Well, we're now at the point of fifth-of-a-novel-length chapters. Oy. I intend to try to remedy this in future, because it makes for such darned long posting intervals, but success is far from certain.
The Ahsoka part of this chapter is neither as deep nor as polished as I would like, but I've been stuck on it for long enough. Sometimes, you've just got to call a thing good enough so you can move on.
I am, however, rather pleased with how the Vader and Piett sections turned out! My brother helped me to smooth over a couple of rough places, so many thanks to him for that. He's started working on original fiction of his own, and it's both so weird and so nice to be able to have extended conversations about writing with him. Every so often, we go over the latest chunk of his story and the latest chunk of my story, and it's so cool, our own little writers' group of two! (And it's just... so weird having a beta-of-sorts, like, this story was not that serious of an endeavour when it started.)
TW for mentions of suicidal clones, and Imperial personnel probably handling it the wrong way.
Although most of the Rebel contingent was to stay on Shili and continue to establish training camps in the remote areas, away from Imperial eyes, the senior leadership were needed for other missions and remained onworld only a short while longer. Ahsoka spent much of her free time getting to know her biological family. Sometimes Rex or Padmé accompanied her to the Tano house, and sometimes she went on her own. She chatted with her parents, played games with her siblings, and once joined her mother and sister on a hunt. They tried, all of them, to keep to lighter topics of conversation, and it wasn't until the night before Ahsoka was to leave that they returned to talking of the darker parts of Ahsoka's story.
"So," Nak-il said that evening at dinner—jovially, but with a bit of a dreary undertone, "you're off tomorrow and leaving us here on our own again."
"Dear," Pav-ti chided gently, as Ahsoka studied a fascinating piece of tuber on her plate.
"I'm not leaving you," Ahsoka said. "I'd like to visit longer—I would—but I have work to do, and…"
"And you already have a family," Nak-il finished. He patted her hand reassuringly, rather in the way one might pat a nervous eopie.
"Yeah, I…." She didn't bother to finish the sentence. There really was no I guess about it.
"I'm glad," Pav-ti said. "I never knew whether my worst fear was that you had died, or that you had survived and were alone in the galaxy, somewhere."
"I've never been alone," Ahsoka told her. "Well—not for a long time."
Nak-il's expression darkened. "You mean when the other Jedi thought you had attacked their temple."
"You knew about that? I had no idea—"
Her parents had known. She couldn't imagine how it would feel to know that a child she had given up for their own good had stood on trial, accused of terrorism and facing execution.
"Terrorism in the capital of the Republic?" said Pav-ti. "At the headquarters of the war's generals? It was all over the holonews! There weren't many details, but the headlines were there."
"We tried to contact the Jedi to find out what was going on," Nak-il put in. "But we could never get through. Wartime filters, probably. We couldn't even get to Coruscant in time, what with the travel restrictions and the delays."
"You tried to come to Coruscant?" An unexpected warmth filled Ahsoka.
"Of course we did. Even afterward. It all faded away on the holonews, after you were exonerated. A nine days' wonder. We didn't know what was going on. They stopped mentioning Skywalker's padawan being involved in battles, that was all. Some of the gossip programs speculated you had left the Jedi. We still tried to get in touch—if you really had left, we wanted to bring you here—but nothing ever came of it."
"Did you leave?" Roshaar asked, in his quiet way.
Even Kaava looked somber as Ahsoka nodded.
"I needed to get away. The Council—the Jedi leaders—they tried to tell me I'd done well and it had all been my trial for knighthood, and I couldn't take it. The way they caved to the Senate, and some of them refused to acknowledge they'd been wrong—so I left."
Maybe it sounded a little childish, now. She had been a little childish, then. That was no great surprise, really. She'd only been sixteen—just Roshaar's age.
"And your master never tried to find you, or make sure you were all right?" Pav-ti demanded. It seemed her opinion of Anakin was not improving.
"He understood that I needed space," protested Ahsoka. "And there were other reasons."
Pav-ti still looked skeptical. An absurd image popped into Ahsoka's head, of her mother berating Darth Vader for abandoning his padawan.
To herself, she could admit it had stung a little, when Anakin hadn't contacted her. But she'd also known that he had been busy fighting a war, and that he already faced disapproval for his attachments. She hadn't wanted to add to that. Now, too, she was glad he had trusted her to take care of herself, and loved her enough to let her go.
It was the Council she really wanted to see Pav-ti berate, she thought with a flash of anger. A kid. You, with all your supposed wisdom and compassion, let a kid go out on the streets to fend for herself. What were you thinking?
It hadn't seemed so viscerally wrong at the time, that they had let her walk away. After two years of war, she'd felt grown up and capable. But now, looking over at Roshaar, still so obviously a kid, she wanted to reach back in time and shake the Council till their teeth rattled. What were you thinking?
"Was that how you survived the end of the war?" Pav-ti asked. "By not being with the army?"
Ahsoka shook her head. "Not exactly. How much do you know about the end of the war?"
"They tell us the Jedi tried to overthrow the Republic."
"Do you believe that?"
"Not very much," Nak-il said. "But I think we knew more about the Jedi than most people. We learned what we could before we sent you to them, and we paid attention to the news because of you. They didn't seem like the kind of people who would stage a coup."
"They weren't. We weren't." Not most of us, anyway. Just the one. "We were sick of war, all of us. But the Chancellor wanted power, and he didn't want us standing in the way." A gross oversimplification, but she didn't want to explain the whole Sith thing to her family, nor did she want to give them any more reason to worry for her. "He used a control that had been engineered into the clones. Told them the Jedi were all traitors to the Republic."
Pav-ti snarled a Togruti curse and thumped her hand on the table so hard that the dishes rattled. "I'd like to rip out his eyes and feed his entrails to a raxshir."
"While they're still in his body," Kaava added.
Nak-il raised an eyemarking, but didn't rebuke his youngest for her bloodthirstiness. The feeling was mutual. Even quiet Roshaar had the hint of a bellicose gleam in his eye.
"Every family that did as we did deserves a piece of his miserable hide," Pav-ti declared. "More than we do, even. We are so much more fortunate than many." She dipped her head, palms pressed to the floor in a silent prayer of thanks, shaded by sorrow for those whose children had never returned, nor ever would.
Many Jedi had been orphans, some had been unwanted, but there were others, like Ahsoka and like her own master, whose families had loved their children and tried to do the best for them. Families who had entrusted their children to the care of a strange Order of service, either for a better life, or so they might learn to use their gifts—and seen them first drafted to the frontlines of war, then slaughtered for the crime of existing. Ahsoka felt ill at the thought. Truly, there was no end to the horrors Palpatine inflicted upon the people of the galaxy. There was probably someone out there whose child or grandchild or little sibling had been a Jedi, someone who had later sheltered a surviving Jedi or a Force-sensitive child for their sake, and been punished by the Empire for it.
And there might even be a handful of families, perhaps just one or two, whose children had become Inquisitors. Chance or the Force had led her back to her birth family; who was to say the same would not happen for an Inquisitor? No awkwardly joyous homecoming there. She knew too well the horror, the guilt, and the grief of such a reunion. First Barriss, and then Anakin—oh, she knew.
Fortunately, before Pav-ti could notice Ahsoka's troubled expression and inquire, the solemn mood in the room was broken by Kaava, who had evidently been ruminating with no small pleasure on the prospect of Palpatine's demise.
"You'd better get rid of that ko gaan kir fast, Ahsoka," she threatened, "or else I'll get old enough to join the Rebellion, and I will."
Pav-ti cast up her eyes as if imploring the stars for mercy.
From there, conversation strayed again to happier subjects, and Roshaar hunted out a pack of cards so Ahsoka could teach them a version of sabacc she had picked up from a gang of smugglers on an Outer Rim mining world. But shades of solemnity lingered, and the gathering remained rather more subdued than on previous occasions.
The next morning, Pav-ti came early to the training camp and walked Ahsoka to the shuttle that she and the others were to take offworld. She had a large package with her, wrapped in a colorful matting of woven turu-grass blades, and tied with twine. Pausing some distance from the shuttle, she handed Ahsoka the package.
"We wanted to give this to you, before you go. I've kept it for so long—Roshaar and Kaava thought I was refusing to accept that you were gone, but I hoped— Well." She dashed away a tear, and smiled. "Go on—open it."
Curious, Ahsoka gave the package an experimental squeeze. It gave easily. When she untied the twine, the matting fell away. Inside were two folded pieces of material, one leather and one cloth. She picked up the leather and gently shook it out. It was a Togruta sash, like the one she had worn as a padawan, but larger, made of slatey-grey leather, elegantly tooled and accented by patterns of subtle blues and a rich, rusty brown. The second piece of fabric turned out to be a long robe of dark grey turu-linen, with a kybuck fur lining that could be removed for wear in temperate climates. Not just a robe, she realised—it was cut after the pattern of Jedi robes, with voluminous sleeves and a deep hood.
"We meant to send them when you became a full Jedi," Pav-ti explained. "Something of your homeworld, and something so you would know we loved you."
She took the robe and held it up. Ahsoka slipped her arms into the sleeves, smiling as her mother fussed with the drape of the fabric, fastened the sash around her waist, and stepped back to cast a proud eye over her.
"Knight Tano."
Ahsoka blushed, still unused to the title, and even less used to her mother's praise.
"They're beautiful," she said, running her hands over the buttery leather and the soft crispness of the linen. "Thank you."
Padmé watched Ahsoka and Pav-ti from the bottom of the shuttle's ramp. They were more comfortable around each other, now, but still the awkwardness of twenty years apart lay between them. She saw it in the little pauses, the unsure way Ahsoka cocked her head now and again, and in Pav-ti's occasional small, jerky shrugs.
Was this how she and her own children would be, someday? So uncertain, so hesitant? And would they see her as a stranger, no more than a distant memory? She could imagine Luke, grown, awkwardly scuffing his feet on the ground as he smiled and tried to find something to say; Leia, extending her hand in a polite but professional and distant greeting—seamlessly exchanging pleasantries, only to fall into awkward silence when the conversation turned to personal matters. Or—they might have families of their own, by the time she saw them again—grandchildren she had never met. Never even known about, if things got bad enough and she had to cut off contact with the Lars.
Force help her—Force help them all.
We have to find a way to end this. I don't want to become a stranger to my children.
Like she had become to her mother, who believed she lay surrounded by cold stone, and her child with her—the child Jobal would only have learned of when she was told her daughter had died.
I'm sorry, Mom.
She saw Pav-ti take Ahsoka's face in her hands, and stretch up on her toes to press a kiss to her tall daughter's forehead. Ahsoka pulled her mother into her arms, and lifted her clean off the ground.
Padmé looked away, her heart aching.
Ahsoka returned her mother to solid ground. Pav-ti held her a moment longer, then stepped back, surreptitiously wiping the corner of her eye.
"Ahsoka," she said, "I know you're a Jedi, and a Rebel, and you have a family of your own, but you can always come back here. If you ever need somewhere to go, we will always welcome you. Even if the Emperor's own attack dog is on your tail."
"I could never—" Ahsoka tried to protest, but Pav-ti cut her off.
"Even if." She poked her in the shoulder with one emphatic finger. "It's one of the very worst things in the world to be alone. If you ever are, you come here. End of story, shaari na kija. Remember that."
Daughter of mine.
"I'll remember."
Satisfied, Pav-ti pulled Ahsoka into one last embrace. "Be careful, out there."
"I'll try," Ahsoka said. It was the best she could promise, as a Rebel and a Jedi. "And if I'm ever passing through again—I'll stop, if I can."
"See that you do," Pav-ti replied, mock-stern to hide how her voice wanted to shake as she let her daughter go for the second time. "Now, I think your friend is getting impatient. Best not to keep her waiting." She gestured toward Padmé, staring into the middle distance with a troubled expression, her arms crossed. "Goodbye, Ahsoka."
"Goodbye, shiri. May the Force be with you."
Ahsoka turned, then, and went to join Padmé, who greeted her with a melancholy smile.
"Is something wrong?" Ahsoka asked.
Padmé shook her head. "Nothing that talking will help."
Ahsoka looped her arm through Padmé's, understanding.
"Come on," she said. "Let's go. We've got work to do. A war to win."
And they headed up into the shuttle, where Rex and Numa were already preparing to take off, Ahsoka turning back for a final wave to her mother just as the ramp began to rise.
In the early hours of the morning, Vader selected eighteen clones of assorted ranks and ordered them to report to the medbay, where they would be seen to strictly by droids which he would either wipe or dismantle when the inhibitor chip removal was complete. That done, he sequestered himself in his quarters, there to attack a slew of reports, communications, and various other administrative tasks with an uncommon zeal. It was not until midway through the afternoon that he finally rose to leave the spartan room that served him for an office.
As the door to the outside corridor opened, a mouse droid trundled in, chirping a stream of frantic binary about urgent messages and stupid organics. A symbol on the droid marked it as belonging to one of the medbays.
"State your message," Vader told the droid, and tried to ignore a rising feeling of apprehension.
[Duplicate organics glitching. System crashes. Going rogue. Attempting to auto-deactivate.]
An icy chill shot along Vader's spine. The clones had not taken the chip removal well, then, and that cold only mean one thing. The Apprentice had spoken the truth, and his men, his loyal soldiers, were no more than—
His slaves.
Overcome by a sudden feebleness in the parts of his limbs that were still organic, he braced one hand against the wall. His office shook around him, the holomaps to one side of the room blinked out, and a pile of datapads clattered off the desk, as the mouse droid's message rattled loose feelings for which he should long ago have lost all capacity. For a long moment, he knew only horror and revulsion, until they were chased away by the rage that was always so ready at hand, tinted now with a shame that seared like sand at midday.
Long ago, when his Master had condoned slavery, Vader had questioned.
It is different, Sidious had said, after the subjugation and enslavement of a former Separatist world. It is necessary. There are but two ways to prevent insurgent rot from spreading, my apprentice—containment, or obliteration. A necessary sacrifice, for as long as there is a rabble that seeks to sow chaos, order and stability cannot endure.
And Vader had accepted the explanation, because freedom or death was a thing of the sand and the suns and the life that was no more.
But this, now, was not a matter of enslaved Separatists or insurgents, nor anything that could be shoved under the guise of a necessity to preserve order. These were his own men, his soldiers, his 501st—and they were his slaves. His slaves, and he must—
He stormed forth into Devastator's halls, a hurricane making for the medbay.
He tried to bury the feelings that were of the Jedi and of weakness, but they lay unquiet in a shallow grave, and so he leaned into his anger—at the Kaminoans, at foolish Sifo-Dyas, at Dooku and Sidious, and at the Jedi. The Jedi should have believed Fives—he should have connected what Fives had said to the shadowy origins of the clone army—
Should have questioned, should have realised—
Heedless of his surroundings, blinded by the furious turmoil within, Vader nearly collided with an officer who had the misfortune to be rounding the same corner as he, from the opposite direction. Venting his rage, he flung the hapless man aside. The thud of his body hitting the opposing wall barely registered. Whether he died or he lived, Vader knew not, nor did he care—his thoughts were consumed with the clones.
Slaves.
Once in the medbay, he went straight to the room where the clones were sequestered. They had congregated in small groups, huddled together on cots like passengers aboard flotsam rafts after crash landing on a water world. Two cots, however, had solitary occupants who lay unmoving. Dead? No—sedated. For their own safety, most likely. Vader recalled the mouse droid's frantic message about attempts to self-destruct.
One of the clones looked up—then, whispering, nudged his companions who followed suit. The morass of grief and guilt and disgust in the Force sharpened, and then all nine Corellian hells broke loose. A handful of clones lurched to their feet, shouting, and formed a defensive line between Vader and the rest of their comrades.
"Dar'jetii shabuir!"
"Who the kark do you think you are?"
"Stay away from our brothers, you kriffin' Sith clanker!"
"Demagolka!"
"Silence!" Vader thundered above the cacophony.
The clamor ceased, and the clones fell back, except for one. CT-6922 stood his ground, blaster in hand.
"Sith scum! You made all my brothers fight for you. You dragged me out of prison to fight your dirty wars. I'd rather have lived the rest of my life in a cell than have been trapped in my own mind and forced to hunt down Jedi and vod'e! Why? Why did you pull me out of that cell just to make me a prisoner in your ranks? What do you have against us, that you just had to torture one more brother?"
Vader had no ready reply for that, and so it was CC-1119, hitherto sitting quietly with his back straight against the wall behind his cot, who spoke into the silence.
"When you were gone, Dogma, our Jedi led us to murder every Jedi in the temple. And then he disappeared. We were assigned to Lord Vader. Every clone unit's been decommissioned. Except ours. There's only one person I can think would do that..." He paused, met Vader's ireful stare, and finished, "General Skywalker."
Vader bristled. "That name has no meaning to me. You will not speak it again."
"What are you gonna do, sir?" asked another clone, who evidently cherished antagonistic inclinations. Striker, the Jedi's memory supplied. "Off us all? After you pulled Dogma out of prison? You've never killed a clone. I don't think you're gonna start now, General."
"That—is—enough." And Vader raised his hand.
"You betrayed us!" Dogma spat, ignoring the ominous gesture. "You led us against our own, Skyw—"
"CT-6922—" Vader warned.
"My name's Dogma, sir, and damned if I'm gonna be called a string of numbers like a karkin' brainless clanker. Been there once, and I'm not going back. We trusted you, General, but turns out you're just another kriffing Krell!"
"He's worse!" Striker argued, before Vader could lash out at Dogma. "At least Krell, we could disobey. But you, General—you made us slaughter Jedi when those kriffing chips in our heads gave us no other choice. You used us, you made us your sla—"
He cut off, gagging and gasping for air as Vader's fist closed.
Dogma's face contorted with fury, and his fingers jerked the trigger of his blaster once, twice, three times. Vader deflected the shots with the Force and likewise yanked the blaster from his hands.
"I have been unaware of the function of the chips," he hissed—though the vocoder made his voice sound the same as it ever did.
"And that makes it any better, what you've done?" asked another clone. Stowaway. "You thought we wouldn't question executing civilians just because they sheltered a Jedi for a night? You thought we'd willingly fire on Captain Rex, and the Commander?"
"They are traitors!"
"Then all I can say, sir, is that maybe being a traitor isn't always wrong. Because if loyalty means killing innocents and crushing the worlds we fought to free from the Seppies—then treason's the only decent choice."
Before Vader could respond, his comm chimed. Piett.
"Admiral."
"My lord—I've had an urgent report." Piett sounded more nervous in addressing Vader than he had for weeks.
"What is it?"
"Several soldiers have accessed the hyperdrive chamber and are attempting sabotage."
Vader almost made a sharp inquiry as to whether Piett was unable to deal with a small mutiny on his own ship. Another thought occurring to him, however, he scanned the room and realised four of the eighteen men he had sent to the medbay were absent. Those still present and conscious watched him with expressions ranging from shell-shocked to hateful.
"Sir?" Piett prompted.
"I will see to it, Admiral." Turning to the clones once more, he added, "You will not leave this room."
"How'd the General turn dar'jetii?" Dogma demanded, once Vader had gone.
"I don't know," Appo replied. "Everything was going okay, we were on Coruscant, enjoying the leave; General Kenobi had just taken his boys off to catch Grievous. Thought maybe it'd be the end, and we'd never have to ship out again. Then I got a call from the Chancellor. He said..."
They all knew what he had said, of course. Every one of them had heard the order repeated.
"Skywalker ordered us to the Temple grounds. Something was off about him. Then he led us inside. He led at the front, just like always. He fought as fierce as any of us, just like always. Except..." Appo didn't need to finish that sentence, either. They all remembered the Temple. None who had been there would ever forget—none could—and Dogma did not need to hear the horrors spoken.
"It doesn't make sense," Stowaway said. "If General Kenobi and the Commander had died, then maybe—but they're alive. He knows they're alive. They're top of the kriffin' wanted listed."
Appo shrugged. "Maybe he has a chip, too. Maybe the Chancellor wanted a dar'jetii of his own after he saw how powerful Dooku was. Maybe he got him chipped right on Corrie. He'd have the connections."
"Whatever it is, I say we get out of here," Dogma muttered. "I'm not fighting for any damned Sith, even if he is the General."
"You should leave," agreed Appo. "Our codes probably haven't been inactivated yet. Sneak away while you can."
Even on Devastator, there was often a bit of a lag in administrative affairs.
"Sir, you're talking like you won't be coming with us."
"I won't. Someone has to stay for Reech and Suumla—" he nodded toward the vod'e who had been sedated, "and for the di'kuts who decided it'd be a good idea to sabotage a dar'jetii's flagship."
"If you're staying, sir, then we all are," Stowaway declared.
Appo glanced at Dogma, whose face was set, and Striker, who had moved to stand beside him. "No. You should go. You deserve better than being prisoners here."
"No, we don't!" burst out Shereshoy. "We've shot at the Commander, and we've shot our own vod'e. We've shot kids, Appo! Cadets, tubies—we killed 'em! We don't deserve—"
Appo rested a hand on his distraught brother's shoulder. "Listen to me, Sheresh'ika. You heard what the droid told us. There were chips in our heads. The Jedi Temple and everything since—that wasn't us. We're better than that. We all deserve better than this, and as your commander, I'm ordering you—" He broke off with a sigh. Soldiers though they were, it felt unfair to order them to do anything at this point. "Look—we don't want to let Dogma and Striker go off alone, do we?"
A murmur of agreement rose around the room.
"All right, then. I want one squad leaving, and one staying. Got to make sure there are enough of you to take care of yourselves, out there. With a whole squad, you should be able to claim you're on official business if anyone asks."
A second round of agreement, albeit more grudging this time.
"Then we'd better get this sorted quick, before our di'kut'la General comes back. Dogma, Striker, and seven more of you will be going. Take a shuttle from one of the busier hangars, and no one should bother to question it. Head to Naboo, or Alderaan. Find one of the Senator's vod'e, or Senator Organa. If anyone knows where to find the Rebels, it'll be them. Maybe they'll even be able to get you to Rex and Commander Tano."
Piett, waiting on the hyperdrive chamber's central catwalk, saluted at Vader's approach. A number of stormtroopers stood near him, guarding two clones whose hands were bound behind their backs.
"Aruetii etyc—ni'duraa!" one of the clones growled, and spat on the walkway at Vader's feet. Vader silenced him with a gesture. The clone continued to glare death his way, struggling against an invisible muzzle.
"Damage report," Vader told Piettl.
"One of the main hyperdrive cores has gone completely offline, sir. We have engineers working to locate the problem. The safety systems have also been disabled, and several sensor arrays need to be repaired or replaced. Support beams for the backup drive's core were cracked by an explosion that also destroyed part of a walkway. Five technicians and engineers have also been sent to med bay for blaster wounds."
In other words, Devastator was effectively crippled for the time being. There would be no chance of keeping the matter quiet, Vader realised with frustration. The hyperdrive crew, the repair crew, and the stormtroopers who had apprehended the clones would all be well aware of what had happened.
Impulse and habit reached for violence, the dark side of the Force gathered round him, ready to constrict throats and snap necks—but in a moment of prudence, he hesitated. As it was, the crew knew that four clones had mutinied. It was an isolated incident. But to silence everyone who knew it—that would create the appearance of conspiracy. Four clones going rogue could be explained, somehow. The sudden disappearance of half a dozen or more hyperdrive crew and two entire squads of stormtroopers, however, coupled with the removal of two squads' worth of clones—that would create talk, and talk might make its way back to his Master, who would be quick to scent treachery.
And so Vader stayed his hand, and watched in silence as several more troopers approached from another of the catwalks, herding two more clones.
"Let go of me, you kriffin' shiny," one snarled.
"Sorry, sir, but I can't," the young stormtrooper gripping his arm replied—a squadmate, perhaps. "It's orders."
The clone's face twisted. "And good soldiers follow orders, eh? Don't listen to 'em, shiny. It's a damned lie."
Vader felt the other stormtroopers' morbid curiosity as their attention shifted back and forth between him and the clones. They knew clones enjoyed greater leniency, but surely there must be a limit to what their commander would tolerate. There should have been, undoubtedly. The dark side curled impatiently, feeding on his flickering anger, snapping for rage and death, but he did not reach for it. These were his men, and they had all been through hell together—scores of battlegrounds, sun and rain and snow and mud—bled together, and together buried their dead. They were the 501st, and perhaps that meant more than it should—to a Sith, and to Vader in particular—but just now, he little cared.
"The incident will be investigated," he said, for the benefit of the ruse. A couple of the clones coughed, while the other two shot him incredulous looks. "Lieutenant, take these men to the cells."
The stormtrooper lieutenant saluted, and his squads marched their renegade comrades away. Vibrant Mando'a obscenities drifted in their wake.
"I am to be informed when the core is back online and repairs are complete," Vader told Piett, who had lingered on the catwalk. "Report to me at the end of your shift, as well."
By that time, he intended to have an explanation ready which would avert unwanted rumors.
Piett paled a shade or two, but he offered a sharp salute before going to confer with one of the engineers working to repair the main hyperdrive.
The departing squad was long gone by the time Lord Vader returned. Aside from Reech and Suumla, only Appo, Stowaway, and a trooper named Mouse remained. Appo had managed to arrange things so the vod'e who were the worst off had gone with Dogma's squad. Stowaway and Mouse, like he himself, were better able maintain perspective, at least for the present.
Upon Vader's entrance, his respirator made three ominous cycles as he took in the absence of clones, before he finally demanded, "Where are the others?"
"Gone, sir," Appo replied.
Three more cycles.
"Where have they gone?"
"They didn't tell us where they planned to go."
Fortunately, Vader didn't pursue that line of questioning any further, saying instead, "Yet you remain. Why? Do you plan to escape later, with intelligence for the rebels?"
"No, sir," said Stowaway. "We're here because the 501st doesn't have dar'aliit."
"We won't fight for the Empire," Appo added. "But we're not leaving our vod'e, not any of 'em."
Vader said nothing—merely stood, an ominous figure looming above them. He seemed at a loss for words—surprised, perhaps, to find there was a middle ground between blind loyalty and treason.
Regarding him carefully, Appo rose. If he was going to try to speak on behalf of his men, it had better be now, while Vader was thus on the back foot.
"Sir," he tried.
"Commander."
"The others, sir, who've still got their chips. Please—don't order them to fight for you."
He wanted to ask Vader to remove their chips, but he wasn't blind to the ramifications of that. Remove all the chips, all at once, and some of the brothers who couldn't be trusted with blasters would surely slip through the cracks. Nor was he blind to the fact that Vader might very well refuse such a request outright. He was a far cry from the General they had known during the war. And indeed—
"You make this request," Vader said, "after turning against me."
Appo did not quite manage to stifle a sigh. "I haven't turned against you, sir. None of us have. We're just refusing to fight for a cause we see as wrong. There's a difference. I'm still here. All I'm asking is that you take care of our men. I know you've got more regard for the vod'e than you do for most natborn soldiers."
Vader raised a menacing finger in Appo's direction. "You presume much, Commander."
"It's not a presumption, sir, it's an observation. You've never yet killed a vod, and I think that has to count for something. All I'm saying, sir—if you care at all for any of us, don't make the brothers fight. And Reech and Suumla—they deserve better than to be kept drugged out of their minds. They need help." He paused, aware of the explosion his next words could cause, but forged on for the sake of his brothers. "Rex and the Commander might—"
"Enough," Vader said, pinning Appo with a forbidding stare. But there seemed a weariness to the word this time, and Appo thought perhaps his gaze lingered a moment on the still bodies of Reech and Suum'la before he turned to leave.
Seething, Vader once more paced his quarters. Of the eighteen clones whose chips had been removed, nine had deserted, four chosen sabotage, and two attempted to put a period to their existence. Only three had elected to remain, and that merely out of concern for their comrades.
But we're not leaving our vod'e, not any of 'em.
Perhaps, though, it was not only for their comrades that they stayed. He did not think he had imagined the brief, significant look that had accompanied Appo's words.
Your loyalty would do you credit, Commander, he thought, but entertain no delusions. Skywalker is gone. Others have tried to resurrect him; you will not succeed where they have failed.
But try as he might to disdain the clone commander's misplaced faithfulness, he did not meet with unmitigated success. [What was it Padmé had said, months ago? Something about the necessity of connection. People aren't made for isolation.]
Impatiently, he brushed the thought away. None of that mattered—certainly, the faint, nebulous suggestion of warmth which Appo's words had conjured did not. It would only weaken him, which he neither wanted nor could he afford. Only strength in the dark side would allow him to rise up against his Master.
His Master, who had brought this upon his men. Wrath boiled in his veins, warm and vital, urging action, retribution. He dared to indulge in a fleeting, vengeful fancy—Sidious, the wicked light fading from his eyes, replaced by a satisfying fear as he looked into the face of death, seconds before Vader's crimson blade plunged into his chest to the hilt.
One day. For now, however, revenge must wait, and Vader must set aside his wrath. The setting-aside of anger was an exercise to which he was long unaccustomed, but it must be done, if he was to deal carefully with the matter of the clones.
He tried to despise the clones who, appalled by what they had done, had attempted to put a period to their existence. Appo had supplicated for aid on their behalf, but they were weak. Unfit for duty. Unfit to be soldiers. Suumla, at least, had never even been much of a soldier to begin with.
[But he had been the heart of his squad. A gentle, daydreaming soul, whose batchmates had covered for him on Kamino, to prevent him being decommissioned as a defective product. His vod'e in Sarlacc Squad had continued to do so during the war, until they learned that their General would never decommission one of his men.]
Vader had no use for gentle daydreamers.
[They deserve better.]
They are disloyal.
–They are mine, and I will not lose them.–
Most of all, however, they were a liability. That must take precedence above all else, for if Sidious learned of the hyperdrive incident, if he thought to connect the Apprentice's beads, Piett's promotion, and the handful of clones going rogue—. Questions would follow. Suspicions, restrictions. Investigations.
Padmé. Luke. Vader's only choice was subterfuge, to prevent a confrontation he had as yet no chance of winning.
Damn his old master a thousand times. Were he whole, unlimited by the injuries from Mustafar, he could act freely, without this maddening necessity of conspiring in the shadows until his apprentice grew strong enough to help him kill his Master. Feeling more trapped than ever in the confines of his suit, he retreated into his meditation pod. Better to be stuck in a cage than in a sarcophagus.
He must prevent his Master from discovering what he had done with the clones, and why. Every de-chipped clone who had not already escaped or decided to remain voluntarily must be sent elsewhere, out of Sidious' reach. To Mustafar? No—it was Vader's domain, but his Master could trespass with impunity, and would, given reason. Besides, the saboteurs had already managed to cripple Vader's own flagship while he was onboard. Force only knew what they might attempt—and achieve—in his absence.
But, if not Mustafar, then where?
[You know where.]
Far out of Sidious' reach—somewhere he would never expect his apprentice to hide his secrets—
[They need help. Rex and the Commander might—]
Absolutely not. Darth Vader would not provide soldiers to populate the ranks of the insurgent horde.
But if he was forced to choose between sending six men, none of them ranking higher than sergeant, to the rebels, and leaving loose threads lying around the galaxy for Sidious' spies to root out or stumble upon, then he knew what his choice must be. With the saboteurs and the suicidal clones safely hidden amongst the rebels, he could allow the rest of the 501st to suppose they had been imprisoned or executed.
The rest of the 501st.
Preoccupied as he had been with Appo and company, he had not considered what was to be done with all the other clones in his legion. Slaves, all of them—but if he removed the chips, they would turn against him. He cursed the Apprentice for sowing those seeds of doubt which had led him to shatter the illusion of his loyal soldiers.
I dreamed… I freed all the slaves.
Long-forgotten words floated across the years. The divide between past and present wavered, illusory. The Jedi's revulsion seeped through, and his guilt.
He thought, bitterly, of Ringo Vinda and of Tup, and Fives—of a field of graves on a desolate moon, and of the many soldiers aboard Devastator at this very moment, all slaves to the chips in their brains. The Jedi had been foolish. He should have known better than to tolerate a control chip of any kind, but he had followed blindly along with the other Jedi, accepted the "inhibitor chips" as a distasteful but necessary part of a distasteful but necessary war, and in so doing had failed his men.
And left Vader with an impossible choice. Traitors, or loyal soldiers? The answer was obvious. Free men, or slaves? Again, an obvious answer. But they were mutually exclusive, these answers, and so Vader found himself mired in uncertainty and indecision such as no Sith should ever suffer to hold them back. There was no way forward, unless he purposely allowed his men to turn against him—
Like Appo and Stowaway and Mouse turned against you? Padmé's voice asked, somewhere in his mind.
Even if they had not turned against him personally, Vader argued at the voice, they were but three out of eighteen, and they had certainly turned against the Empire.
And does that matter? It was his— It was Shmi Skywalker's voice, now. If you do not remove the chips, then the 501st are your slaves.
Leaning forward, metal elbows propped on metal knees, he pressed his hands to his face, buffeted by alternating tides of fury and loathing. His durasteel fingers dug into his skull as though striving to physically pry the remains of the Jedi from his brain as he fought to convince himself that he did not care.
Let the Jedi protest vehemently from his living tomb; it would change nothing. The chips would remain. Darth Vader did not care.
The struggle met with mixed success. Only upon realising that he could not possibly remove all of the chips and keep the matter quiet was he able to regain a semblance of self-command.
For this was the most important thing: that his Master must not know. Removing all of the chips would lead to a full-scale mutiny, and there would be no keeping that from Sidious. [And there would be more clones who, like Reech and Suumla, would not be able to live with themselves.]
The chips must remain.
Still, it would be advisable to remove the clones from active duty. This was simply because Vader had no use for soldiers whose loyalty depended upon a chip—of course. They would be a liability. And a security risk. For all he knew, the chips could degrade tomorrow and lead to a full-blown mutiny. Removed from active duty, therefore, the clones certainly must be.
There should be little enough questioning of the reason for the change, given today's hyperdrive incident—and it would be simple enough to pass off said incident as the result of an illness contracted on a recent campaign, to which the clones were peculiarly susceptible. Ironic, to be using that excuse now that the secret of the chips was known. Even his Master should find it believable, however. The chips did have a history of malfunctioning, and it was not beyond the realm of possibility that some biological agent might disrupt their function.
Again, his fury toward Sidious flared. Again, and with great effort, he banked the fires. There would be time to let loose his wrath upon his Master. For now, he must strategize how the clones were to be delivered into the care of the insurgents. He ground his teeth at the thought, but there was no help for it. To the rebels, six of the clones must go.
At the end of his shift, Piett reported as ordered to Lord Vader's quarters. He knew where they were, of course—many officers did, if only for the sake of being able to avoid their general vicinity. The door slid open at his approach, which shouldn't have unnerved him, given that every other door on the ship worked the same way, but here it made him feel as though he was being watched.
He probably was. Lord Vader would be able to sense his approach with the Force. With that pleasant thought, he squared his shoulders, stepped inside, and tried not to feel too much like a fly entering a spider's web.
The room beyond, which appeared to be an office, was at present unoccupied. Piett elected to wait just inside the door, lest any further progress should be construed as intrusion.
Cautiously, he looked around. He had anticipated some degree of grandeur in the private rooms of the Emperor's second-in-command. His expectations, however, were rapidly corrected, for he found himself in an austere, impersonal space not unlike the corridor from whence he had come. All in shades of black and grey, devoid of even an iota of warmth or character, it was furnished only with a broad, utilitarian desk, accompanied by a sturdy bench and inhabited by a computer terminal and a collection of datapads. To one side of the room were also a comms holoprojector and several strategic holomaps. One showed current fleet locations. On another, Piett noted flags for the Ring of Kafrene and a nearby planet; on a third were flagged Kamino, Wrea, Geonosis, and another Rim world he didn't recognize.
If he had supposed his commander's inner sanctum might so much as hint at a personality beyond the terrifying presence that haunted the bridge, he was mistaken. The only thing that even suggested Lord Vader's existence as a sentient, organic being was the disorderliness of the pile of datapads on his desk. And even that was a stretch, really—Piett had heard of droids that developed quirks and messier tendencies when improperly maintained.
No family, no interests, no comforts of any description. On the bridge, that was intimidating. In a private office, it felt rather desolate, the marker of a cold, meaningless existence. But he swiftly stuffed these thoughts away, recalling Lord Vader's uncanny ability to read minds and feelings—and not a moment too soon, for just then a door whished open on the far side of the room to admit the individual in question, who came to a halt at his desk, whereat he anchored in the attitude of a judge presiding over his bench. The sound of his respirator echoed ominously in the spartan room.
Piett saluted, and tried to calm a flutter of nerves. If Lord Vader had been displeased with his handling of the clone incident, he would have been swiftly apprised of the fact, and would likely be enjoying a chilly reception in the ship's morgue at this very moment.
"At ease, Admiral," said Vader. "Come forward."
Piett advanced until he stood just a pace or two from the desk. He felt rather as a clawmouse must in the shadow of a lothcat.
"You have a close acquaintance with Colonel Veers, of the 501st," Vader observed.
Piett stiffened again, despite the order to ease. "Yes, my lord."
"You consider him trustworthy."
Was Max's loyalty being called into question? Surely, Lord Vader could not believe he had been involved in the hyperdrive mutiny?
"I trust him with my life."
"With your secrets?"
Piett felt the blood drain from his face. Perhaps this was not about the stormtroopers at all. Vader must have somehow learned that Veers knew something of Starkiller's existence.
"Yes," he said, willing his voice to remain calm and sure. "I trust him."
Vader leaned forward a trifle—the lothcat, about to strike.
"So greatly that you told him that which I commanded was to remain in confidence?"
"I—" Piett's mind raced. Lord Vader had Max in his cross hairs, and all he could do was to draw his fire. He raised his chin. "Yes. I told him."
"Do not waste my time with lies."
Damn the Force. Piett looked past his commander's accusing forefinger to meet his inscrutable gaze. "Colonel Veers knows the boy exists and that he has some connection with you. That is all. All that he may have concluded, he has done only through my own carelessness. The fault is mine."
But for all that he took the blame on his own narrow shoulders, he did not actually apologise, nor would he. It was not insubordination; merely, he had drawn his line and he refused to cross it, come what might.
He waited for the inevitable pressure around his throat, but nothing happened. Vader merely crossed his arms.
"Tell Colonel Veers to report to me," he said.
Piett waited as long as he dared before snapping out a curt, "Yes sir."
"I presume," Vader continued, "that you have been wondering what could have inspired stormtroopers to sabotage."
"I have, sir," Piett replied stiffly. "If there is to be mutiny, I would prefer to be aware sooner rather than later."
"It seems, Admiral, that some among the legion contracted an illness during a recent campaign. The clones appear particularly vulnerable to it. The affected individuals have been isolated; the rest will be removed from active duty until further notice, and their access to weapons and munitions storage revoked."
Piett thought this sounded a trifle peculiar—but then, it was the clones, after all, and they were generally understood to be a trifle peculiar themselves. Perhaps it ought not to come as a surprise that men who aged twice as quickly as their peers would also be prone to exhibit strange reactions to illnesses.
"And the saboteurs?" he asked, before he could think better of it.
"What of them?"
"Are they to be held responsible for that which was not their fault?"
"I was unaware that the Stormtrooper Corps had fallen under the Navy's purview."
"My apologies, sir. I overstepped."
Vader regarded him for a long moment before, unmooring from the desk, he crossed to the triad of holomaps and studied the one wherein Kafrene was flagged. With one finger, he traced a route between it and some world within the Chommell sector. When he spoke again, it was to change the subject entirely.
"Among the rebels is an agent named Revenant. Any information regarding her is to be brought to me at once. This, too, is to remain confidential."
"I understand," said Piett, with a mixture of one part dread and two parts resignation at the prospect of further involvement in his commander's secrets.
"Then you are dismissed, Captain," said Vader, and started back toward the door from whence he had come.
Captain? Perhaps it had been a slip of the tongue, for Piett had never known Vader to demote an officer rather than off him, but neither had he ever known him to slip thus.
"My lord—" he began, "to clarify—was that a demotion?"
"Was what a demotion?"
"When you called me Captain, sir. I thought perhaps—"
"No," returned Vader, abruptly. Though Piett could not see his eyes, he felt the intensity of his stare nonetheless. "Your service has been... commendable, Admiral. Dismissed."
Commendable? And now it was Piett who was staring, thrown completely off kilter by that one word.
The door opened—Lord Vader must have opened it—and even without the Force, he could feel his commander's irritation growing. With a hurried salute, he made his retreat, found Veers and reluctantly informed him that their commander wished to see him, and returned to his quarters in a bit of a daze.
Commendable.
Not merely sufficient, or adequate, but commendable. Had any officer before him earned such high praise? Piett did not like to overestimate his own merits, but he had to admit that it seemed unlikely, given what he knew of naval officers in general, and their turnover rate in Death Squadron in particular.
So, here he was—keeper of Lord Vader's secrets, and an officer of commendable service, despite his absurdly meteoric rise through the ranks. He could not but wonder why. Why him? Why all of this? Why any of it?
He poured himself a drink and took a moment—quite a few moments, rather—to sit down, rest, and reflect upon the strange series of events that had brought him to this point.
It seemed all to have begun after that business at Kafrene—and there was another rumor to Lord Vader's detriment, to the effect that a rebel had made off with his Lordship's own starfighter. After that, Starkiller had called, and Lord Vader had allowed Piett to live despite knowing of his secret apprentice. It was clear enough now that he had been testing him—and that he must have found him satisfactory, for he had proceeded to elevate him several ranks and finally to deem him commendable. And then there was this matter of inquiring after Veers' trustworthiness—and Starkiller's account of how his master had taken care of his "training injury." Plus, there was a rebel named Revenant, whom Vader for some reason wished to remain a secret, as well, and where she fit into the whole thing, Piett could not say. Perhaps she had been the one to steal the starfighter.
He turned the pieces over, trying to see how each could possibly fit with the others. Lord Vader had a secret apprentice. For Lord Vader, terror personified, had a master of his own. He was but an apprentice, conspiring to overthrow that master, Starkiller had said, and Starkiller would aid him. Was this what he had recruited Piett into, and now Veers as well? Were officers of His Imperial Majesty's own military to be dragged headforemost into a power struggle between two dark sorcerers?
Force, let it not be so. Piett took a rather lengthy draught of brandy, and rose to pace. By all the depths of the universe beyond, this was a strange world anymore. Strange times, and stranger beings. He felt as though his life was become something from an ancient legend, where men were called upon by gods.
He wondered what the Emperor himself made of it all. Vader's loyalty to the Emperor was strong as beskar. What of his master? Did His Majesty even know of the second Sith? Or was Piett, in this one, unenviable way, more knowledgeable than he?
Hold up, he thought, there's something else. The Sevret campaign…
Why had Lord Vader allowed the invasion of Sevret to be such a poorly-strategized affair? That was not his style. He would not have used so many squadrons, and he would not have risked the survival of his own to give Piett a humiliating demise, nor would he have compromised its reputation for that end. Especially not when he found Piett commendable.
That order must have come from the Emperor. His Majesty must have been unaware of the fraught circumstances in Death Squadron, and thus assumed it to be headed by a capable and seasoned admiral. But had Vader not informed him otherwise, to spare his own fleet from risk? Was he so zealously faithful to His Majesty that he would not speak up to preserve his own squadron's reputation? But why would a Sith Lord be the zealot of a mere, Forceless, workaday emperor? Why, for that matter, did the Sith allow the Emperor to govern at all? Why not crush him like the insignificant clawmouse he was, next to their might?
And where, in all this, did Vader's shadowy master figure?
Perhaps Vader had sworn fealty to the Emperor in hopes of recruiting him and his resources to fight against the hidden master. That hypothesis, however, only raised the question of why the master would allow such a thing—and allow it he must, for Vader made no secret of his Imperial allegiance.
No matter how Piett turned them, the pieces of the puzzle refused to fit together.
Until, pondering late into the night, he found himself wandering a long and convoluted avenue of thought through which he arrived at the question of whether Obi-Wan Kenobi could be the Sith master. Lord Vader certainly harbored hatred enough there, he thought, recalling the damage inflicted upon poor Devastator's bridge the day before. But no—Kenobi was thoroughly documented as a Jedi, a traitor, and a rebel. A Jedi, like those at Errece. Jedi, enemies of the Sith according to Starkiller.
And that led him back again to Errece and Sevrevar, for who was it who was killing the Jedi? Who ordering the glassing of cities to prove a point about the Jedi?
It can't be.
Piett's blood ran cold at the thought that began to worm its way into his brain. Why would a Sith Lord be a workaday emperor's zealot? Why, indeed—unless all was not as it seemed—unless the Emperor possessed some hidden power. Unless he was not a workaday emperor at all, but rather—
Knees suddenly in danger of giving out, Piett sank into the chair at his desk. The wood was cool and solid beneath his fingers, reassuringly and devastatingly real. He had not embarked upon some mad flight of fancy—but that only meant he was, in fact, very much involved in a very real matter of treason. For the simplest conclusion was that only another, more powerful Sith could hold such sway over Lord Vader as the Emperor did. And if the Emperor was Vader's master, then it was the Emperor against whom Vader schemed, and it was the Emperor from whom Piett was sworn to conceal his scheming. Every moment he served under Vader's command, he was breaking his oath of service as an officer of His Majesty's Imperial Navy.
Questioning the methods of the Empire, as he had begun to do, was one thing. Participating in treason was quite another thing entirely.
He rubbed his eyes. This must be merely a leap at outlandish conclusions, brought about by the lateness of the hour. Yes, that must be it. He would turn in, and come morning he would realise that Emperor Palpatine could not possibly be a Sith, and he himself therefore could not possibly have committed treason, however unwittingly, by keeping Vader's secrets from his master, nor—oh, stars. Nor gotten Max dragged into it.
Upon that cheery thought, he lay down, turned off the light, and studiously attempted to think no more about it until sleep snatched him away into blessed oblivion.
My brain is for some reason possessed by the urge to do a sketch of Ahsoka in her new robe and sash, in the style of a 1920s fashion plate, so that will probably be added to my Tumblr at some point.
Togruti translations
Since there's apparently no official Togruti conlang, I made up a little of my own, based to some extent on the sounds and sound combinations present in canonical Togruta names. (Same strategy as I used to come up with names for the Regasa, her minister, and Ahsoka's siblings.)
Ko gaan kir: insult/obscenity that I haven't bothered to define, but a strong one, along the lines of e chu ta or shabuir.
Shaari na kija: daughter of mine
Shiri: mother/mom
Mando'a translations
Demagolka: monster, war criminal
Dar'jetii shabuir: Sith "extreme insult - *jerk*, but much stronger". (I am so amused by how the Mando'a dictionary website dances around explicitly defining shab as f***, even though it's pretty clear from the usages of all the words with the root shab.)
Shereshoy: Mando'a word meaning lust for life, carpe diem, etc.
Suumla: from suum "beyond" + 'la (adjective suffix) to make "beyondish," I'm thinking like a daydreamer, that sort of idea
Di'kut'la: idiotic
Aruetii etyc—ni'duraa!: filthy traitor—you disgust me!