up. I don't fancy fighting a downed opponent." She stepped back a few paces, waiting for him to get on his feet.

Slowly, carefully, the mandalorian got up, retrieved his pistol with shaking hands, and stood up in a ready stance.

The woman made no moves, simply observing and waiting.

He needed to make the first move. He had to!

His hands shook more. He stood still.

Come on! For years he'd hated the Jedi for what they'd done! This was his chance! To face his failure! To triumph against his cowardice! To prove that the mandalor's faith in him wasn't a painful fiction from the old days, but a inherent trait, a value he could access years after Fett's disappearance! He was a true mandalorian! He was!

His emotions swelling, he made to step forward, and the jeti woman drew her weapon, a long poleaxe, in response to his intent.

He stumbled back in fear.

A honest look of dumbfounded shock came to her face, before being replaced by a sneer of pure disdain. "Pathetic!" She spat, and turned her back to him, sheathing her poleaxe once again and began walking away, toward the edge of the rooftop.

Rage overcame his fear. "STOP!" He shouted, stepping forward. He didn't shoot while her back was turned, a small remanent of his past cringing at the dishonor such an act represented. But as soon as she turned, the very moment she had him and his weapon in her sights, he open fired.

He had pictured fighting a Jedi thousands of times over the years since that day, and knew that regular bolts would be reflected by a lightsaber with often lethal accuracy. Because of this, he used stunblasts. They had a wider spread and simply dispelled on contact with a lightsaber instead of being reflected, so they were by far the safer option. As soon as the Jeti was on the ground and unconscious, he'd send a proper blaster bolt through her skull.

The reality of the situation was quite different than what he pictured, as the woman he was fighting wasn't a Jedi, and didn't have a lightsaber.

Again taking out her flinthead axe, Nyra sliced through the stun rings with contemptuous ease, which highlighted the other downside of stun rings when compared to blaster bolts. They were significantly slower, and thus easier to block.

The mandalorian ground his teeth in frustration, which went unseen beneath his helmet. He was hoping some of the energy from the stun rings would have reached her, but the reach of her pole arm was far too long for any to pass the distance.

Seeing that she didn't have a lightsaber, he cursed himself for his assumption, she had been carrying the axe the whole time, but he had ignored it, too caught up in the past.

Firing off his vambrace flamethrower, they lost sight of each other as the massive plume of flame obscured their vision. Using this as both an attack and a distraction, he fired a stun ring through the flames, as well as a pair of knee darts many members of the True Mandalorians favored. An atmospheric barrier technique would work on the flames, but not on the ring or the darts. Jedi often had techniques that allowed them to block the burning gas of the flame thrower or the energy of a stun ring or the physical threat of the knee darts, but rarely all three simultaneously.

Furthermore, the danger sense a Jeti felt from the flame was apparently quite 'loud' to their senses, which effectively masked the danger of the stun ring and the darts.

After the plume of flame dissipated, an empty rooftop was all that met the Mandalorian's vision.

Wh-what? Where did she go?

A clicking tongue from behind had him wheeling around to find her standing behind him!

Activating his jet pack in a short burst to gain distance, he landed a good distance away, furious at her so obviously toying with him. How had she disappeared?! Had she teleported?!

"Cease your deception and illusion, Jeti sorcerer, and fight me directly!" He spat with the fury of his ancestors.

The woman scowled, angry at the accusation. He must have touched a nerve with that one.

"MANDALORIAN!" she shouted, her enhanced lungs projecting her voice at superhuman levels, which made him step back in shock, his helmet's dampeners registering it as a minor explosion. "Do not take me as some conjuror of cheap tricks! I am no Jedi!" she spun her poleaxe theatrically, it's movement so fast it looked like a singular blurry wheel, before slamming the butt of her weapon into the stone surface of the roof with a mighty CRACK.

Holding the shaft of the planted axe with one hand, she thrust out her other palm toward him in declaration. "When I made my way to this building, it is simply because I ran! When I reached this rooftop, it is simply because I Jumped! And when your attacks did not reach me, it is simply because I got out of the way! There is no illusion! There is no trickery! There is no teleportation or barriers or clouding of the mind! My combat is direct! My body refined! My will unyielding! My soul empowered! I am a Matukai!"

At this, her voice returned to its regular volume, but her tone was no less biting. "And if you continue your attack, I will crush you with direct combat, huttservant!"

Perhaps under other circumstances he would have found her actions and words overly dramatic, almost to the point of watching a holofilm or a play. And yet, there was a part of him long thought dead that cried out with religious fervor, reveling in her zeal and conviction the same way he reveled in the Mandalor's.

To hold honor above all else! To fight with purpose! To have ones very own blood pound and flow with fury and devotion!

Shining out through the cracks from under more than a decade of cowardice, depression, and self loathing, was a lust for life he had long thought impossible to feel again!

His blaster slipped from his hand, clattering on the ground. She raised an eyebrow in question.

"I will not move against you or your house for as long as I live, honored warrior." He said with an air of ritual. "Honored Matukai" he amended.

He raised his fists, and she blinked in confusion. "I challenge you, to a bout of honorable combat, with no weapons, to the death."

She scoffed, not believing his words for a second. "You want me to abandon my weapon? And why should I indulge you, who serves the hutts and enforces their slavery? I was under the impression that being the lesser to a Hutt was a great insult in your culture."

His fury burned for a moment in his chest, but it was quickly doused by a much greater portion of guilt and shame. Her words may have been harsh, but they rang with truth. "I-I had to survive somehow! If the damned Jeti hadn't helped the Deathwatch slaughter us true Mandalorians at Galidraan, none of this would be necessary! The hutts may give jobs and protection but I do not belong to them! I have never captured slaves or anything of the sort! I was only told that night to protect the hangar from thieves!"

Most of what he said went unheard, as Nyra focused on one thing he said. "You were at Galidraan?" She whispered, shocked, a look of pity on her face. "How did you survive?" She inquired.

"I… I…" he clenched his fists. "If I tell you, will you accept my challenge?"

"Perhaps. It certainly wouldn't hurt." She said calmly, implying much and promising little.

He sighed explosively through his teeth. "I ran." He stated. "When the fighting broke out, and the first Vode was bisected by a saber, I…" he gulped, forcing the words out. "I fled! My brothers and sisters needed me and I fled! The true mandalorians were slaughtered to a man and I couldn't do any more than save my own hide!" He paused to gather himself, not willing to let tears fall, even beneath his helmet. "When I heard alor Fett survived I scrubbed my armor of its symbols and headed for huttspace. I disappeared, hiding from my dishonor."

"You abandoned them." The woman said. It was like a lance to the heart, filling him with searing pain, but he gritted his teeth and bore it. It was true after all, he deserved her words and more.

"So you understand. Allow me an honorable death. Let me leave life as a warrior."

She scoffed. "I will not be the instrument of your suicide. We can fight, but it will be to surrender, not death."

His bowed head shot up, his fury emanating from his t shaped visor. "You would go against your promise?! You would deny me this final honor?!"

"First of all," she shot back, "I made no promise! I said 'perhaps'. That is not even close to a promise! Second of all, me beating you to death won't change what you did in the past, it won't fix your mistakes, and it certainly won't suddenly make you an honorable person!"

He flinched with every censure. She continued.

"Honor is not bestowed nor taken by another person. It is a cumulative quality that is dependent on the sum of your own actions! It can only be restored by your own conduct, and by nothing else! It is not how you die that matters, death is only a singular moment. What's truly important, is how you live."

He slumped, defeated, his arms falling by his sides.

"What are you doing?" She asked. "We have a fight to get to, don't we?"

He scowled beneath his helmet. "For what purpose? You will not kill me, and I cannot kill you."

"Because," she began, "I may not be a Jedi, but I do draw strength from the force. I just said honor is based on action right? So act! Reclaim your courage!" She took a fighting stance.

She was doing this… for him?

How was it, that all the treachery, the bowing, the scraping, the wallowing in his own misery and self hatred for all these years didn't sear half as painfully as this simple act of compassion?

He felt a near feral defensive rage, which made tears come to his eyes for the first time in years, feeling so deeply after years of emptiness was agonizing down to his soul. "Why…. How… Harchaak! Why are you doing this for me?! Why are you being so fucking kind?!"

She smiled. "This is my way." She responded.

The practiced response of 'this is the way' was halfway on his tongue before he realized what exactly she said. His eyes, widened. It was that simple? Just because she felt like it? That… that was impossible! But he saw no deception in her eyes. Unbidden, blurry memories of Jaster Mereel and much clearer ones of Jango Fett rushed forward from his past, the zeal that they inspired, the compassion they treated their clan with, and the brutal fierceness they showed when defending their own. He had given up feeling like that about anyone ever again.

And here he was now, the painful heart of his emotion newly thundering in his chest, reminding him of the lifestyle of loyalty, honor, and hope he thought he'd never capture again. She was so so different from the Mandalore in almost every way, but at the same time, in this moment, she didn't seem all that different them after all. This is her way eh? Well then… perhaps it was a way worth following.

He took a fighting stance. She smiled, and waited for him to make the first move against her.

Staying nimble on the balls of his feet, he dashed toward her without breaking his posture, and the very instant he was in range, he threw a blisteringly fast jab, flickering through the air faster than a baseline human could ever perceive.

Compared to her, it might as well have been moving through jogan syrup.

Slipping outside his left jab, she sent a left handed palm strike to his chest plate, sending him hurtling back through the air with a loud gonging noise, a shallow hand shaped dent in his impure armor.

He trembled in fear. This speed! This precision! It was just like back then! And the strength?! If it hadn't been for his chest plate, his ribs would have been pulverized and his chest caved in! It was like being hit by an angry gundark! Fear pounded in his veins as he struggled to regain his breath. This wasn't some friendly match! She may not be aiming to kill, she would have struck his unarmored throat if she was, but she certainly wasn't holding back her power either! He should surrender! There was no way of winning!

Looking up at her face, it was perfectly serene, without a hint of urging one way or the other. She was simply waiting, the very picture of patience. She was leaving the decision to him. He could surrender. It would be easy! She wouldn't pursue him, there would be no consequences to giving up!

He stood back up and retook his stance.

She smiled

He rushed back in.

He didn't know how long the fight lasted. He started getting used to her speed, utilizing his armor to get away with glancing blows, every one of her hits leaving a dent.

There was something terrifying about the way she moved, like she had both an apex predator's innate instinct mixed with the most ancient and pious monks practice. Her style of fighting went beyond martial arts, every new strike he sent was met with a perfect counter as if she had seen him do it 1000 times. It was if she had attained understanding of the flow of movement and combat beyond the levels of standardization and human teaching. There were no flourishes, no telegraphing, not a single hint of unnecessary movement.

Each of her strikes pounded into his armor, flesh, and soul like an armorer beating the impurities out of an ingot.

And every time he went down even for a second she showed him that perfect poker face, with no hint of recrimination or distain. Allowing him a way out, allowing him the choice to flee.

And every time he got back up, her smile returned brighter than before, and his mandalorian blood pounded in his ears.

The rust was shaken off, his instincts reawakening as he moved faster, better, and more skilled as his body sung with the blood of the Mandalorian crusaders of old, Millennia of war flowing down through his ancestors and into his very being, Every time he rose up from defeat he lasted longer, his potential drawn out with every round.

She never slowed, never even breathed hard.

But she was starting to sweat, and she had a slight hint of a flush of exertion.

She was as strong as a gundark, as graceful as a nexu, and as wiley as the most cunning fighters of Mandalore.

She was terrifying and cunning and brutal and unyielding. A tester of limits. A bringer of pain. And then he realized. She wasn't an enemy, or a trickster, or even a Jedi.

She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen in his entire fucking life.

Apparently yielding to the limits of mortality, the Mandalorian crashed to his knees. He visibly tried to rise, but his muscles simply had no more to give.

Nyra breathed regularly and steadily, regaining her stamina. She was honestly shocked at the level of combat this mando had achieved without out even a whiff of force usage. She was confident he would absolutely destroy every baseline human he ever came across in a straight fight, old bloodline Mandalorians were just that terrifying. Whether the rumors of neocrusader gene therapy were true, or if natural selection had just done its job spectacularly well over multiple millennia of unending war, the mandalorians and the surrounding systems that descended from them were a people that broke the limits on what was considered possible for humanity.

A rasping came from the tinhead's bucket, and she couldn't quite make out the words.

"What was that?" She asked.

Reaching up shakily, he removed his helmet, which went clattering to the floor.

"Teach… me…" he rasped between large shaking breaths. "Please…" he finished.

She stared at him, shocked, but not just because of his question.

When she had learned he'd fought at the battle of Galidraan, she had assumed he was in his late 30s or early 40s. She had expected a face worn by several decades of hard living, maybe with crows feet or perhaps some graying temples. What she saw was a man her age, several years away from 30, with flowing blonde locks, minty green eyes and a strong scruffy jawline. A light scar ran through one eyebrow, and his nose was ever so slightly crooked, as if it had been broken and reset at least once, but not nearly jarringly crooked enough to be to detract from his looks, even giving his face a roguish vibe, which Nyra found only enhanced his appearance. However, despite her awareness of his good looks in the back of her mind, something else took center stage.

"How… how old are you?" She asked, hoping she was wrong. Perhaps mandalorians aged more gracefully than she thought?

Puzzled, but far too tired to be contrary, he answered her truthfully between gasps of air. "I'm… 25… standard" he breathed out.

"The battle of Galidraan was 11 years ago…" Nyra whispered in response, horrified at the implications. "You were only fourteen! In an active warzo—"

He interrupted her, defensive, "I had passed my verd'goten! I was a man!"

"You were a CHILD!" She shot back, not missing a beat. "Even Jedi padawans have to be at least 18 before they are sent to fight in a confirmed war zone! And even then they have the force on their side!"

"And I had my vode!" He finished mulishly, making fierce eye contact as if daring her to contradict him. She wanted to lash back, to point out if they were comfortable sending a non force sensitive 14 year old to his likely death, or to possibly be captured by an enemy and tortured for information, than maybe they weren't so great after all. But before she could get the words out, he slumped again, defeated.

"And I betrayed them." He finished. Downtrodden.

She sighed. "Do you… really want me to teach you? You know I use the force right?"

His head shot back up, looking up at her with hope shining in his eyes. "Yes! I do! Please! I don't need to learn any Jeti trickery, I just wish do learn your ways of combat! To transcend my limits as you have! I beg of you!"

There was something about that look of pleading and hope that strangely enough reminded her of the adorable golden furred fetch hounds that were popular on Alderaan, and she looked away, a slight blush on her cheeks.

"Hold on! I-I'll check to see if you can learn! Just… close your eyes and concentrate" She redirected, a bit flustered.

He did as she asked, and she connected with his force signature, placing her hands on either side of his head.

He hadn't used the force at all during combat, which was telling. Anyone with any kind of talent in the force wouldn't be capable of at least receiving some guidance, but that didn't necessarily mean he was completely force blind. Just… very untalented.

Subtly, she extended a tendril of energy toward his mind, brushing against his consciousness.

His breath hitched slightly, and she could feel his surprise and confusion.

She withdrew. Not feeling her hands on the sides of his head anymore, he opened his eyes. "Was that… you?" He asked.

"Yes." She answered. "Okay so, good news and bad news. Good news is, you aren't totally force blind, which means I can technically teach you."

At this he perked up a bit, but was still ready for the other shoe to drop. "And the bad news?"

She sighed. "Bad news is you are incredibly untalented in the force. You would have never in a million years gotten picked up by the Jedi, and if your M-count is even a single point over 4000 per cell, I'll incinerate all my winter clothes and permanently move to Hoth.

"It will be extremely difficult for you to make it even to the beginning stages of training a force sensitive. I don't even know if it will be possible to get you to the starting line."

He steeled his expression, his face the very picture of determination. "I'm no stranger to hard work" he declared.

"Heh! Good! Let's get you up, we'll get your things ready to move. Do you have a ship?"

He shook his head no as he struggled onto his feet. "Sold it when I got here. Been using the hutts transportation since."

"Then we'll use mine." She said.

"We are leaving?" He asked

"Yes." She declared, "My time on Tatooine is at an end. I had initially intended to return to my order, but I sense that the force is calling elsewhere."

He rolled his eyes and put on his helmet. "If you say so. I'll get my affairs on this planet in order."

She paused, contemplative. Without his helmet on he was simply a regular (admittedly very handsome) guy her age. But when he put back on his helmet all she was met with was the cold calculating gaze of a T shaped visor. Even his voice now had regained the deadly metallic edge of the vocoder, and his entire bearing screamed 'hyper lethal'.

She briefly wondered if she was making a mistake with his training, before dismissing the thought. Any character defects he had would either be worked through during training, or cause them to part ways before he made measurable progress. Either way, he wasn't force sensitive enough to be easily corrupted by the dark side, or pose an unbeatable threat with any minor powers he might gain.

It was funny, Her first ever student, Anakin, was most likely the most talented force sensitive she had ever seen bar none, and her second student would be barely be Force sensitive at all. Funny how things work out.

"Where will we be going?" He asked.

"Hmmmmmm…" she pondered. No planet immediately sprung to mind, but she could tell that she was being called somewhere. "I am unsure. I will need to meditate on this to gain more clarity on our path. For now, I'll settle on making it to a nearby maintenance station that'll safely put us up for a few days."

The Mandalorian nodded. He supposed he would have to get used to a force user utilizing her gift for navigation if he was to properly follow her. "What is your name?" He asked.

She laughed. Had she really forgotten to introduce herself? "Nyra. My name is Nyra."

He nodded. "Aran." He shared. "Aran… Naasade" he clarified, seeming to come to a decision.

Nyra nodded. "Well, Aran Naasade, I suggest you prepare yourself. The journey to enlightenment is never easy, and if you thought you attracted trouble as a Mandalorian, you're in for a whole new level of action as a force sensitive."

"Hn." He grunted. "I welcome the challenge." Superstition only let him believe so much. In his experience, the big kind of planetary trouble usually only came to those who actively looked for it. How bad could it really be? It wasn't like they were living in the old glory days of Mandalore, with a galaxy spanning conflict every few decades. Things were boring and peaceful, and with the Sith extinct, Deathwatch defeated, and Mandalore ruled by a fucking pacifist, the galaxy was sleepy and boring, and would most likely stay that way long after he died of old age. Really, under the circumstances, how much trouble could he possibly get sucked into?

End of interlude 1

Interlude 2: A Sith and a Feeling

Darth Sidious, by day known as Sheev Palpatine, was deep in meditation.

The Sith apprentice, Hopefully soon to be Sith Master, had always had a gift for peering into the future. This ability was prized by his Master, Darth Plagueis, who's own foresight had been damaged in a confrontation with his own master years ago.

The Sith had used foresight over the last millennia to great effect, allowing them to avoid detection from the Jedi and weaken the republic from within. Because of this, they were able to not only utilize cunning, but also to practically weaponize luck itself, as they could always be in just the right place at just the right time. Because of this, times where they were caught off guard were far and few between, and they almost never faced an unknown threat they hadn't already studied and made plans for.

Between this, and the veil of the dark side the line of Bane had created which prevented all but the most talented of Jedi seers from using the same ability, the future was the domain of the Sith, with no one else able to intrude with any effectiveness or clarity.

Or at least, that's what he had assumed, until a few weeks ago.

It had started with a feeling. Like there was a single consciousness split into tiny bright fragments, dancing through vastly different points in time like glitter on the wind. He had tried to follow one of these pitifully bright fragments to its source, but was only led to strange random points in time, completely unrelated to one another and far too minuscule to trace back to a single user.

This strange phenomenon had Sidious stumped. He found it hard to believe that a single person would be responsible for all the fragments scattered through time and space, but they all had the same force signature! Could it be a hive minded swarm of force sensitive insects that grasped clairvoyance before gaining sentience? Certainly it couldn't be a single person, that wasn't the way people minds naturally received visions, so it couldn't be a technique a single being learned! Perhaps some kind of unique herb or unheard of arcane ritual?

Over the next month or so, whenever he had time to meditate, Sidious observed the fragments. While he could tell that they were perceiving the future, he couldn't actually sense what they were seeing, just that they were in the process of seeing a vision, and the level of skill by which they did so.

They didn't always appear, but when they did, they were closer and more centered every time, until he was even able to pick up brief glimpses through them, though they were still too warped and prismatic to make heads or tails of, like looking through the viewfinder of a Kaleidoscope.

Sometimes the fragments would even solidify into what must have been one singular vision, but it was always too far in the future for him to chase after with any clarity, and the individuals presence was too strangely obscured for him to view for himself whatever it was they were seeing.

It was bizarre! Seeing the future had limits, the most important of which were focus and specificity. Without focusing on what you wanted to see, with little knowledge of what you might find, it was almost impossible to pin down a related future that would give useful information.

Simply meditating on 'how do I win?' Was an incredibly vague and therefore weak and ineffective method of seeing the future, where as 'what are the direct ramifications of this specific plan I have in place, if I were to implement it by the end of this week, which I am able and willing to do, as I have all the methods and people already in place' would pierce into future far more accurately and reliably.

It was imperative that one narrow the field if they wanted usable visions that didn't require expending large amounts of power and effort.

So the only way to see that far into the future with any clarity, especially for someone that wasn't Sidious and was therefore much less powerful by definition, would be to know exactly the events they wanted to witness before they had actually seen them, which was ridiculous!

And, this narrowing of field made an actual sensory difference in how he perceived their temporal probe, making it feel sharper and more durable in the force, so he could tell without a shadow of a doubt that that is what this new player was doing, he just for the life of him couldn't fathom how it was possible.

If you already knew exactly what you were going to see, then why in all the nine Correlian hells did you even need to view it in a vision in the first place? You already knew what would happen!

Furthermore, if this seer did already know such incredibly detailed and specific information of a single distant future possibility, than how in the flying fuck did they know about the event at all, if they hadn't seen it in a vision first?!

It was a circular paradox! They couldn't have seen a vision that far into the future without knowing what exactly they were looking for, and they couldn't have known exactly what they were looking for if they hadn't seen it in a vision! It was frustrating in the extreme!

A raspy voice filtered by an electronic vocoder interrupted "You are ruminating on our temporal intruder again."

Sidious did not jump, he was too well trained for that, but a jolt of surprise flared behind his shields, as he had not detected his master entering the room. He slowly opened his eyes, the very picture of calm. "Temporal intruder?" He questioned.

"Yes." His master replied, his eyes bright with fascination, which irritated Sidious. This was a setback, a potential threat and his master only viewed it with scientific curiosity, rather that the anger and contempt such an anomaly deserved. Smirking at his Apprentice' irritation, Plagueis continued. "I meditated on what you have previously told me, and this is my main theory. Our intruder is able to pierce into the future with such effectiveness because they personally witnessed the events firsthand. They are a time traveler."

Sidious blinked in shock, wondering if he was being mocked. "Really master? Time travel?"

Plagueis nodded seriously. "I always consider time travel as a possibility. My master did a great deal of study on the subject, and though he never was able to work out the technique itself, the alchemical formulas always resolved themselves as possible within the force. Furthermore, there are ancient references of an inter-time nexus known as the 'world between worlds' in the most ancient holocrons and records of force users, which are consistent between several cultures with no contact with each other. Just because we don't currently know how it can be done, does not mean it is impossible.

Sidious curled his lip in distain. "You are implying that there is a force user with more advanced knowledge of temporal matters than us?! Impossible! I would have sensed them!"

His master quirked an eyebrow. "You are sensing them currently. You are always so quick to assume your own superiority apprentice, and are thus caught off guard when it is challenged. It is your most dangerous flaw. You would rather continue in vain overconfidence rather than use this challenge as an opportunity for growth. Being faced with a phenomenon we do not understand simply means there is an opportunity to gain knowledge we did not previously have. You should relish the opportunity for study, for experimentation." The manic glee in his eyes increased at the final word, showing his excitement at their current situation.

Sidious' hatred burned behind his impeccable shielding. His master was always like this! Always so meandering, so methodical. If Plagueis remained the master of the Sith, the Grand Plan would likely take another century to complete! Risks must be taken. Plans must be progressed. And though his master was incredibly powerful, In Sidious' opinion Plagueis was a scientist first and a Sith Lord second, which was an unacceptable quality for the any emperor of the galaxy to have. 'Soon,'. He thought, 'The time of your death has nearly arrived my master, and oh it shall be exquisite! And then we will see who is overconfident! We will see who the real master is!'

"Yes, my master." Was all that escaped his lips.

Plagueis hummed at this, knowing his apprentice was fuming at the lecture, but there was no slip in his shields. Good. Any slip up in mental defense could alert the Jedi to their presence. He stood, and was about to leave when they both felt the veil of the dark side ripple. Someone was attempting to penetrate it! If they succeeded, it was possible, however unlikely, that they would be discovered, that this new interloper would find a weakness and exploit it. "Find them!" He commanded his apprentice.

Sidious was quick to comply. Scanning quickly, he immediately sensed the strange fractal presence from earlier, but instead of using its extremely refined specificity to reach into a possible distant future, it was reaching through the veil into the very near future! They could not allow anyone to possess knowledge of the grand plan that wasn't under their absolute control! Projecting his power toward the hated prismatic irritant, Sidious immediately attempted to trace it to its origin!

It was not to be however. With a jolt of fear the presence disappeared completely, leaving only a single glimpse of a sandy colored duracrete wall before being lost.

Sidious snarled in rage at the failure! Beige duracrete?! That could be literally anywhere in the entire thrice damned Galaxy! And because of whatever method they were using to to achieve that strange fractal state, for the short period of time that he was able to sense them, they appeared to be all over the galaxy while also being nowhere at the same time! Lighting crackled around Sidious' fingers as he relayed this to his master.

"Fascinating!" Was the Muun's only response.

Sidious wanted to loose his power at his Plagueis right then and there, but from the knowing gaze of his master, it would not go uncontested. A twinge of fear traveled down his spine. He scoffed, and turned away. Plagueis smirked beneath his breath mask, and left the room.

'Soon,' Sidious promised himself. 'Soon.'

End of interlude #2

A/N: Hey guys! Been a while, but I'm back! I originally planned for three interludes to this chapter, but the one about what's happened on Ryloth since Alask, Obi Wan, and Qui Gon showed up was feeling super rushed and unsatisfying. I honestly think I have enough for a multi chapter story, and actually have it be amazing to read through with twists and turns, good characterization, and awesome scenes and training, and I'm feeling super unsatisfied with just chopping it all down into a quick and dirty summary.

However, I also really want to get into the phantom menace and finally get the 'Jedi Order' section of the story underway, which I consider the meat of what I have planned.

So this is the question is for you guys. Do you want me to publish the Ryloth chapters (hopefully only 2 or maybe 3) next and then after go on with the phantom menace and our SI?

Or should I work on it as a side story and get to publishing the phantom menace with only vague spoiler free references to what happened on Ryloth, and get to the phantom menace right away? I'm not sure what I want to do, because I said we'd get to the phantom menace soon and the Ryloth arc wouldn't have SI Anakin in it at all, but is relevant to the greater story later on.

Alternatively, I could break the arc into parts, which only the beginning stages of the conflict happening before TPM, and the next most juicy parts happening after, but I don't want to shuffle characters around as I really like Qui Gon being there for many of the scenes, and splitting it in half like that would break the momentum of the story. But even with all that, I can still have most of what I have planned happened anyway, just with a few tweaks. Idk

What do y'all think? Also, how did you like the chapter lol? Reviews fuel me!

Ciao!