Chapter 103: I Have a Bad Feeling About This

Chapter 103: I Have a Bad Feeling About This

-Deep Space - Unknown Location-

Jedi Master Hallan Krintu wasn’t at all used to his particular brand of requests made to the Force getting back returns that felt urgent. The Jedi Explorer Corps wasn’t normally the sort to get into major events or serious happenings. Ironically, their particular branch of the Jedi Service Corps had perhaps the greatest amount of battle experience in the entire Jedi Order, but that was entirely due to where they operated. The largest chunk of the Explorer Corps were actually Seekers, who went out to find new Force Sensitives for the Order. Yet, both the Seekers and the Corps more exploration focused activities both had a tendency to take them into the wilder parts of the galaxy. For all that they saw more conflict and adventure than most Jedi though, it was rarely urgent on the scale that the Force cared about enough to actively prod them to hurry.

Which is why, when the Force had practically slapped him in the face with a ‘get your ass moving, fool!’ the moment the veil weakened, Master Krintu hadn’t hesitated to do just that. Of course, it had still taken weeks for him to follow the convoluted urgings he got in meditation after the veil’s thinning reversed. For some reason, the Force was firm in its desire for him to not be spotted going wherever it was taking him. Now, finally, he was so close to his destination that he could feel the Force urging him on, even without meditation. It was a very odd sensation, and he had to admit that his curiosity about what he’d find when he came out of hyperspace was very nearly overpowering at this point.

Lost Jedi Relics? A foundling of great importance in danger? Some obscure world or hint about the Sith? Krintu didn’t know, but was eager to find out. Thankfully, he could feel the moment coming up and reached out for the hyperspace lever, doing his best to hit the precise moment that felt just right to his senses. Hyperspace vanished from view and he found himself…in the middle of nowhere? For long moments, he wasn’t sure he’d arrived in the right place, but then some smaller and satisfied feeling from the Force urged him to look up. He nearly flinched when he did, finding he’d emerged so near an inactive Capital Ship, a Rendili Dreadnaught he thought, that he could practically read her hull number.

Frowning as that thought triggered another nudge from the Force, he reached for his ship’s controls. He tweaked his pitch and attitude just a bit, bringing the nose of his ship around to face the dreadnaught. A flick of one switch caused the floodlights he’d had added for just such occasions to power on, and what he saw in the next instant wasn’t a hull number, but a name, a name that caused his breath to hitch.

Katana

Jedi Master Hallan Krintu was suddenly very, very worried just why the Force thought he needed to locate the Katana Fleet, without anyone else knowing he had…

… … …

-Atar 5 – Prindaar System-

Jedi Master Rahm Kota had to admit he was impressed. Surprised too, that went without saying given what he was seeing, but certainly impressed. When the news passed on by Shaak Ti to Adi Galia, about what she’d found on Geonosis had finally smacked some sense into the Council, they’d decided it was time to quietly check on what allies they had. That is, what few allies they had who were loyal to the Jedi Order rather than the Republic as a whole. For the most part, it was an accounting of various chapter houses, friendly Force Sects, and a few worlds that held Jedi in particularly high esteem.

Someone had remembered the Atarian Rangers and how oddly well-equipped they’d been to help with the situation at Karazak, though. Given he was one of the very few Jedi with actual military experience, gained before he joined the Jedi Order much older than normally allowed, it had made sense to send Rahm to check in with the Rangers. What he very much hadn’t expected was to discover that someone had given them a serious infusion of cash, which they’d reinvested on the advice of a few Force Sensitives among their number who were too weak or too old to have become Jedi. Not that he approved of the too old concept, given his own history, but he knew he’d been a lucky exception.

Pushing that old thought aside, he went back to being seriously impressed by what the Rangers had done with the successful investments. Who knew that a few Force Sensitives working the market would be enough to finance both a major asset and training expansion…and a shipyard complex capable of handling construction of light cruisers or repair and refitting of even larger ships. So far, the largest thing the Rangers had refit was a Munificent-class Frigate, quietly acquired back when the Federation’s Trade Defense Force had been forced to downsize. They were apparently using it as a flagship of sorts to watch over the shipyard, which made a lot of sense.

Finding out that the Rangers were apparently a much larger organization than they’d once been. Not to mention that they had quite a few Defender II corvettes that they’d acquired through dealings with the Shattered Shackle, were just as pleasant surprises. Something niggling at the back of Rahm’s instincts was telling him that the shipyard itself was the most important thing for some reason, though. Even if he didn’t quite yet know why.

“So, General…if you were provided with more funding, just how fast could you expand this shipyard complex? It looks like it was built with the idea of possible expansion in mind?”

The current Ranger-General, who had been showing off their expansion efforts with nervous pride, looked startled at the question. Clearly, from what Rahm could tell, the man had been afraid of being told to shutter the project, not expand it. Understandable, given the way the Jedi had handled the Rangers in the recent past.

“Uh…yes, it was built with the idea of expansion in mind. Assuming we have the credits, we could easily triple it in size within a year. It would take a pretty large quantity of credits to do it that fast, though.”

Rahm nodded, already running calculations of his own. After all, if a couple of barely Force-Sensitive people could predict stocks so well, a few Jedi who specialized in foresight could likely do it even better. With the idea of what had been found on Geonosis fresh in his mind, Rahm Kota had a bad feeling it just might be needed. Now, he just needed to figure out exactly how to sell the Council on the idea. Or, failing that, how to circumvent them and do it anyway…

… … …

Sidious drummed his fingers on his hidden throne, one of the very few expressions of his inner thoughts he allowed himself to let loose from his habitual iron control, even here in his own place of power. Things were going somewhat well, keeping his actual rage to a minimum. The Jedi were, irritatingly, making more of a nuisance of themselves than he’d expected. Unlike their previous passivity, the bursts of insight they’d received when the veil thinned seemed to have stirred them into greater action than he’d thought them capable of at this point. Quite a few useful pawns had been swept up by them as they aggressively followed up on what few visions had slipped through for them. The loss of the Tarkin family and several other supporters on Eriadu was perhaps the most irritating. Though he would be able to fiddle with the results of the trials to get the more useful members of the Tarkins out of the corruption charges laid on them. The fact they would owe him even more deeply appeased his annoyance at least marginally there.

The entire sequence of events was a good reminder not to underestimate his greatest enemy. The Jedi Order weren’t entirely useless, when they were properly motivated, but these minor setbacks wouldn’t be enough to truly matter in the grand scheme of things. It was too little, too late for them to stop onrushing events, even if it might slow them down slightly. Better yet, it wasn’t doing them any favors among the Republic’s halls of power. Despite several of their most renowned Jedi Masters going on ‘good will tours’ to their allies, showing far more awareness of their political peril than expected, the overall sentiment towards their Order was growing ever more negative. The Senate was too corrupt, with too many of those within it having every reason to fear investigation by the Jedi. They were making themselves two enemies for every one ally they soothed.

Of course, given that many of those they were targeting had Separatist leanings, they would likely gain an upswing of popularity within the Republic when the war started. That too, however, was in his favor. After all, it only would it make it easier to place them at the head of the Republic’s war machine, responsible for its inevitable and pre-determined failures. All while he could twist the narrative behind the scenes to make it seem like their aggressive actions were what had caused the crisis to renew in the first place.

More complicated were his efforts with the League.

That stupid chit Amidala had played right into his hands, again, despite her own growing power base. She’d achieved the creation of an Interpol with the League of Free Stars, giving Sidious a means to start slipping agents into the bedrock of the League’s government. Her reports to him highlighting her fears that some Republic worlds might use existing treaties to break away was even more delicious. It would, after all, serve to stir the fears over the larger successionist movement. He might even push a few worlds in that direction himself, behind the scenes. It’s not like the League could grow enough to threaten his future Empire, after all. Even if they doubled in size, he would eventually crush them easily once the upcoming Civil War was over.

On the other hand, this ‘Sovereign Midoriya’ was proving to be a more capable nuisance than he’d expected. Military acumen had been a given, but his initial read on the man had been that he was a bit of a Rancor in a porcelain shop on the political side. Setting him up to blow the whistle on the Trade Federation Battleships had seemed like an easy win, one that would help push the Senate back where he wanted them. Unfortunately, his lack of direct intelligence had forced him to reassess when the man had suppressed the information instead. He seemed to have at least some level of base cunning, then. Enough to instinctively sense a trap, perhaps. Or maybe that animal of his, the Twi’lek girl that was better fit for a collar, had gotten some bare hint of it through her weak connection to the Force?

No matter, it had hardly been Sidious’ only move to get the Senate back onto the topic that mattered. Other methods to reveal the needed information organically would be slower, but more certain. More time just meant more clones and more droids to fuel the fires of war, anyway…

… … …

“Very good, initiate Ra. You truly have a gift for this.”

Kalda Ra beamed up at Master Bnar, even as the previously-ill tooka kitten happily nudged her hand. At the advice of ecologists that were attempting to revive Ossus, tookas had been imported to keep down pests. So far, very little in the way of animal life had been reintroduced, but pests were inevitable unless you had a very sophisticated starport setup, which Ossus didn’t and might never have. Semi-domesticated tookas were considered an ideal solution, as they were perfectly happy to stick around the sentients on the planet and feed on the pest problem. All while getting attention from any local who was a sucker for tooka eyes.

They, along with a few different types of domesticated livestock animals, also served a purpose for the new Ossus Academy. After all, animals got sick, and it was a lot safer and more ethical to practice Force Healing on a sick animal than on a sick sentient. Kalda was lucky enough to be one of the rare Force Users who was, apparently, extremely gifted with Force Healing. To the point that, only a month into studying here, she’d been allowed into the very first class focused on teaching healing of others instead of just yourself.

It was incredibly rewarding, as far as she was concerned. Far more so than the basic combat exercises, though she was so far doing reasonably well in those as well. The structure of the Academy as a whole was still…experimental. Everyone got certain basics, such as using Force Senses to detect life or danger. Meditation, basic telekinesis, self-healing and basic combat were other areas that everyone was being put through. That, however, tended to be where the similarity with the Jedi Order ended.

After all, virtually their entire student body were adults.

This meant that, beyond a barebones foundation, the students of the Academy could far more easily voice what they felt called towards doing. Where Jedi Younglings might virtually all think that becoming a Jedi Knight on the Guardian path was the coolest thing ever and obviously the best option, as adults with already-formed personalities, most of those now training knew themselves better. Kalda was an example of that, knowing full well she wasn’t a fighter by nature, despite her species’ predator past.

So far, the rough methodology of allowing students to specialize into ‘electives,’ taking one of several sets of classes that most interested them, seemed to be working. Healing was just one of those in the set Kalda was taking, others being focused on studying the Force itself. A more esoteric set of Force branches for which Master Bnar was the most frequent teacher. She found it fulfilling, but certainly didn’t begrudge those who seemed set on more combat-focused paths. The galaxy could certainly use more Guardians, in her experience.

No one seemed quite sure just what the results of letting the students self-filter to such a degree was going to be, but it certainly seemed to be producing results more quickly than the various instructors seemed to have been expecting. Though no one seemed at all sure if that was an effect of the greater age and maturity of the students, or the ability to focus first on what they were most called towards. It was one big experiment, and one Kalda Ra was happy to be a part of…

… … …

For the first time in his life, Mace Windu really wanted to bang his head on an appropriate desk and ask the universe why him in a voice entirely too close to a whine. He didn’t, of course. Such would be an inappropriate reaction for the Master of the Order, or for any other Jedi Master, for that matter. Still, as he looked over the report he’d gotten from Shaak Ti, not through critical channels but more mundane ones, he had a weirdly strong compulsion to try it. That, or to shout ‘Motherfucker’ out of a sense of extreme annoyance.

Technically, the information Shaak Ti had sent along by slow courier wasn’t important, exactly.

What it was, however, was several different landmines just waiting to go off when some idiot eventually stepped on them. He fully understood why she’d sent the information along. Not just a report, but also a physical package containing some samples and copies of data for First Knowledge. He was however, absolutely, positively, not looking forward to explaining that there was apparently now a Sith, as in the species, running around with the League of Free Stars. He was looking forward even less to the reaction of everyone when it inevitably leaked that she was also from one of the old Sith Empires, even if she apparently wasn’t a Dark Sider.

Frankly, it was a complication that was absolutely going to cause him migraines. Hopefully, the data on a lost section of Jedi/Sith history and the personal accounts from someone who’d lived through it would be enough to placate First Knowledge, at least. He just hoped he could keep a lid on any conspiracy theorists trying to link the woman to the modern Sith, and any hotheads that wanted to kill her just because of her species or previous affiliation. He had more than just Shaak Ti’s word that she wasn’t a Dark Sider, after all. Several other Jedi who had met her had been prevailed upon to add their own notes. Including Masters Eno Cordova and Bant Errant. They’d all been…bemused by the apparently rather chaotic storm of a girl. But Eno Cordova had positively gushed about her historical knowledge, and the various Masters were all quite certain that she wasn’t a Dark Sider.

Mace wondered, sometimes, if reincarnation was actually a thing, just what he’d done to deserve this sort of problem always landing on his desk. Maybe he should retire for a decade and force Yoda to handle this? It was looking like a more and more attractive option as he considered how to deal with the newest little bomb Shaak Ti had delivered into his possession…

... ... ... ... ...

A/N 1: Mwhahaha! So, several people have mentioned the Katana Fleet as a possible source of ships in the past. I, however, didn't really want to give it to Izuku and the League because it's...frankly a little overplayed in fanfiction. Instead, I decided a while ago, that I'd use it for a more unexpected purpose. Which some of you are undoubtedly now connecting a few dots about...

A/N 2: Likewise with the Atarian Rangers ;-).

A/N 3: Palpatine is actually somewhat calm about events right now, but that's mostly because he's horribly underestimating how much of a problem the League is going to be eventually. For all his political genius, the one thing Palpatine manifestly is NOT is a brilliant military strategist.

A/N 4: Hope you liked the small snapshot of Ossus Academy, we'll see more of it later throughout the small time skip hops :-).

A/N 5: Poor Mace, good thing you're already bald, or you'd be pulling your hair out...