Ten years, third month, and tenth day after the Battle of Yavin…
Or year forty‑five, third month, and tenth day after the Great Resynchronization.
(Nine months and thirtieth day since the arrival.)
The Quimar sector was located at the northern end of one of the most important and ancient galactic hyperspace routes: the Hydian Way.
Hemmed in from the north by the Happih sector, from the south by the Nembas sector, from the west by the Korva sector, and from the east by the I‑sector, it, like the other satellite sectors of the Zann Consortium, was experiencing what could be called the Dominion's "wrath."
On first glance, it was not the most significant sector, yet it was a crossroads of critical hyperroutes.
In addition to the aforementioned Hydian Way, Quimar's territory was crossed by routes important for this part of the galaxy: the Listerhol Run, connecting the eponymous planet in Quimar sector with Zygerria in the Chorllian sector, which lay south of the Corporate Sector.
It was there that the Listerhol Run intersected with the Shaltin Tunnels, which led into the southeastern part of the Corporate Sector.
There was also an ancient hyperroute known as the Morellian Trail, which connected worlds and sectors in the northern galaxy with the Corporate Sector back when the Hydian Way, previously a collection of separate routes, had not yet been linked into a single whole.
By now, only scholars and particularly meticulous navigators knew that the northern part of the Hydian Way was in fact an entirely different hyperroute.
However, it was not the worlds on the Morellian Trail that were the objective of Commodore Stormaer, his Abyssal Fury, and the fleet controlled from the flagship Star Destroyer.
Antonias watched calmly as the colorful spectacle of hyperspace faded before his eyes.
The Abyss's commander mentally prepared himself for what he had to do.
The limited fleet at his disposal—two dozen heavy cruisers, only two interdictor cruisers, and three Star Destroyers, not counting escort and screen vessels—was hardly an invincible force the Abyss could afford to scatter across every system he was supposed to conquer.
So he advanced slowly, step by step, world by world, system by system, subduing the Quimar sector's territories.
From spy droids he knew perfectly well what forces the enemy had in each system.
He also knew they were unable to coordinate their own assets—fleet special forces had disabled the sector relay.
Without the HoloNet and its function of duplicating transmissions through the nearest relays, the enemy had very few options to oppose the threat of a Dominion invasion.
Antonias readily exploited the lack of communication between enemy detachments to deliver his first blow.
Dividing his forces into task groups, he struck at those systems which had the fewest defenses.
Using numerical superiority over his opponents, he burned his way through the Haaridin, Bizikiya, Protask, Rakrir, Raya, and Vendarra systems.
The ships patrolling those worlds—Zann Consortium assets or local defense forces in league with them—were utterly and unceremoniously destroyed.
Smashed before they could jump out of their systems and join the enemy's main strength in a few key locales to put up serious resistance to the attackers.
One had to give the enemy commander his due—he was no fool.
Immediately after the HoloNet fell and the routes out of the sector turned into lethal traps for anyone trying to leave it, enemy command had begun pulling forces back from secondary worlds.
Zann's people were abandoning their bases and outposts, loading up and trying to consolidate everything into a single fist.
Antonias did not share their confidence that they would succeed.
He understood perfectly well he lacked the strength to attack all systems at once.
So he identified the priorities the enemy themselves used when weakening some positions in order to reinforce others.
He would have to fight the Zann forces "for real"—that was a fact.
But the Abyss believed it would be wiser to weaken the enemy by every available means before the decisive battle.
So he sent his ships across the sector, destroying the enemy's numerous yet individually weak detachments.
Thus he kept them from linking up and becoming a force to be reckoned with.
By attacking systems from which the enemy had scooped out their forces and prepared to withdraw, by hitting convoys of enemy ships en route to their destinations, he made his subsequent work much easier.
But the cost had been the loss of both Venator‑class Star Destroyers assigned to his fleet, as well as an equal number of interdictor cruisers.
And more than ten escort ships—corvettes.
They had been dispatched to intercept two enemy groups which, according to intelligence, were hauling out of the Artus system an extremely valuable mineral from the mines on Artus Prime.
A mineral which greatly concerned the Jensaarai Order.
So much so that they had assigned to it…
Antonias glanced at the section of the bridge usually occupied by a currently absent trio.
One—a Jensaarai Defender, hidden beneath his armor and thus looking like a large beast.
The second—a grown man, dressed plainly and practically, giving those around him dark looks.
The third member of their group…
Or rather, the third was a woman.
A Dathomiri witch.
Lightsabers hung from the belts of all three, and judging by what the stormtroopers had said about their participation in the ground operation on Stormaer's first major objective in Quimar sector, the world of Corlong, they wielded their weapons quite skillfully.
Funded by aristocratic families who enthusiastically and eagerly supported the Zann Consortium, these nobles possessed substantial fleets and armies of mercenaries.
It had taken all of the Abyss's strength to eliminate them.
The bloody battle had lasted several days.
The enemy had kept feeding in reinforcements from nearby systems, throwing them into the fight to keep the fleet from interfering in the ground operation.
Reinforcements came from Wencin III—a world of slavers that had turned into a forge of units for local Consortium forces.
With their brains washed, obedient and undemanding, hundreds of thousands of slaves hurled themselves at Dominion soldiers.
As infantry, as ship crews, as fighter pilots…
They had to kill them all.
And in such moments there was no room for sentiment.
It was either you or them.
No middle ground.
The easy targets were gone.
Only the hardest ones remained.
Listerhol and Artus Prime, Telos IV had been attacked a day earlier, and the campaigns on those worlds had ended in the Dominion's favor.
Not the most brilliant victories, but victories nonetheless.
Stormaer had taken the sector's key transport hub, a planet whose depths produced crystalline deposits that interested the Jensaarai Order, as well as one of the sector's fortress worlds.
Tactically speaking, though, these worlds were of little immediate use to the Dominion.
The Listerhol Run was tightly blocked by mines, and Listerhol itself no longer mattered as a transport node.
On Artus Prime, almost all the mines had been blown up by Kavil's Corsairs' mercenaries before their seizure, and their restoration would cost a great deal of money and precious time.
Telos IV… Devastated by invasion, it too had become a less than hospitable planet after the orbital bombardment of enemy bases.
Still, there were benefits amid all this.
The enemy had lost half of its remaining fleet, but not many of the Abyss's ships remained combat‑capable either.
He could not control a large number of systems with his thinned‑out squadron, so he had to leave behind only symbolic garrison forces.
Station duty fell to the fleet's most badly damaged ships—mostly heavy cruisers and corvettes.
Yet on Telos IV and Listerhol, because of their proximity to the criminals' remaining worlds, Antonias had been forced to leave two of his four Star Destroyers as station ships.
Because that was where the Abyss's rear and repair bases had been deployed.
By the time of the final assault, he had only both interdictors, Abyssal Fury, the recently repaired Bellicose, sixteen escort corvettes, and ten heavy cruisers at his disposal.
And there was not one target.
There were three.
The same Wencin III, Tigan, and Tantiv.
The first was clear enough, but the second was where a protocol droid manufacturer was headquartered.
Tigan Technological Consortium had not previously been known for producing combat or saboteur droids of various models from the days of the Confederacy of Independent Systems.
But judging by intelligence data, after "vultures" appeared on the planet, management had decided to repurpose its production capacities.
Whether voluntarily or under pressure, intelligence could not say.
Such nuances, however, did not concern the Abyss.
Far more interesting was the fact that Tigan Technological Consortium possessed several factories built by the CIS in the period of the Clone Wars.
How and when they had acquired them, history was silent.
Yet the fact remained.
There was a hostile planet.
On it were factories that produced the same droids the Dominion used.
There was an order—destroy the enemy.
The logic of events drew itself.
That was why two‑thirds of the Abyss's available fleet were now attacking the specified worlds.
According to courier reports, things on Tigan and Wencin III were not going particularly well.
But not particularly badly either.
What worried the Abyss much more was the Tantiv system.
To the galaxy at large it was famous for several reasons.
The first was the Alderaanian Gallery of Progressive Art located on the fourth planet from the local star.
Alderaan and Tantiv IV had once been sister worlds with a long history of cooperation. The former had even named one of their ships after their twin planet.
The second reason to remember the Tantiv system was the battle at Tantiv V.
A few years earlier it had seen the defeat of Admiral Drommel and the destruction of his fleet, after which the New Republic had almost effortlessly brought the Oplovis sector under its control.
Those were stories for laymen.
For military men, Tantiv V was of interest for a different reason.
Tantiv V was the primary target of the attack in Quimar sector.
It was to its defense that the enemy had pulled all combat‑ready forces, stripping the periphery.
All the sector's transport flows converged here before being routed to their proper destinations.
Here, too, were headed the two convoys that had been the target of both Dragons and two of the four interdictor cruisers he had initially possessed.
It was because of the cargo of those convoys that the enemy had committed additional forces to their defense—forces intelligence had not been able to report in time.
The result—immediate loss of four ships.
And the deaths of seventy percent of the crews aboard them.
That bothered Antonias far more than the roughly twenty enemy ships destroyed in the course of the operation, from corvettes up to battleships.
As a prudent commander, he understood the effort it took to replace the fleet's skilled personnel.
Ships were less of a loss than people.
But he had to act.
Thus the plan for simultaneous attacks on three enemy worlds at once was bold.
He had dispatched task groups of two heavy cruisers and four escort corvettes to Tigan and Wencin III.
They had easily wiped out enemy patrol craft, allowing several starfighters to escape.
It was a trap, based on the assumption the enemy would not risk losing both droid production and their slave army.
The expectation had been justified.
Zann's forces had not dared.
Two larger detachments had left Tantiv IV to aid them.
Both had been intercepted at the borders of the attacked systems by two other task groups—Dominion forces this time.
Each formation had three heavy cruisers, an interdictor cruiser, and four escort corvettes.
The reinforcements had been caught in a trap, and now bloody battles raged in both systems.
In ten minutes two Star Destroyers—those from Listerhol and Telos IV—would arrive to join the fighting.
And that would put an end to those engagements.
But not to the battle awaiting Abyssal Fury, Bellicose, and their four escort corvettes.
Tantiv V was not just the site of Admiral Drommel's defeat.
Tantiv V was a planet whose orbit hosted a shipyard capable not merely of repairing but of building ships of the Star Destroyer class.
Not a full manufacturing cycle, of course, but modular assembly—and that was still an unpleasant surprise.
According to New Republic intelligence, this shipyard had been destroyed during the attack on Drommel's fleet.
Either before or after; details varied.
Yet the fact remained.
The enemy had restored it.
And was using it to bring Star Destroyers online at a furious pace.
And not just any Star Destroyers.
The Adjudicator.
An Imperial‑class II that had once served under Imperial Grand Inquisitor Tremayne.
No one had yet managed to figure out how this ship had ended up with the Zann Consortium.
Nor could anyone understand how it had acquired a partner in the Dominant.
Another Imperial II that had served under Grand Admiral Demetrius Zaarin.
Like all his fleet, it had vanished into space after his failed uprising.
Neither ship had been spotted in the sector by the time Stormaer began his attack on Quimar.
Nor had they appeared up until the Venators' destruction.
They had taken direct part in that fight and were currently undergoing emergency repairs.
From scraps of data the Abyss had pieced together that both vessels had arrived almost by accident, pulled out of hyperspace by gravity wells.
They had already suffered serious damage.
The kind typically inflicted by minefields.
There was only one hypothesis—these vessels had been en route to Quimar when the activation signals of the mines had gone off.
Things would become clearer only once they had first‑hand information.
For the moment, now that it was clear the previously idle shipyards were being used to repair two formidable adversaries, the Abyss could not delay the campaign's finale.
He had made the upcoming job as easy as he could.
The work still lay ahead.
And there was plenty of it.
A pair of battered Destroyers were only a small part of the problems awaiting his task group in orbit around Tantiv V.
The whirlpool of hyperspace peeled away, ejecting two Dominion Destroyers and a pair of Crusaders into realspace.
A few seconds later, two more escort corvettes dropped from the main bays' mag‑clamps, and a stream of small craft poured from the bellies of both Dominion ships.
Before them, the orbital dock's sight unfolded in full—similar to those once seen at Sluis Van.
The gray hulls of two Destroyers inside closed slipways beckoned with their dull plating.
But to reach them, the Dominion forces first had to take out half a dozen Interceptor‑class frigates, six Acclamator‑class assault cruisers—those very same "trucks" ferrying loot from all over the sector to the enemy's last base—and ten Kaloth‑class battlecruisers.
Not to mention ten Corellian DP20 frigates which, judging by their positions in space, had been about to head to reinforce Zann's troops at Wencin III and Tigan.
Seeing the wealth spread out before him, Antonias rubbed his hands in satisfaction.
A predatory grin appeared on his face.
Yes, he had already lost four ships.
But he had a chance to make up for it, at least partially, by acquiring new vessels.
It would not return the people, of course, but war was war.
"Order to the fleet: destroy the Kaloths," the wasteful command made his stomach clench. Still, the Abyss knew such ships were of no use to the Dominion, even as scrap. "Capture the assault cruisers and Corellian frigates."
"Sir, we're detecting activity on the Destroyers," the watch officer reported tensely. "They're starting to pull out of their docks. We're reading up to half of their artillery operational."
"The Adjudicator and Dominant are not our problem," Stormaer cut him off, watching as the pair of second‑model Crusaders raced toward the orbital dock at high speed.
"I hope that Jensaarai brood doesn't damage my prizes," the Star Destroyer's commander grumbled, observing the battle's beginning.
***
Is it right to contradict your mother?
By all laws of human morality—not really.
And when your mother is also your superior?
A debatable question.
A matter for discussion.
So Fodeum argued.
A lot.
For a long time.
To no avail.
Now, standing by the Crusader's emergency airlock, he could feel two pairs of eyes on his back, burning through his sealed‑breather armor more fiercely than a couple of blasters.
"The truth isn't written on my cloak," he told the insufferable pair.
"You yourself said: wisdom must be drawn from everywhere," Gantoris replied meaningfully.
"Including from those around you," Magash Drashi echoed him.
The Jensaarai Defender rolled his eyes, mentally appealing to the Force for the patience he so badly needed.
This was mockery.
Handing him—him, who not so long ago had been a student himself—two pupils at once!
"We don't have so few mentors, Fodeum," was how the saarai‑kaar had explained her decision.
His mother, by the way.
And she hadn't cared what Gantoris had told him when they met.
Nor had she cared when her son declared he was completely uncomfortable teaching the Order's ways even to a single adult, fully formed personality—never mind two.
But the saarai‑kaar was adamant.
"We can't train adult adepts who know of the Force and can use it on the same footing as children," she put a full stop to their argument. "Gantoris absorbs basic knowledge faster than Tatooine's sands soak up moisture. Magash is trained enough in the fundamentals to be part of combat groups. They only need a push in understanding our philosophy, and a demonstration of how it is implemented in practice."
Jensaarai combat groups…
What had it come to?
Defenders going to war as part of regular Dominion armed forces, and the saarai‑kaar saw nothing shameful in it.
No logical contradiction either.
The Jedi, "guardians of the peace," had likewise become military leaders overnight—and where had that led them?
And in the end, why was it exactly their "honor" to ensure that the crystal mines on Artus Prime were seized as soon as possible and placed under the Order's jurisdiction?
There were other "combat groups."
Why couldn't he teach these two the Jensaarai philosophy somewhere on customs posts instead of on the front line?
Yes, those cursed Artusian crystals, insofar as Fodeum could judge from the samples found on‑world, resembled those used in lightsabers…
But they were "a thing in themselves," and their properties were not fully understood.
Of course Dominion intelligence had to discover those mines right now.
But the deed was done.
Artus Prime had been taken.
And most likely the crystal mining sites would be transferred to the Order, just as they had been to the Jedi under the Old Republic.
The mines were destroyed—all but two—and all extracted stocks were now aboard Acclamators, past which the Crusaders carrying assault teams had just flown.
His mother had ordered him personally to see that the crystals already recovered did not leave the sector.
Commodore Stormaer would deal with the enemy ships, and it was up to Fodeum and his students to attack the Imperials moored in the slips.
Primarily because the cargo had been transferred from the cruisers to the Destroyers' holds.
And secondly…
"Master," Fodeum flinched every time someone addressed him like that. This time was no exception. "Are you sure we can capture two Star Destroyers at once with our small force? Their crews are several tens of thousands of people each!"
The Jensaarai Defender sighed heavily.
"We don't have to capture those ships with tens of thousands of crew aboard," he said. "Most of their people are on the planet and have been called to battle stations. Only skeleton watches remain aboard. Our task is to keep the shuttles with crews from reaching the Destroyers before our forces do. And yes, hundreds of droidekas for each ship will be enough to keep the watches from trying our fleet's nerves."
"But first and foremost we care that they don't get the Artusian crystals out of the system, right, Master?" Gantoris kept probing.
"That is also part of our mission," Fodeum confirmed.
"Aren't the Jensaarai supposed to focus only on defense?" Magash Drashi asked. "Yet we are, in fact, attacking…"
He had no answer ready except…
Fodeum turned to face his students.
Both were clad in light space suits that did not restrict movement.
Behind them stood several droidekas, awaiting their "moment of glory"—one that would clearly last a while.
Especially considering that these droids choked practically every corridor and free compartment aboard the corvette.
"There is an old saying: 'Attack is the best defense,'" he began, realizing as he spoke that he had mangled the quote. But there was no point stopping the motivational speech now. "The Zann Consortium and its minions attacked the Dominion we swore to protect. To sit in a passive defense is not the best option. We could hold the enemy at our borders for months, but that would be unwise. Because after a destroyed fleet and shattered army, other fleets and armies will come. The galaxy is vast. There is no shortage of people willing to fight for money."
In truth he was quoting his mother.
To whom he had asked precisely the same questions.
"It does sound ambiguous," Gantoris noted. "So we defend ourselves against aggression with our own aggression? Not with negotiations, discussions, and compromises, in which the Jedi supposedly excelled?"
"Seems logical enough to me," Magash said. "Why endure attacks if you can go to the offender and kill him in his own home? Why torment yourself with qualms if the ultimate goal is good?"
Of course.
Given how she had ended up in the Dominion and that at first she had trained under Darth Maul (who had rejected her for being "unable to follow the path of the dark side"), no other answer was to be expected.
Such were his students.
Gantoris—the pragmatic phlegmatic, cautious and thoughtful, very much like a Jedi.
Magash—impulsive and stubborn, quick to mete out punishment and eager for borderline‑reckless schemes.
He achieved his aims through diligence and a methodical approach.
She—through ferocious onslaught.
Two sides of one coin.
They could both stand to learn the traits they lacked from each other.
Fodeum nearly slapped his own face.
Now he understood why the saarai‑kaar had paired them and put them under his command.
Each possessed what the other lacked.
"Exactly, Gantoris," Fodeum said. "The Jedi liked to chatter. And where are they now?"
The man from Eol Sha stayed silent.
"The Jensaarai will not strike first," the Defender said. "But we don't flail blindly. We strike back."
"Sometimes before we're even hurt," Magash giggled.
"Never," Fodeum denied.
"But Quimar sector and its worlds have not attacked the Dominion," Gantoris stubbornly reminded him.
"They did provide the enemy with resources, provisions, and bases, and they maintained its equipment," Fodeum countered. "Anyone who aids an aggressor is a participant in aggression. If such people are not stopped—swiftly and harshly—one day they will come to believe this petty toadying and aid comes without consequences. In the long term, we get a potential aggressor at the Dominion's borders. Once they build their strength, the only way to stop them will be at a high cost in blood."
"There is logic in that," Gantoris agreed. "But wouldn't it have been simpler to send diplomatic notes to local governments and demand they hand over the accomplices? Are you not the one who teaches us about humility, patience, and emotional control? Does control not imply first negotiating a way to save the innocent?"
"That was done before the invasion began," Fodeum told his students. "All of the Zann Consortium's allies refused. In rather rude terms. After that the HoloNet fell, and we began seeking justice by military means."
"Can we stop with the talk and just kill those who are against us already?" the Dathomiri's eyes flared with a dangerous yellow light, and the dark side emanated from her.
With his experience as Reynar Obscuro's student, Fodeum had to agree with Darth Maul's words.
Magash Drashi was not strong enough in the dark side to become one of the Shadow Guards.
So he would have to keep wracking his brain and wearing down his nerves to instill the Jensaarai philosophy in them.
"Killing cannot be wanton," Fodeum said. "The dark side comes easily to you when you're in battle or wounded. Too easily to resist without preparation. Negative emotions feed the dark side, and it feeds them in turn. That's why Sith who lacked control and discipline turned into maniacs and terrorists. It was with them the Jedi fought at the dawn of their order. Only control of our emotions—both positive and base—keeps us from sliding into dogmatism and lets us take from the Force what is needed in the moment. We turn it into a controlled, accountable tool. If you submit to it without the skills of self‑control, you will lose yourself. Forever."
Their answer was silence.
And skepticism in both sets of eyes.
"Defender, prepare for drop," the corvette's captain reported as the ship began to shudder from periodic hits against its deflector shields. "We'll be in launch position in ten seconds. Countdown has started. Compartments are sealed. Good luck."
"And to you," Fodeum signaled his students that it was time to move on to the main part of their flight.
Calling on the Force as an ally, the young Jensaarai Defender expanded his awareness and tensed his muscles…
***
It was unlikely any pilot or crewman of a Star Destroyer had ever seen anything like this.
What makes decompression dangerous for a starship?
The fact that atmosphere blasts out of a breach at insane speed, dragging out everything not welded or bolted to bulkheads and decks.
And what makes it dangerous for sentients?
For stormtrooper squads flying into the main bay's open doors on jump packs—nothing.
For droidekas, which the outrushing air hurls out of emergency locks like cannon shots—well, maybe a couple of dents or a broken component if they plow into the Destroyer's hull.
And for three Jensaarai, two of whom are students?
For three Jensaarai who have not learned to handle jetpacks and are now hurtling at high speed toward the glowing rectangle of the Adjudicator's main bay?
Anything but pleasant.
In theory the plan was quite ambitious.
Launch an assault team straight into an Imperial Star Destroyer's hangar via explosive decompression.
Do it on a trajectory such that the end of their flight path would drop them right into the ship's primary landing section.
Bursting through the white‑blue shimmer of the atmospheric shield under raw inertia, Fodeum felt his insides, recently crammed into his boots by the G‑load, yank downward.
He and his students had entered the zone of the ship's artificial gravity.
Exactly as planned.
Which in no small measure stunned the deck crew.
Some of them reacted faster, reaching for their blasters.
But they fell at once under rapid fire from the droidekas that had slammed down onto the deck in a horrific screech and grind of metal.
The metal killers began their advance deeper into the enemy vessel flawlessly, relentlessly, mercilessly.
Their glistening deflector shields soaked up fire of every power level the bay's defenders could throw at them.
Unlike his students, Fodeum had no need to discard his suit.
Even using the quick‑release system that literally blew off the front and helmet.
He dove into the current of the Force, thinking that for the stormtroopers assaulting the second Destroyer (also with droideka support) the situation was no easier.
Even harder.
Because the Force was not telling them where their enemies were.
Their armor's scanners and targeting systems could help…
But that was another matter.
Fodeum habitually turned to his annoyance with his students as a starting point for his appeal to the dark side of the Force.
He still feared who and what he might become if he surrendered to it entirely, but…
He had trained under Bre'ano Umakk precisely so he would know how to keep the beast inside on a leash.
His irritation and fear heated like metal in a foundry, releasing a white‑hot, all‑consuming wrath.
Deflecting the shots aimed at him, Fodeum charged, exulting at the sight of a squad of enemy troops attempting to take him down.
The lightsaber that had once belonged to Darth Vader—born Anakin Skywalker, later passed to his son, the New Republic's vaunted Jedi—caught every bolt, and, thanks to the lunge of its new owner, drove its blade into the nearest foe.
The armed technician split into two halves, and Fodeum was already moving on.
He parried a shot aimed at his head, then used the Force to hurl the shooter back several meters, bowling him into a group of other troopers.
And kept killing.
Did he regret the lives he was taking?
Perhaps somewhere deep inside.
But in that moment he was a force of nature, an unbridled power ripping the hangar's defenders apart and…
An explosion went off barely a meter away, blasting him back into a side bulkhead.
Dazed and knocked out of his focus, the young Jensaarai struggled to his feet, trying to understand what had happened.
Sounds reached him in fragments, distorted as if he were underwater and someone on the surface were trying to talk to him…
He reached for the Force, using the pain from his wounds as fuel to carry on.
The Defender ignored the shards of the grenade embedded in his body.
He did not care that the armor he had crafted—previously dismissed by him as a "waste of time"—had in fact saved his life.
The breastplate, studded with razor‑edged fragments, said as much.
Fodeum set aside all reflection.
He saw more enemy troops entering the hangar.
He saw Gantoris and Magash attacking them even as a Rodian grenadier—the one who had hit him—took aim at them.
The alien had already dropped a new grenade into his Plex launcher and was raising the weapon…
One blast and both his students, whose only protection was cloth, would be dead.
"Not today," Fodeum said, thrusting out his free hand.
The shards that had nearly killed him tore themselves free from the armored segments of his suit with a thin metallic whine.
Ballistakinesis, the unique Jensaarai technique, more lethal than Force Lightning.
In the right place, at the right time.
It was devastating and merciless, because the stream of razor‑sharp fragments that ripped through the Rodian's body did not stop.
His launcher exploded, sending a new spray of shrapnel flying.
Fodeum did not allow it to harm his students.
He seized it.
Each piece separately and the entire mass of deadly metal released by the blast.
Guided by the Defender's will, it went on, seeking new prey.
Two technicians running for the briefing rooms were shredded to rags.
Fodeum looked toward a Devaronian setting up a heavy repeater…
A lethal swarm of fragments turned the alien into a bloody steak.
The enemy fell back, seeing that more and more droidekas were rolling into the bay.
They began retreating, realizing that without the heavy weapons crews, whom the droidekas shielded with their deflectors and the trio of Jensaarai were cutting down, they had no chance.
Fodeum, Gantoris, and Magash had no intention of letting them go.
The sentients, that is.
Not the deserting Imperials.
There were few of those on deck.
This was no longer a ship with traitors aboard.
This was a Destroyer fallen into the hands of criminals.
A blight intended to be turned against the Dominion.
Unforgivable.
It had to be eradicated.
The dark side called to Fodeum, and he answered.
Eagerly, lovingly, with all his attention.
His wounds' pain stoked his wrath, and wrath stoked his rage.
The stronger the latter grew, the more pain Fodeum felt.
He was literally burning, swept up in the treacherous vortex of emotions that fed the dark side.
Which, in turn, fed them.
A vicious circle he used to carve his way through the Destroyer's corridors.
He killed indiscriminately, paying no heed to the fact that his armor had blackened from the hits landing ever more frequently in his path.
Each one brought pain, and he turned pain into a weapon.
He himself had become a weapon.
Unfaltering.
Unstoppable.
Absolute.
He no longer distinguished corridors and compartments and had long ceased to notice he was no longer moving with the droidekas but along his own path.
He was not clearing the ship after the machines.
He himself had become a machine of flesh and blood, forcing his way through the busiest parts of the Star Destroyer.
It didn't matter whether he wielded a lightsaber or the mangled remains of equipment he himself had smashed.
All of it was a weapon.
Decorative panels whose thin durasteel sliced sentients to pieces.
Light fixtures that exploded whenever crew members of the corrupted ship came near.
Bulkheads that crushed foes when they found themselves between them…
He killed, leaving behind piles of bodies and pools of blood—where death did not come from a saber.
His path ended abruptly.
In a large, spacious compartment he entered, there were simply no enemies left.
He had killed them.
Every one.
Ripped them apart.
And he realized with surprise he was on the Destroyer's bridge.
In the command tower.
Though not so long ago he had been in the hangar…
The man snapped out of it and activated his comlink.
"Gantoris! Magash! Where are you?"
"Behind you," came the reply.
But not in his helmet.
They spoke behind his back.
The man turned.
Both students, pale and clearly uncomfortable, looked around.
Every bulkhead, every console—everything was covered in bodies or soaked in the blood of the dead.
Dozens of people.
Far more than were needed to run such a ship.
"You drove them from the hangar to the bridge," Gantoris said, as if reading his thoughts. "Herded them here like animals, killing anyone who tried to stop or resist you."
Fodeum felt his hands begin to tremble.
What he had most feared had happened.
He had lost control…
And he, a butcher, was supposed to teach these sentients the philosophy of protection?
How could he make model Jensaarai out of students when he himself did not match the model?
"This…" the man muttered. "This is wrong… It should not have happened."
"I thought it was something else," Magash's eyes shone. "I've never seen anything like this even from the Inquisitors working for Silri!"
"You killed them like animals," Gantoris shook his head. "You just tore sentients apart…"
"I lost control," Fodeum said miserably.
He was least pleased by what had happened.
And most guilty of the carnage.
Something had happened.
Something had broken his moral compass…
"Lesson learned," Gantoris suddenly said, clipping his lightsaber back on his belt. "Patience and emotional control. Now I see why they are necessary. One demonstration replaced dozens of hours of your clumsy explanations."
Fodeum realized he was panicking.
What was going on?
"Well, I wouldn't mind doing the same to those who used me and sent me into the Dominion," the Dathomiri witch said vindictively. "But… Master, no offense. Being around you at that moment was simply dangerous. You nearly killed us three times over… If what you showed us is what awaits us if we fall to the dark side, then… Fine, I'll stop dismissing your talk of control as empty chatter."
The Jensaarai Defender quickly clasped both hands behind his back.
So his students would not see them shaking.
He…
He had almost become a mindless killer in thrall to the dark side, and they…
They decided he'd given them a practical lesson?
That he had chosen to show them, clearly, what unbridled, all‑consuming rage looked like?
This…
This…
This had to be used.
Fodeum channeled the light side through himself, letting go of fear and confusion.
"There are still enemies aboard this ship," he said. "Now I will show you what it means to fight using the Force under control, instead of surrendering to its madness…"
"I hope I can make it no less impressive for them," Fodeum thought.
***
General Rahm Kota felt a certain unease within.
Something was happening, and he did not understand what.
The Force seethed in an unusually turbulent way, something that had not happened in a long time.
If you listened closely, you could sense that somewhere in the galaxy something irreparable was taking place.
The old Jedi tried to look into the Force, to push through time and space, to understand…
But he could not.
Visions of future and present swept before his eyes in an indistinct tumble of images he could neither comprehend nor process.
Irritated, the old Jedi opened his eyes, breaking his meditation.
He had never been strong in interpreting the Force's hints.
Only a few times had it granted him a clear picture of what was to come—when he'd met Galen Marek at the Imperial fighter construction array.
And on Dantooine, when he had decided to find his old student, Falon Grey, to bring him into the Rebel Alliance.
Instead he had discovered only the corpse of the first and his clone, for whom Falon had given his life.
The old Jedi muttered an inarticulate curse, pondering what these twists of fate might mean.
He did not grasp their essence, but suspected nothing good would come of the HoloNet's collapse for him or the galaxy.
Nor could he prevent it.
At least not from here, in orbit above Sullust.
All he could do was wait.
And hope the Force would take pity on him and answer.
***
Starships dropped out of hyperspace in several groups, as if competing to see which side could field more.
Captain Pellaeon watched warily as the Alliance squadron and Silri's Syndicate fleet materialized at the Kessel sector's edge.
Where only one Interdictor and a pair of Dominion patrol corvettes were positioned.
"Sir," he addressed the Grand Admiral. "We risk losing ships before we even engage the enemy."
Not to mention that both sides had brought dozens of capital ships and oceans of starfighters.
"We do," Thrawn agreed. "There is no war without risk."
"The donor's memories of last year's campaign say you can conduct a battle like a symphony," the super star destroyer's commander thought. "With no risk to the personnel."
"Sir, if they unite against us, they will have a guaranteed advantage over all our forces in this sector," Pellaeon warned.
"Key word 'if,' Captain," the Grand Admiral said, stroking the ysalamiri as his eyes skimmed the encrypted signal deck from across the Kessel sector. "Let our opponents understand who stands before them and have time to overcome the shock of learning that each of them is not the only contender for control of Kessel."
That would not happen until the radiation had washed off their hulls and their sensors were working again.
That took time.
Not much—but still.
"Oh." The Grand Admiral smiled in satisfaction as faint pinpricks of turbolaser fire flickered between the two fleets. "It has begun."
Well then…
Quite an inventive move on the Dominion Supreme Commander's part.
Luring two rivals into one system and forcing them to fight each other for the right to deal with the Dominion.
Inventive.
"All that remains is to watch them tear each other to pieces," Pellaeon voiced the presumed plan.
"It would be pleasant to enjoy such a spectacle," Thrawn agreed, keeping his gaze fixed on the two Dominion‑enemy fleets exchanging fire. "But we are gracious hosts and cannot allow our guests to leave without the attention of our turbolasers. Begin assigning targets for our Scimitars and Avengers, Captain. It is time we informed both sides they are not welcome here."
"Yes, sir!" the Guardian's captain replied with some enthusiasm. "Shall I order the fleet to advance on the enemy?"
"Of course, Captain," Thrawn said. "Order the fleet to begin closing with the Alliance and Syndicate ships. We wouldn't want to scare off the enemy's reserves."
"We would not," Pellaeon agreed, trying to understand how those two statements were even related.
He never did find the answer.