Cato Neimoidia, Outside Lot Dod's palace. (7 Hours Later)
Having retrieved from the ship several of the belongings the Neimoidians would object to under cover of darkness, I eyed the palace of Senator Dod from the roof of the nearby Lor Dev Stock & Trust Analysis headquarters. R2-D2 had gained access to the building's external security cameras only, and was presently occupied looping footage with altered timestamps. Still, even with my own little slicer-droid, SL-R1 helping, I wasn't going to be able to stay up here forever. Legionnaires had already been up here twice as part of their continual security-sweeps this close to the Senator's luxurious multi-spire habitation, and only my Matukai training made it possible for me to hang from the building's nearly sheer sides by fingertip-sized holds the Force alone had helped me find until they eventually departed. Fortunately, R2-D2 had reported the building was equipped with a powerful security-field. Likely to inhibit corporate espionage, the security-field rendered the handheld bio-scanners carried by the second-in-command of each six-legionnaire unit useless. Otherwise, no amount of Felacatian burglar-like antics would have prevented my being revealed already.
"You can do this, Padme" I thought to myself. Using a technique Dark Woman had taught me shortly after Mimban to allow me to see in the near-total darkness as clearly as if it were midday, and relying on my Force Sense to warn me before a possible third sweep by the legionnaires could take me by surprise.
Padme had given me a rather pointed look when I'd advised her the data-disc she needed to acquire would almost certainly be in the main library, but she hadn't pressed me for an explanation. Instead, we'd moved on to concoct a rather simplistic plan initial plan I had every reason to believe wouldn't be enough to realize our objective and see us off-world. That was why we had contingency plans, and Dark Woman standing by aboard Seraph amid the debris of the system's extensive asteroid belt, but now wasn't the time to be focusing on what might happen in future. Right now, I needed to remain watchful for her appearance on one of the eastern facing balconies which were part of the Neimoidian Senator's enormous palace. Once she tossed the data-disc from said balcony, I was just close enough to grab it with telekinesis. I could then sneak back to the ship, and stash the disc in one of the concealed and shielded compartments. It was a plan possessing a certain elegant simplicity, and one which should have every chance of succeeding.
Unfortunately, I knew it wasn't going to be that easy. Even with Force-assisted recall, I didn't have the ability to simply call up the details of everything Star Wars-related I'd come into contact with during my first life. I'd loved the Clone Wars animated series, but it had been twenty years, and not everything had made a deep enough impression to begin with for even Force-enhanced memory recall to make a difference. Still, the episode which dealt with these events had stuck out in memory. Showing as they had a foundation for darker things to come during a fateful encounter on Mustafar. Padme was presently ensconced in a den of vipers who thought nothing of murder in service to their greed, and I was going to have to do something about that.
The appearance and subsequent disappearance of the shadow on a higher balcony than I was anticipating happened so quickly, I would have missed it if not expressly looking for it. Spotting the small object flung into the night, I reached out with the Force, arrested it's fall, then reeled it in a moment later. My hand closed over the circular disc a few seconds later. Only to find myself also holding a bit of flimsi which has been hastily bound around the disc using the wire filament-camera I'd given her.
"No problem getting in and out of the library. Went back and used the secret passageway you told me how to find to listen in on and make a holo-recording of Rush meeting with Dod and Poggle using your filament-cam. Stayed behind after Rush left the room to record the rest of Dod and Poggle's conversation. Poggle has "something much bigger than a mere droid-foundry" he wants to bring the two of them in on, but he's leery of his new partners.
Someone named Ventress is supposed to arrive very soon to determine neither of them are serving any conflicting interests. The mere mention of this Ventress's name had Lot Dod nearly hyperventilating in the heart of his own palace, so he or she must be someone important.
After that, the two of them went back to talking about the foundry, and complaining about the terms favoring Rush too much. Dod said he had something in mind to "Persuade the good Baron to treat with them more equitably." I didn't like the sound of that at all. Will await your implementation of contingency one or two, but I don't think things have reached the point of considering contingency three."
Padme's message ended there. Leaving me silently cursing this unanticipated divergence from the original timeline. Dealing with the fact the Neimoidian Senator obviously intended to use poisoning her as leverage over Clovis just like before was bad enough, but Ventress's presence would make the situation untenable.
"It's safe to assume Bulq is pursuing the goal of controlling the IG.BC just as Darth Tyrannus would have. Meaning Asajj will wholeheartedly endorse poisoning Padme to subvert Clovis, even if against all odds she were to somehow consider the presence of a Senator trained to conceal her thoughts a coincidence. I have to get her out of there before Ventress arrives" I silently concluded. Releasing my fear for the fearless woman I admired so much into the Force, and weighing my alternatives with lightning speed.
Deciding I'd try the simplest of our contingency plans first despite the danger of raising the conspirators' suspicions, I swept the area around the building's perimeter for any sign of another patrol. Finding nothing, I flipped open my comm and contacted R2-D2. The instant his domed form appeared in the center of the circular hologram-projector, I said "Give me ten seconds, then collect SL-R1 and meet me at the intersection just before the edge of the landing complex. Your mistress is going to find herself in a great deal of trouble if we don't act fast, Artoo."
I received a whirring hum and beep of confirmation from the quintessentially cool-headed droid, then his image disappeared. I pocketed the holo-comm, then made of my body the deepest channel for the Force I could in just a few moments. Thankful in the extreme for my former Master's brutally demanding standards for performance under pressure, as I leaped from the edge of the hundred and fifty meter-tall building.
The Force carried me more than a hundred and twenty-five meters laterally to the next building-top, but rather than make a static landing, I used the Force to cushion my rolling descent. Completing my forward roll, and plunging forward using Force Speed to turn what was already a dead-sprint into a blurring passage across the rooftop. Making my arrival and traversal nothing but a dark, indistinct, man-sized streak the cameras were welcome to as I leaped again. In less than forty-five seconds, I blazed across nine roof-tops to fling myself into empty space a final time. More than five kilometers from where I'd started across from the Senatorial palace, and now coming down in a seedy alley one street over from the eastern edge of the landing complex. My boots made a faint thwud-thump as I landed beside a dumpster. Frightening into motion a pair of six-legged lizards with four prominent glowing eyes each I took for the local cat-analog as I did so.
Walking out of the alley, I made as if I were readjusting my pants like a man who'd just ducked into an out of the way spot to relieve himself. Careful to proceed toward the ship in the relaxed manner of a pilot returning from liberty. I brushed bits of gravel from my tunic as I came to the intersection I'd mentioned, then waited with idle unconcern. A six-legionnaire unit passed me headed west no more than ninety seconds later, but I'd already learned the larger nighttime units had territory-coverage quotas which left them disinclined towards shakedowns of those they couldn't expect to receive enough credits from to risk falling behind. The data-goggles worn by the officers recorded whatever they saw, so their corporate overlords had a ready means available to determine which units were on-task, and which units needed to be assigned to more unpleasant duties. I'd heard quite a lot of "Hurry up, you maggots! Unless you want to be patrolling hip-deep in hatchery filth this time next week!" urging while hanging from the side of the Stock & Trust. The senior legionnaire barely glanced in my direction before prodding his subordinates onward.
R2-D2 proved adept enough to have detected the oncoming patrol in time to divert to the north. He'd rolled one street up, come one street further west, then turned south to roll up to me with SL-R1 riding atop his dome. The slicer-droid lifted off a moment later, and I had the melon-sized droid back in my pack in less than three seconds. From there we simply walked briskly and openly back to the ship.
Once inside, I stashed the data-disc in the shielded compartment no wider than three of my fingers. It was beneath an always hot static-dispersal unit attached to internal components of the Sossen-7 sub-light engines, so it was an excellent place for such a compartment. The sheer number and genius placement of such little hideaways all over the craft's interior made me wonder just how often Padme had reason to be in possession of items she'd rather the authorities not discover, but I shoved such extraneous speculation from my mind as I darted forward into the cockpit and dropped into the pilot's seat.
The main comm-array was already set for contact with Padme's personal communicator. Requiring nothing of me but the depressing of a single button, and a subsequent few moments tense delay as I waited for her to pick up. Those few seconds seemed to pass like years, as I ruthlessly quashed images of Ventress strolling into the same room as Padme.
Padme's blue-white hologram appeared on the console a moment later, and her demeanor was the picture-perfect depiction of a superior interrupted by necessary minutiae brought to their attention by a subordinate, as she inquired "Yes, Anayk? I told you to only contact me if something urgent came up. What is it?"
"Forgive me, Senator Amidala, but a message just came through from Senator Robb's attache. I offered to relay her signal to your personal communicator, but I was told it's Senate business requiring a diplomatic communications seal. It was requested you contact the Senator as soon as possible, and they made sure to reiterate the importance of your doing so immediately. If I shouldn't have contacted you, I ask your pardon" I replied with obvious deference clear in my tone.
Her beautiful features tensing in a masterful counterfeit of deep concern, she sighed, then answered "Please transmit my receipt-of-transmission to the Senator's office, Anayk. I'll be returning to the ship immediately, so please set the initial signal-encryption to running. I have hopes of returning in time not to disrupt my host's hospitality. Meaning I won't be very understanding of any delays once I arrive. Understand?"
Bobbing my head, I didn't allow a particle of the relief I was feeling to show on my face, as I replied "I'll have everything prepared for your arrival, ma'am. Again, I ask your pardon for the interruption. The attache simply spoke in such an urgent way, I thought it best you be given the opportunity to respond as soon as possible."
Instead of replying, she simply inclined her head regally. Silently telling me she'd caught my "Hurry the fark up, or you're going to die." Her image disappeared from the console an instant later. Prompting me to turn to Artoo and say "I'm going to be needing my lightsaber, Artoo. Things never seem to come off without a hitch when I'm involved."
The droid didn't so much as beep as his dome slid back. Apparently, he agreed with me that everything was proceeding entirely too smoothly. I snagged the weapon, and immediately felt more myself.
Going to one of the larger shielded compartments, I retrieved SP-C1, then commanded the spider-droid "Hover one hundred and twenty meters up and a hundred meters to the west. Send a burst-signal to my communicator the moment you spot Senator Amidala, a contingent of hostiles moving this way, or anyone matching your Dathomiri biometric file-specifications."
The droid's silent repulsor-lift unit whisked it out the back of the ship and into the night. I hoped I'd be given time to recover it, but situations like these were while I'd built it expressly to preclude the possibility of sapience. SP-C1 and SL-R1 were valuable tools in which I'd invested significant time and resources, but they weren't beings whose welfare I needed to be concerned with.
One file compartment revealed my grenade-belt. Ventress was a dirty cheater with a fondness for droidekas, but so was I. We'd just have to see whether my fondness for ion and sonic grenades would trump her penchant for droids doing her dirty-work. I girded on my magnetic-lock ordinance, then stepped outside. The time for blending in and going along to get along now read 0:00.
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The beep on my wrist came just before I personally sighted Padme walking purposefully but without any tell-tale haste through the intersection where I'd waited for Artoo. I was just about to conclude I'd been wrong, and this might all come off without a hitch, when another humming signal caused my wrist-band to pulse.
I felt the Force keen and instinctively allowed my Force Sense to blossom outwards to cover an area of more than fifty meters. Ventress had grown truly exceptional with Force Illusions, but for one thing, the technique lost some of it's effectiveness when a prospective target was specifically on the watch for a cloaked approach, and for another, I simply had a stronger Force Sense than her facility with Dark Side illusions could compensate for.
Shimmering into existence as the Force wailed around her, I noted the silver-haired pageboy cut and the dead shark-like gray eyes were the same, Just like her whip-thin build I knew was concealing a surprising amount of strength. Now, however, she was wearing the black "long loincloth" style skirt and sleeveless silver tunic which had been her look for the duration of the Clone Wars in another timeline. Her leap carried her from the far end of the northern path R2-D2 had rolled down to meet me. While a trio of droidekas rolled along in her wake, and two ten-strong squads of Neimoidian legionnaires double-timed it along far behind the droids rolling progress perhaps two hundred and seventy-five meters behind Ventress. She'd tried to land in between me and a Captain Typho accompanied Padme, but I put the nix on that with a burst of Force Speed faster than any I'd ever kept control of before. It actually surprised me for a split-second, finding the world turned streaky for the moment it took Force-enhanced senses to compensate. Pouring strength into my legs, and reinforcement into my knees, hips, and connective tissues with Force-augmentation, I came to a stop on a credit beside the dark-haired woman I'd come to protect.
I could sense the fraction of an instant between Ventress's eyes losing me, and her other perceptions reacquiring me two hundred meters away at the Senator's side. My left hand made an up-then-jabbing gesture which tore four grenades from their places on my belt. Sending two low and straight, as the other pair went high and wide. Droideka threat-detection sensor packages were among the best possessed by any droid, but a destroyer was never more vulnerable than while rolling at maximum speed. Their straight-line top speed enabled them to go so far as chasing down speeders, but once they'd attained that speed, their lateral maneuverability turned to bantha pudu. All three destroyers detected the incoming threat. Resulting in two beginning shallow curving paths to the right, and the third arcing left.
My "throw" had been a little left of center, so the droideka furthest to the right was caught only by the edge of the blast as both ion grenades went off. It had also chosen differently than it's nearest compatriot automaton. Popping emergency overrides which allowed it to unfurl despite the fact it hadn't come to a stop. It nearly overbalanced and landed on it's head as it's shield began flickering to life simultaneous with the detonation, but firing both it's turrets into the ground before it had provided just enough recoil to tip it back onto it's tripod like legs. Now, that shield continually flickered on and off, as internal shorts and overloads caused half it's right most turret limb to actually explode in a shower of sparks. It's two companions hadn't been nearly so fortunate. One had simply fallen over as an inert wheel, and the other lay on it's left side half-in, half-out of wheel-mode. Intermittent sparks shot from the thing as two of it's three legs weakly kicked, but it's head was a blackened mess of shorted out components.
The Neimoidians fared rather better. They'd been much further away, and the data-goggles worn by the officers had identified the fast-moving orbs as dangerous ordinance even in the dark of night. Each of the four officers had grabbed the nearest subordinate as they dashed aside, then threw themselves right or left with all their strength. Half the detachment made it to the furthest edges of the blast-zone created by the pair of sonic grenades, but the other half clutched their heads and dropped in boneless heaps. Those who'd escaped most of the punishing ultra-sonic attack proved to be made of surprisingly stern stuff thought. Their movements were drunken and fitful for the present, but already they were beginning to fumble about on the ground for dropped blaster-rifles.
All of this happened in less than a second and a half. Stock grenades used four second delay detonators, but as Ventress and Yaddle had both proven on Tynna, that was plenty of time for an attentive Force-sensitive to devise a counter even if you resorted to magnetic locking. Learning from that encounter, I'd opened up quite a few grenades to learn how they actually functioned. Once I understood how they worked in detail, it hadn't been hard to find and purchase after market motion-and-proximity sensors I could install myself. Once a grenade was armed, there was a 1.5 second "safe" delay, then it went off the instant it came within ideal effective coverage of a moving target bigger than a small child. It quadrupled the expense, but now that I was a Jedi Knight, I had access to a significantly more robust Temple account I could draw on for mission-requisite goods and services.
Padme and Gregar were just beginning to react to my sudden presence between them and Ventress, when our respective lightsabers hissed to life simultaneously. One glance at the woman before me was enough to know she was aware of what had happened to her back-up without so much as a glance in their direction. The damaged droideka began firing at me just as she blurred forward, however. My Third Sight showing me she meant to take advantage of my need to deflect the droid's blaster-bolts to get past me to my charge. All things considered, it was a pretty good idea. I just managed to get my blade back on-line for a weak horizontal parry of her leaping downward cut after sending three bolts back in the droid's direction, but caught a boot in the midsection for my trouble. One of the reflected bolts narrowly missed, and another splashed off the intermittent shielding, but the third scored the plating of the droideka's chest-plating. It didn't seem to do much damage, but the impact rocked the machine back onto it's rear third leg. Momentarily sending it's return fire hissing just over our heads.
Captain Typho already had already drawn his own S-5 blaster, and he fired on the move at the damaged droideka. Hurrying Padme toward the ship as I was sent skidding backward a few meters with a quiet grunt of pain. Again, Ventress tried to cut me off from my charges, and again I was there ahead of her. Driving forward into a blade-lock, I used her against cover from the droideka, and yelled "Now, SP-C1!"
The slicer-droid drifting back in the direction of the skiff sent out a signal that was picked up and relayed to the ship's infinitely more powerful comm-array. In turn, said comm-array sent out a signal to the two dozen melon-sized ion charges. All of which I had spent the afternoon persuading various Neimoidians with the right to enter certain locations around the landing complex to conceal them near any major generator or significant power-conduit they could find. Ostensibly, the various technicians and maintenance-workers had additionally been persuaded the totally-not-E.M.P-causing devices were actually portable sensor-suites intended by the office of the Secretary-General of the Defense Legion to prove officials in charge of the landing complex were actually stealing power. I might have been the Chosen One, but even I couldn't outright convince people to sabotage their own infrastructure. Persuading them to betray "criminals" in the hopes of promotion and profit though? Not precisely easy, given the sheer number of suggestions I'd had to make, but well within my capabilities.
What little artificial light there was in the immediate area died without fanfare. Replaced a couple seconds later by even more spotty emergency lighting. The big landing-control tower went through the same cycle of complete darkness and it's emergency-lights activating, but the big pay-off were the four turbo-laser turrets on each corner of the landing-complex. The imposing quad-barrels all slumping from straight-ahead standby to point downward. It would have been impossible to actual cut off power to the actual turbo-lasers themselves, of course. No one with that kind of access I could have found in the time I'd been allotted would have been likely to be the sort vulnerable to mind-tricks. They were still fully operational. It's just their immediate point of control was the landing-tower, and it had just lost main power. I was distressingly confident that somewhere, soon, there existed a primary control for these turbo-lasers. One which would be reengaged just as soon as the people in the tower realized the extent of the sabotage and called for help. It had been the best I could do with five hours to work, and even this much wouldn't have been possible without Artoo's help. That little super-droid seemed to be able to slice anything short of hardened military networks like a lightsaber going through, well, anything. He'd found names, work itineraries, schematics, and organized it all into one easy-to-digest series of holograms.
"What happened to For Knowledge and Defense, Never Attack, Jedi?" Ventress hissed as she tried to disengage. Only for me to loop my lightsaber beneath hers and circle with her. Her left foot snaked out to try and slip behind my right to trip me, but I kicked it back down.
Rather than answer her taunt, I raised my voice to say something more meaningful. Watching as she spun aside and away like a flitting shadow. Forcing me to begin deflecting the destroyer's fire once more, as my withdrawal was slowed to a crawl by the need to keep her from getting past me.
"Ky Narec was a hero and a great Jedi. I mourn his loss, and think of him often. If-" I stated with real sincerity.
Only to be cut off by a hissing buzz as the Force shrilly screamed, as Ventress snapped "Ky Narec knew nothing about people, nothing about the galaxy, and less than nothing about the Force's true nature! He was weak, and he tried to make me just as weak as he was! I need hear nothing from the likes of you, Jedi. Nothing except your screams as you beg for mercy!"
Involuntarily, my eyebrows shot up at this unfocused rage. My lightsaber was a streak in the air before me as I deflected one bolt after another. Bounding into a series of back-flips as Ventress came ahead with a low-mid-high routine which was badly telegraphed. This wasn't the tightly controlled operator I'd met on Tynna, or the crafty assassin who'd plagued Obi-Wan and Anakin throughout the Clone Wars. At least not for the moment it wasn't. Ventress felt like I'd imagined Maul would feel. A simmering caldera of rage, always on the verge of an eruption.
Our sabers crossing diagonally as I landed and squared up a couple dozen meters closer to the ship, I eyed the half-dozen legionnaires now up and staggering up the road in our direction. They weren't shooting yet because of Ventress's proximity, but this was going to get bad if I were still here when they found an angle to all join their fire to the droideka. Worse, I could sense another far larger contingent of soldiers hurrying up from the south. Behind me, I could hear the skiff's repulsor-lifts having finished powering up, but there was still a hundred meters between me and the ship.
Asajj's grin was a demented, feral thing as she taunted "What's the matter, Jedi? Feeling the jaws of the trap closing around you and your little Senator? Already, the security-platforms will be reorienting to fire on a certain J-type skiff. Even if you managed to elude me by some miracle, where exactly do you think you're going?" She came ahead before even finishing her question. Intent on pinning me in place. Keeping me defending myself from her and the droid until either the legionnaires gathered in enough numbers to tip the scales, or our window here in the landing-complex closed.
Near enough the ionization made some of my hair lift, ship-grade guns spoke once, then again, and one final time. Erasing a damaged droideka from existence, and sending the group of recovered legionnaires scrambling for cover. At my feet, I saw a spike impact the ground. The silver cable attached to it leading upward and behind me to the skiff now nearly forty meters overhead.
Ventress realized what was going to happen, but I flung out a hand and Pushed as I grabbed the cable. It was a weak effort due to my more pressing need to reinforce my off-hand. elbow, and shoulder, but it forced her to drive her saber into the ground to prevent her being hurled off her feet. She only skidded backward maybe seven or eight meters, but Captain Typho timed his auto-reeling of the ascension-gun's line perfectly. Snatching me off my feet and into the air even as Ventress leaped after me. Pulling up my legs, I poured strength into my left arm and pulled myself horizontal with one arm by the line as it drew me in. Our sabers clashed three times at the apex of her leap, but then she began to fall back toward the ground, as I was hauled aboard ship by my aching arm.
Scooping SP-C1 from the air the moment I touched the rear ramp, I turned to flash a grateful smile at the Captain, then I was past him in a flash and headed for the cockpit.
We weren't out of this yet by any means.