A Young Girl's War Between the Stars [Youjo Senki/Star Wars]

86

A Young Girl’s War Between the Stars86

Hyperspace, en route to Lothal. 35 BBY/965 GSC.

Sipping at a cup of tea, I hummed in thought as I read over the latest missives and reports.

The operation to retake Botajef had been a complete success—a decisive win and a good opening move for the start of this war. My Padawans had performed admirably and, after going over the reports from the Mandos with them along with watching the footage from the squad helmet cameras, I had put together a plan to work on areas where they could improve—after I praised them and promised a reward, of course. A job well done deserved to be acknowledged, after all.

The way they lit up when I did so made it worth it. The pair of girls were desperate for acknowledgement and validation, to know that their training had paid off and they had my approval. It left me wondering if perhaps I was a bit too sparing when it came to doling out praise and reward. They children, after all. In the end, I had resolved to find more things to test their skill and properly acknowledge them for—since praise without having done something was meaningless.

As for Botajef, unfortunately the TradeFed had managed to damage the shipyards in the end—both the orbital works and in their siege on the ground yards. It was minimal, thankfully. Civilian casualties were a minimum and only a few had lost their lives in the initial takeover of the orbital works by the TradeFed. Initial estimates gave one to three months to affect repairs and get them back online, and turning out ships for the Confederacy. I had already called for volunteer repair crews from Mandalore to come and aid in the repairs, promising triple overtime plus hazard pay to try to cut that restoration time down as much as possible.

From this point onward, the Botajef situation was out of my hands and left for someone else to deal with. We were leaving a small number of ships to patrol and secure the system against the TradeFed potentially trying to retake it, but I didn’t believe they would. Not after the massive loss they had suffered here.

And it was . An entire fleet of TradeFed ships had been destroyed. One of their droid carriers captured, along with the army of droids it controlled—which had been recalled from the surface using the same control system that had sent them down. The had managed to get out a transmission just before I had captured the bridge, informing the TradeFed that the fleet had been destroyed, the ship boarded, and the scuttling protocol disabled.

As for my new prizes… After loading the droid army back up onto the , I’d had the whole thing shipped back off to Mandalore with an escort, where my people were going to go over it with a fine toothed comb. The battle droids would likely be relegated to labor—there were plenty of simple, repetitive, dangerous jobs in the system that were better suited to a droid than a person. The droid control system would be removed and studied, in an attempt to better understand how to interfere with the TradeFed’s droid army in the future.

Then there were the droid fighters… I was having most of them shipped to R&D. I was not above reverse engineering them and further filling out our starfighter ranks with droids. I was thinking mixed units of living pilots, working with droid fighter support. I had kept a group of six such droids for myself and loaded them onto the after doing a complete wipe of their systems and a bit of reprogramming of their IFF system to recognize Confederate ships as friendlies and TradeFed as hostile. Those, I would start training with the girls with shortly, against our own fighters. Certain levels of droids could —that was one of their biggest advantages. The fighters were in that class, and I wanted to teach them how to fly and fight against superior opponents and as part of a team. The more work we did training them now, the better off we’d be later, since we could export that data into whatever new droid fighter we developed. I was looking forward to seeing them in action.

Capt. Taris and his crew, along with the intelligence team assigned to my stealth ship, had redeployed after acting as our forward scout in the Botajef system. Currently, they were set to head to the Corporate Sector and do some scouting. A number of people involved at high levels with the Trade Federation called the Corporate Sector their home and I wanted actionable intelligence. I was a of the decapitation strike, and if I thought it was possible to cripple or even significantly damage the TradeFed with a few precision attacks, I would take full advantage of whatever opportunity I could find or create.

Finally, myself and my Padawans. I had only one active mission at the moment, and Darth Logis was laying low for the time being until I had more intelligence worth acting on. With Master Dooku’s assignment on Botajef concluded, I had some free time on my hands and I had promised my Padawans a . I wanted to give them something special, something they would appreciate for years to come. And since we were in the galactic neighborhood at only nine grid squares away, I’d decided to take them on a field trip to find their own familiars—and maybe some companions for Catya to play with. And if I were being honest, I was also a bit interested to see just what sort of environment bred an animal with an innate ability to teleport using the Force.

The holocom on my desk blinked, and I raised an eyebrow at the incoming call on a secure line. Hitting accept, I found myself looking at a full color image of Taria on the other side, a smile on the girl’s face. “Taria.”

“Tanya,” she nodded. “Or should I say ‘Mand’alor?’”

I sighed, shaking my head. “Just Tanya, please.”

“Weeell, if you insist,” the girl teased, and I rolled my eyes.

“I take it you’re settling in well?” I asked. The last thing I had heard from her was just before the Botajef operation. She had arrived on Serenno and made contact with Jenza as instructed, and we were in the process of constructing a hidden Temple/library out in the mountains somewhere to her specifications.

“Yeah, things have been great. Countess Jenza’s people have been really helpful. Did you finish with that secret mission?”

I frowned. “And how did you hear about that?”

The aqua haired girl grinned. “,” she reminded me, and I resisted the urge to groan. I would be having a talk with Xana and patching whatever leak Taria had found.

“It’s not secret anymore,” I admitted, standing and moving to the teapot to refill my cup. As I did, I explained, “We went to Botajef and liberated it from the Trade Federation.”

“And their shipyards, of course,” I could hear the amusement in her voice at that.

“Of course,” I agreed.

“Mm.” There was a pause, then, “…And you’ve been there the whole time?”

“Hm?” I asked, glancing up and seeing her studying me. Moving back to the table as I stirred my cup, I nodded. “Yes. We left this morning, en route to our next destination. I’m taking my Padawans hunting for familiars. Why?”

The girl was silent for a few moments, before tapping at something on her end. A moment later, a new video popped up—this one in the standard holocom shades of blue. On it, a robed and armored figure cut her way through a group of Jedi. I swallowed thickly as I watched the carnage.

I recognized the form—or rather, the complete lack of one. There were elements of other forms in places where it was needed—the strikes of Shii-Cho, the defensive maneuvers of Soresu, the mobility of Ataru, the ferocity of Juyo. In other words, it was less using the styles themselves so much as the ideas behind them. And all of those were cut down, reduced to their core tenants and stripped of anything extraneous, then used in the most mundane, utilitarian, way possible.

Use basic strikes instead of anything flashy or complicated. Move as little as you have to, and when you do, move fast and with ferocity. Use minimalist dodges and parries that lead to easy counters, instead of flashy blocks or acrobatics. It wasn’t a style, it was literally just the embodiment of the idea of .

Studying it more closely, I hummed. The robes looked similar to those I used in my alter ego, as did the armor. But the —that wasn’t one of mine. It was shaped a bit oddly. A bit too wide—like two of my normal lightsabers stacked on top of each other for the bottom three quarters. Just below the emitter was a round plate attached to vents, creating a circular guard of plasma above the hand—shielded from the hand by the physical guard at all times. The emitter was also a bit longer than normal, which told me that it likely included some kind of modification, such as a whip mode and, judging by the fact that I saw the blade lengthen and contract mid-fight, the same dual-phase conversion as my own sabers.

It was interesting and I wanted to get my hands on it to tear it down and see what I could learn.

The video ended and the feed from Taria’s side returned, the Shadow studying me intently. Our eyes met and in that moment, I knew that she knew.

There was a moment of mutual silence, before I asked, “Where was this and what exactly am I looking at?”

“This was taken on Coruscant, two days ago. Master Mundi left the Order, not long ago. He took his followers with him. It was… of people. Over a hundred of various ranks. We were keeping tabs on them and saw they moved back to Coruscant. Not to the current Temple, but into the undercity—to what was once an old Jedi Temple, before it was abandoned and the Order relocated to the Temple you know. According to our intelligence, they were only using it as a stopover—a place to congregate and gather supplies, while reaching out to their friends still left in the Senate that weren’t eliminated in the attack. Our embedded agent recorded this footage of our Sith attacking and killing a large number of them, before he fled and pulled back far enough to avoid detection, before sending the video out.”

She tapped another button and a new video popped onto the screen. The Sith pursuing Jedi through Coruscant in a moving battle through traffic as they ascended into the upper levels, taken from a shaky camera being held by some civilian screaming something in a language I didn’t understand as the vehicle they were in followed the fight as numerous police vehicles, even gunships, quickly swarmed the area. “It spilled out into the city and police got involved. The Sith escaped and eluded capture, and Coruscant authorities think she made it off-world.”

The video swapped back to the office Taria sat in again. Holding my gaze, she asked, “So. Botajef. All last week.”

“The entire time,” I confirmed.

Leaning back in her seat, Taria shrugged. “Well, personally, I don’t feel it’s any big loss. They were a mixture of those who had been dragging the Order down for years and the most fervent among the Jedi who feel that Master Mundi to burn out the dark side of the Force. Incompetent, corrupt, or obsessive. So… then we’ve got a copycat?”

“It would have to be,” I murmured.

Leaning forward, Taria rested her chin in her palm. “.”

“Worrying, more like,” I shook my head. “That would make potentially five active Sith.”

Taria cocked an eyebrow. “You mean three?”

Sighing, I picked up my tea and took a sip. Considering it for a moment, I finally said, “Let’s stop speaking around the subject. We both know what I’m doing.”

At that, her face brightened with a grin. “” I blinked, but she continued. “Good work, by the way.”

Blinking again, I hesitated, unsure as I said, “Thank you?”

Seeing my uncertainty, the older girl laughed. “Tanya, please! . We’ve been doing this kind of thing for millennia. Occasionally, the rest of the Order gets a little lax. So we have to find something to get them back on the right track, from time to time. Sometimes, that means manufacturing a little conflict. Or tracking down a Sith to remind them that they’re still out there. We’ve made a few of our own and shifted the blame more than once. Sometimes, that involves doing a little housecleaning within the Order, or the Senate. .”

“…Oh.”

“So. Five?” She asked, looking interested. “Senator Palpatine, which is the instigating factor here. His Master or Apprentice.” Taria paused and gestured at me, raising an eyebrow.

“Darth Logis,” I murmured. “Or so I’ve heard.”

“Mm,” she nodded. “Darth Logis as number three. . And… who’s number five. Master Dooku?”

“No,” I denied, shaking my head. “A Zabrak male, with red and black markings.”

Taria frowned. “I haven’t heard of this one.”

I shook my head. “I haven’t encountered him, personally. But I’ve been having dreams. Visions. You remember that time something in the Temple on Coruscant exploded?” I asked, and she nodded. “I learned after the fact that it was me. I created an explosion in my sleep, in response to a nightmare or vision involving him. I’ve had them off and on again over the years. They’re becoming more frequent lately.”

“And you think the Zabrak is separate from the Senator’s Master or Apprentice?”

“Yes,” I confirmed. “During the attack on the Senate, I sensed something…”

Taria snapped her fingers and began tapping away at a computer on her side. “I meant to ask about that! I did some digging through the footage, and…”

A new image appeared on the screen. This time of a somewhat familiar muun, captured during the attack.

“Is this the guy?” Taria asked.

I nodded. “That’s him. I felt the dark side around him briefly, before it disappeared. He didn’t feel either. He was amused. Excited, even.”

“Yeah, that’s probably a Sith, then,” Taria agreed. A moment later, a file came up on the screen and I began to read. As I did, she gave me the highlights. “I went ahead and dug into his background. That’s Hego Damask. He controls Damask Holdings, which is a large backer of the Trade Federation. If anyone’s pulling their strings, it’s him. He’s a known friend to Senator Palpatine. They met when Palpatine was a young man, before Palpatine’s family died under .”

“And if he isn’t the Sith Master, then he’s still a priority target,” I murmured. “I’ll schedule an orbital bombardment on his position—”

“Don’t bother,” Taria shook her head, and I paused in my plotting. “He’s paranoid. Moves around a lot. Goes out of contact for months on end. All of which could definitely be signs of a Sith working in the shadows in that time. And when he does resurface, it’s almost always in populated areas. So unless you’re willing to order that strike on Coruscant…”

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My silence spoke .

“Tanya. No.”

“Nothing of value would be lost.”

“,” Taria glared.

“It would be an improvement—”

“.”

“Fine,” I conceded. “I’ll speak with Master Dooku.”

“Do that,” Taria agreed. “But if you want my opinion…?” she led, and I nodded. “Leave them. The Order still needs a visible enemy to fight, to force them to get better. To stop playing politics and start again. Especially the other Councils, and most especially the High Council. And unless Darth Logis wants to volunteer to die for the cause, they need an enemy to slay visibly when it’s time to finish it. Someone to kill, be able to say ‘It is done,’ and put an end to the crisis. They also need to see it for themselves. To see proof that the Sith still exist, even after a millennia without seeing one. That, more than anything, will ensure they don’t go right back to what they were doing before.”

I considered her words for a few moments before pointing out the obvious. “Good people are going to die. Jedi and civilians alike.”

“That’s war. People die. Good, bad, and everything in between,” the girl sighed, before sending me a small smile. “But Tanya… The fact that you actually care? That’s why you’re the best choice for the job.”

Reaching up, I pinched the bridge of my nose. As I did, Taria said, “Anyway, have fun wherever you’re going. I’m going to look into our copycat. I’ll send an update once I have something. It shouldn’t take terribly long to complete the Library either, so swing by when you get the chance.”

“Thank you. I will,” I agreed. A moment later, the call disconnected.

Letting out a sigh, I finished off my tea and leaned back in my chair. Closing my eyes, I replayed the images I had seen in my mind. As I did, a feeling of unease settled in my gut.

Shaking my head, I pushed myself to my feet and stretched briefly, before leaving the office and making my way towards the training area. I couldn’t do anything about the mysterious copycat at the moment. So, I’d take my mind off of it by terrorizing—I mean my Padawans.

They sensed my mood and fled ahead of me. Smirking, I concealed my presence within the Force and hid beneath an illusion.

Lothal. 35 BBY/965 GSC.

Making sure the girls had everything I felt they might need for an extended stay on the planet, I nodded to myself and looked up as someone knocked on the hatch. Looking up, I found Cindy leaning against it with a grin. “Heya, boss lady~. Heard you’re taking the kiddos down to the planet?”

“For an extended training exercise, yes,” I confirmed with a nod.

“Great! Think you could loan me Arthree and drop me off in Lothal City while you’re down there? I’d like to do some shopping. Looking for parts for that special project, and a few other little odds and ends. No need to worry about sticking around. I’ll call the ship when I’m ready to head back.”

“Sure,” I agreed easily, and the blonde grinned as she joined me in the . I closed the hatch behind her and we headed up to the cockpit, where my Padawans were already strapped in. We dropped into our seats and buckled in, and I checked over the girls’ work on the preflight, before lifting off and easing us out.

“What do you need for it, anyway?” I asked, curious as I turned us for the planet and accelerated away from the .

“Kyber crystal, for one. I know we’ve got a bunch left over, but I don’t want to tap into that if I don’t have to, and a bit of back and forth with a few merchants on the ground confirmed they’ve got it. I’m looking for a better conductor for the wiring. And something that can sink heat and be easily ejected and replaced so you can make big, high energy shots that would normally melt the barrel. S’why I need kyber too—that kind of juice will break a kyber crystal not purpose built for it, so I want to test and see how much one can take before one goes kaput.”

I frowned. “I thought we were already using synthetic kyber for our blasters?”

“For ship mounted cannon, yeah. Artificial kyber is too expensive to throw into common blasters,” Cindy shrugged. Turning a grin on me, she wagged her eyebrows. “But if you want to play sugar mama and have custom kyber cast for that thing, be my guest.”

“It’d be worth it. Cheaper in the long run than trying to track down natural kyber. And,” I paused, before admitting, “it wouldn’t feel right, using natural kyber for something you know is going to destroy it.”

Cindy raised an eyebrow. “It’s just a rock, boss. Shiny, glowy rocks, but—”

“They’re not!” Allaya interrupted, and Cindy glanced back at the redhead.

Asajj nodded. “They’re… not , but it’s more than just a rock.”

“They’re connected to the Force,” I explained. “It’s why kyber crystals are and choose their wielder—which is really more that you match wavelengths with it, but… Most people ascribe a certain spiritual significance to it. And after everything I’ve seen, I can’t entirely discount it. There is certainly something supernatural about natural kyber crystals that isn’t present in the artificial crystals.”

Cindy held her hands up in surrender. “Okay, okay! I give,” she laughed. “No using the good space rocks for disposable stuff. Got it. I can probably scale down the design for a kyber furnace into something small enough to fit onboard the . Want me to do that and we can just make our own?”

“Please,” I agreed.

“Will do,” the blonde nodded.

The ship shook as we entered the atmosphere and began our descent. As we neared the surface, I felt something within the Force, growing more powerful the closer to the planet we got. It felt like a Force nexus, like those I’d encountered before, only more powerful. Perhaps the most powerful Force nexus I’d encountered to date—and entirely neutral within the Force.

“Master?” Asajj asked, and I nodded.

“I feel it,” I confirmed.

Frowning, Allaya asked, “What it is?”

“That, Padawans, is a Force nexus. A vergence. We’ll check it out as soon as we drop off Cindy.”

“Oooh, interesting. Wish I could go, but work calls,” Cindy sighed. “My boss is a slave driver.”

“You aren’t kidding,” Allaya grumbled.

“So! You kids looking forward to your camping trip?”

“Mm!”

I shook my head and ignored the chatter as they talked and I guided us in, making the necessary calls and getting assigned a flight path to approach the capital. Eventually, I set the ship down at a short term spaceport dock on the outskirts of the city. Cindy popped up from her seat and grabbed her bag.

“Thanks for the ride, boss!” she grinned, heading towards the rear. “Come on, Arthree! We’re going ”

The droid made a series of beeps and I heard the blonde hum. “Well, I I could get you a flamethrower. I’m sure the boss won’t mind…”

I raised an eyebrow, but the hatch quickly closed behind them. Once they were clear, I took off and cleared the local airspace. Then, I opened my senses more fully to the Force and followed the feeling north.

It was as we were passing over an absolutely massive sea of bright green grass that I spotted several conical structures rising from the ground. The nexus I sensed seemed to be beneath the largest of them, so I looped around the site, scanning the area from the air. Below, I spotted a design spiraling out from the largest, central pillar, along with the symbol of the Order.

I swung the ship around and found a place to land, near the symbol. Exiting the ship, the girls practically disappeared in the tall grass.

“It’s so flat,” Allaya murmured.

Turning in a short circle, Asajj hummed, frowning. “I sense animals nearby. They feel dangerous.”

“Predators of some sort,” I agreed, heading for the Temple and the symbol on the ground. The girls followed, looking up at the large structure.

“What is it?”

“A Jedi Temple,” I answered Allaya absently as I reached out with the Force, feeling it, before running a few scans with my computation orb. After a few moments, I projected an image based on my scans. “It’s hollow. It looks like it’s meant to be accessed by pulling it out of the ground from the outside, and it’ll corkscrew upwards as it does. There appear to be two entrances—upper and lower. Upper leads to a small chamber while lower leads deeper underground.”

Crossing her arms over her chest, Allaya hummed. “So… head straight down to the bottom?”

I shook my head. “No. It doesn’t feel like a normal Temple. We’ll likely find answers in the upper chamber. Give me a minute to get it open.”

Moving to the symbol for the order on the ground, where I felt the Force converging, I stood in the center and reached out to the Temple to attempt to lift it. The moment the Force touched it in an attempt to lift, I felt something probe me from the Temple, before it locked into place and I frowned. After a bit of experimenting, I realized I was missing something. “Asajj, Allaya, come here. Help me with this.”

Under my instruction, the three of us reached out together and began lifting. There was another probe, before I felt the structure unlock and move easily. “It looks like it’s meant to only open to two or more Jedi. Likely Master and Padawan,” I mused aloud as we lifted it up and it locked into place for the first chamber. It felt like it could easily go further, but I had the girls stop and we made our way into the entrance.

Inside, we found the interior covered in carvings and paintings, in what appeared to be a single chamber meant for meditation. At the far end, there was a door leading out into caves outside the Temple, according to my scans. As the door closed behind us, I studied the room and eventually came to some conclusions.

“It looks like it’s meant as a training ground and trial for Knighthood. In the first instance, your Master is supposed to stay here and meditate. Then, you’ll enter the level below from the door in this room and face a test. If you find your way back, we both get to live. If not, we’ll both be entombed here forever. I would consider that passing the Trial of Spirit and Insight at the same time. However, if you enter from the lower entrance alone, you will be given a series of nine tests, after which should you pass you will be pronounced a knight by the Temple guardians—which are either Force ghosts, or more likely, a gatekeeper similar to that found in some holocrons.”

Bouncing a bit on her heels, Allaya asked, “So, we’re taking the trials?”

I snorted quietly and sent her an amused look. “No.”

“You took yours when you were young!” the girl protested.

Meeting Allaya’s eyes, I waited and after a few moments, she broke eye contact and looked away. “You’ve already begun taking your trials.”

The girls both looked surprised and confused at that. It was Asajj who asked, “We have?”

I nodded. “Yes. And you’ve already passed two of the five required.” They perked up at that.

“What are they?”

“The Trials of Skill, Courage, Flesh, Insight, and Spirit. You’ve already passed the trials for Skill and Courage.”

They shared another look before Allaya asked, “When did we do that?!”

“The first, when you both actually managed to hit me in our last training session.” That one was entirely up to my own discretion, but I judged them both competent enough with their lightsabers and the Force to consider the trial passed.

Biting her lip, Asajj asked, “And the Trial of Courage?”

I sent her an amused look. “When you mastered your fear and jumped into the void, to take an enemy ship.” I had helped a bit, but in the end, they both had pushed past their fear themselves and stayed that way the entire time. All they needed was a little push.

“What about the others?! When can we start?”

I considered Allaya for a moment before smiling. She shivered. “.”

“What?!”

Chuckling, I made for the exit. A push with the Force opened it and the girls followed. “It was a joke, Allaya,” I said, and the girl pouted. “You could both take the final three trials right now, if you wanted. We’ll start with the Trial of the Flesh. Then, I’ll sit in the upper level room and you can face the trial inside for the last two.”

They eyed me suspiciously as we moved back to the symbol of the Order and reached out to lift the Temple again. After a few minutes of thought and lifting it into place, the redhead cautiously asked, “What’s the Trial of the Flesh involve?”

“Mm…” I hummed as we walked towards the entrance to the lower area. “Normally, the Trial of Flesh involves overcoming great physical pain and usually loss. I took blaster shots that would have crippled me if I hadn’t gotten medical treatment and known how to heal myself and kept fighting through the pain.” Though to be fair, . Magical methe was a hell of a drug—one I was no longer allowed. “But other instances tend to involve scarring, the loss of a limb, or eye, or receiving some other disfiguring or debilitating wound and powering through it. ”

Curious, Asajj prompted, “However?”

“Historically, there was another way. Called .”

“…That doesn’t sound fun,” Allaya muttered.

“Well, . Obviously not. It involved being shot with blasters on low intensity—”

“”

I ignored the redhead’s shriek and continued, “—which are allowed to burn the surface layers of skin and leave scars. It was a form of torture—”

“”

I rolled my eyes at Asajj’s comment. “—and was thus discontinued.”

“Gee, I wonder why!”

“Leave it to Master to turn an obscure form of torture into training.”

“My Padawans seem to be getting . Nothing a little extra training can’t fix…” They went dead silent and I nodded. “As I was saying, we’re not going to do that. , having studied medical texts and practiced Force healing techniques, I believe I can accurately simulate something painful enough to be considered debilitating without doing any permanent damage, and for long enough for us to have a nice spar. If you fight through the pain for long enough, I’ll consider it a pass. What do you think?”

There was another of those shared looks, before Asajj murmured, “Maybe later, Master.”

“Yeah, I’m not in that much of a hurry to be Knighted,” Allaya agreed.

“Good.” I turned to them and instructed, “Go set up camp. We’ll start the first part of your training here.”

“You’re going inside?”

I nodded at Asajj’s question and Allaya frowned. “Without us?”

“It’s best to assume that any test for Knighthood a place like this will offer is probably going to be wildly dangerous. So no, you’re not taking it until I’m sure that nothing inside here can pose any real danger to you. I’m going inside to investigate the nexus, which feels like it’s not as deep as the start of the actual trial of Knighthood.”

Allaya blew out an annoyed sigh, but nodded. “Fine! I guess.”

“We’ll go get started,” Asajj agreed.

The pair turned back for the ship and I made my way inside. Not far into the first room of the Temple, I found my sense of the Force drawn to a painting on one of the walls.

Casting a light formula, I raised an eyebrow as I took it in, before running some quick scans. The wall was painted, yes, but according to my scan it actually hid a sort of puzzle mechanism that responded to the Force. As for the painting, it was of three beings surrounded by lines that would glow golden when the puzzle was solved.

On the far left was a beautiful woman wearing white robes, with pale skin, green hair, and an owl on her shoulder. Her left hand, circled by gold, was open and resting on her stomach.

On the far right, a bald man with gray and blood red skin, wearing dark robes. His left hand, likewise circled by gold, was clenched into a fist.

And in the center, between the representations of light and dark, was an old man—taller than the other two, with a white beard and mustache. His robes were a mixture of light and dark colors. His own left hand, likewise circled in gold, held what looked like a stone, or perhaps a seed—open and facing the viewer.

Nodding to myself, I considered the puzzle. Jedi

Humming quietly, I cast an illusion of the painting over it with my computation orb and quickly spun the rings that made up the puzzle into the solution. Then, I flew up and placed my hand atop that of the old man. Reaching out with the Force and pushing it into the puzzle, I felt the mechanism and the way it moved, then quickly reset and adjusted my illusion to test before turning the actual puzzle. A few seconds later, I felt something deep within the wall click and grinned.

“There we go.”

I made to pull my hand back, only to find it stuck—held tight by the Force. I had only a moment to process what was happening, before the entire wall shimmered and turned gray, and I was yanked the painting.

The world went black.

Allaya looked up as something in the Force, in a way that felt very much like when Master’s cat jumped around. There was nothing there, except for their Master, wearing an annoyed expression and looking a bit worn. Her hair was longer and though it was hard to tell beneath the robes and armor—which were different from the ones she had gone in wearing—but she looked… taller? She was also—

“Master?” Asajj asked, picking up on the same thing as Allaya.

“”

The older woman heaved a sigh, even as her lips twitched into a partial smile. “Rude.”

“No, no, no! You don’t get to brush that off! You were red when you went in there! What happened?!” Allaya demanded.

“Did you get covered in paint or… no, that doesn’t look like paint,” Asajj murmured, tilting her head and studying her Master closer. And it was her Master, just… she looked a little different. And was wearing different clothes.

The older woman shook her head. “Come on. Forget the camping trip. We’re going to track down some pets then head home.”

“To the ?”

“No. . I have some things to speak with Master Dooku about. And you could stand to spend more time with your father and aunt. There’s no reason we can’t continue the rest of your training on Serenno.”

Allaya’s heart skipped a beat at that, before she grabbed their camping supplies with the Force and for the ship, a huge grin on her face as she did. “Asajj, hurry up! We’re leaving!”

Studying their Master, the quieter of the two Padawans asked, “Did something happen?”

“Mm. I may tell you about it some day,” Tanya agreed, before pausing and pulling her holocom out of her pocket. “, this is Mereel.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Do you see the structure north of my position?”

There was a pause, then, “Roger that, ma’am. We’ve got it on scopes. Looks like an old temple or something.”

“That’s it. Target the structure. Main guns. Full battery. Wait until we’re clear, then . Then, , just to make sure.”

“Uhh… One moment!” A pause, then, “Fire Control confirms we’re waiting for the to clear the area. The captain wants to speak with you though.”

“Fine, transfer me.”

Asajj followed Tanya back to the ship, watching as their Master waited, before she got a response—this time from the captain. “I had them transfer this to my quarters. Tanya, what’s going on?”

“I don’t want to discuss it over an open channel. I need that structure and the surrounding land for at least a mile turned into a glowing crater, . As soon as we’re clear, Aylin.”

“That bad?”

“…Potentially catastrophic.”

“Understood. If we’re going to be firing on the planet, I’ll send people down to recall Cindy, to keep her from getting in trouble with the locals.”

“Please do. Thank you.”

“No problem.”

They hung up and Tanya slipped the holocom back into her pocket, before fishing something else out as they made it back to the ship. “That reminds me. Allaya, come here.”

The redhead met them at the entrance to the ship and moved aside so they could enter. Once they were in, Tanya held out a hand and produced four beads—two of songsteel, two of kyber. She took a moment to partially undo the Padawan braids in their hair and slip the beads in before retying them.

“To mark the completion of your trials,” she explained, before heading for the cockpit. “Now, let’s go home.”