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"Bohhuah Mutdah?" Plagueis repeated, mind whirling with thoughts. "I am very much aware of the richest man in the galaxy, Padawan."
More than that, truly much more; Bohhuah was an entrepreneur and industrialist who had gained his status and power through his sheer intelligence. Plagueis- and to be honest, most players in the galaxy- had deemed him a non-threat solely because the man appeared to have no ambition besides enjoying endless luxury with the vast riches he had accumulated…but if that had changed, if that man had gained new goals in the face of a crumbling republic...
"You believe he is involved in this? I was under the impression he was enjoying his wealth in..." Damask paused, pretending to only just now realize this detail.
"The Oseon system. Oseon 57...I forget the rest of the numbers," Anakin admitted. "While we were on Oseon 6845, his name popped up a few times."
"That wouldn't be surprising. He does have the biggest holding in that entire system," Plagueis noted, wondering if the young Jedi was onto something or not.
"That's my point. The virus was created in the Oseon system. Given his connections, I don't think it could have been done without his knowledge."
Plagueis paused. He had to ask questions carefully to not draw suspicion to himself. "Did you see anything that directly pointed to him?"
Anakin shrugged. "To me they did, I'm not sure if others would see it the same way," he answered as he looked up in thought. "But when Master Qui-Gon asked about the speed of the operation, to get a shipment of Alberries to Albingi? They mentioned that Mutdah donated money to make everything happen swiftly. Given the nature of Oseon, I assumed he was just bribing them all to do everything and to do it quickly."
"He likely was," Plagueis murmured in agreement. "And if asked, he can just say he paid off corrupt officials to do the right thing. And perhaps he did, if only for his own benefit."
Anakin nodded slowly. "The Hutts on Tatooine did things like that all the time; creating a problem that someone would have to pay them to fix. But this is..."
"Be careful with your suspicions, young Skywalker," Damask voiced in concern. "A man like that is powerful, with hands and ears where you least expect them. Even if you don't have proof, just being on his trail might be enough to make such a foe strike out."
"I know," Anakin answered with a small smile. "That's why I haven't told anyone besides you."
Plagueis blinked in genuine confusion. "I must ask, what has put me above suspicion? Was it the kidnapping or...?"
Anakin shook his head. "No, it's how you act around the Blight. I'm sure you want to help the Albingi, but you also really want to understand how to stop it just because you want to know. If you were a part of this scheme, I imagined you wouldn't be so invested in this puzzle."
Plagueis looked amused and sheepish. "Am I so obvious in my fascination?"
Anakin smiled reassuringly. "Don't worry. I'm the same way with machines. It doesn't matter if it's a battledroid or a speeder, I like tinkering with anything mechanical," he said before turning grim. "But if someone like Mutdah is behind all of this, what is the end goal?"
Empire building was Plagueis's guess. The man would either take the planet entirely if the Albingi were wiped out enough, or have control over it via this treatment.
"Unfortunately, a likely suspect does not help our immediate concerns," Plagueis reminded before looking back at the data for the blight's treatment plan. "However, I believe I can make use of the information you have brought me."
"I hope so, Magister," Anakin remarked. "Master Qui-Gon told me to stay here with you, in case anyone tries to come after you."
"After today, I think I would feel safer with you, Young Skywalker, than I would with any short of Master Yoda himself," Plagueis said in jest.
Anakin couldn't help smirking a bit. "There are indeed few shorter than the Grandmaster, Magister."
Plagueis let out a genuine chuckle. All matters of the Force aside, he preferred dealing with Jedi who possessed a sense of humor.
Meanwhile
"You are sure this is where the coordinates will lead to, Admiral?" Vader questioned firmly.
"Yes, Lord Vader. The teams have triple checked the readings from the device, and we have done the same in testing the coordinates," Pyrl answered firmly. "I feel I must ask, but does this location mean anything to you, Sir?"
Vader considered the question for a moment, crossing his arms in thought. "No. Be it the days of the Empire, the Clone Wars, or even further back; I am unaware of any significance this planet would have."
"Troubling," Tanda said, a sentiment Vader shared. "It is just short of the Unknown Region, Sir. It might be possible for us to trigger the device and slip away before any takes note of us. It would just be another rumor of a massive ship seen through the fringes of the galaxy."
"Perhaps, Admiral," Vader said in acknowledgment. "We either risk removing the device and triggering the hyperspace jump in the process, or we trigger it on our own terms."
Tanda Pyrl said nothing, waiting to see what decision the Sith Lord would come to.
Setting it off intentionally would send them to this system, but trying to remove it could lead to the same outcome if anything went wrong. Leaving the device alone by isolating and guarding the area was the most ideal in theory, but ran the biggest risk. At any time it could be set off by damage to the ship, attempts to make repairs, or one of the remaining Nutters lurking aboard the super star destroyer.
But something else was going on with all of this. The nameless engineer and one of the Noghri had both mentioned a "Lady" that they implied to be the Executor herself. And he had no doubt that the engineer was connected to this device. Something or someone wanted him and the Executor at this location. Given the state of his flagship, it could be a trap just as much as it could be the Will of the Force.
"Have all ships prepare for a joint hyperspace jump. I will speak with Piett," Vader ordered.
"As you command, Lord Vader," Pyrl accepted with a salute.
With a few inputs, the hologram became static before the likeness of Piett appeared. "Yes, Lord Vader?"
"Captain Piett, we will be intentionally setting the device off and dealing with whatever comes of that. How soon can you have the Executor prepared for a hyperspace jump?" Vader asked.
Piett paused in thought. "Within the hour, Sir. Damaged or not, I would like to have every available defense manned and ready in case this ends in another battle."
"A wise decision," Vader said grimly, telling the captain all he needed to know- that Vader himself was expecting that possibility.
"It will be done, My Lord. I will alert you of any unexpected dilemmas," Piett answered before the hologram vanished.
Vader's ship was silent for just short of three seconds.
"So," Farmile spoke slowly. "I think I understand most of what's going on."
Vader turned in his chair to give the boy a considering look.
"You're the leader of the Whitehelms, and the Nogs are your friends," Farmile continued, gesturing to the alien behind him.
"...Nogs?" Ghazhak repeated dubiously, looking to his fellow assassins, who shrugged.
"You lost your city-ship and some of the Whitehelms started fighting over if you were still in charge or not. But the leader working against you had a bomb to threaten everyone into following him. But the bomb isn't a bomb, and it somehow makes the city-ship go someplace else...?" Farmile trailed off, his understanding obviously lowering as he continued his summarization. "And you are going to let it take you there, for some reason?"
"There are times when even if one foresees danger, they can do little but prepare to meet it head-on," Vader remarked wisely.
"Yeah, I kind of get that, but...I don't get it?" Farmile admitted, scratching his head. "Why would someone make a bomb that just sends the ship somewhere else? It sounds like the one who made it was secretly on your side, but why not just leave a note saying you should check that place out?"
A good question, Vader privately admitted. But then again, with the madness that had infested this ship, perhaps even the maker of this device didn't comprehend why they thought Vader should go to these coordinates.
"Also, should I call you Malary now?" Farmile questioned with a head tilt.
"...This is a very strange whelp that you have brought along, Mal'ary," Kohvrekhar remarked, the others nodding in agreement.
Vader chose to ignore both statements.
Meanwhile
This mission had certainly taken some interesting turns, Qui-Gon thought to himself. What had originally just been a mission to mediate the interracial negotiations in this tense climate had turned into a full-blown conspiracy that had apparently been hijacked by an outside influence for currently unspecified ends.
And now he found himself keeping watch over the leader of the Albingi Conspiracy who was also the high counselor's treacherous brother, Carnon. In doing so, he had learned of something that Anakin and himself had come to suspect about the crisis.
Carnon's group called themselves the Altintoln, a racial supremacy group seeking for the Altin of the Albingi to rule over the Patipo and Maspu, holding tight to a many-centuries-old grudge from when the Altin were subjugated by the Patipo, and the Maspu before them. Qui-Gon wasn't surprised; he had seen and heard of many groups like this, those that scapegoated other people to justify or blame for something.
Naturally, many of Carnon's underlings had been reluctant to give up on their conspiracy, this "great mission" in their own words. But the revelation that their human helpers had turned on them caused many of them to cooperate. Even more so when it turned out that the blight did not work as they were led to believe.
But most troubling was that each of the human conspirators they managed to find was already dead.
Qui-Gon stroked his beard as he knelt next to the corpse of a human woman. "What would you say about the odds that your own people grew trigger-happy with them?" he asked idly.
"Once, I could see. But three? With the Altintoln or not, everyone knows we need them alive to get information they kept secret about the blight," Carnon answered with a frown as he crossed his arms. "That's ignoring the fact that none of them were killed by blaster fire."
Qui-Gon nodded in silent agreement. This one had her neck broken, and the other two...they looked as if something had tried to punch through their chests. One succeeded and the other still destroyed the internal organs.
There was an assassin at work here, a Dark Sider if Qui-Gon's and Anakin's instincts with the Force were correct. The question was, was the Dark Sider connected to this as well and cutting off loose ends, or were they trying to neutralize this conspiracy in their own way?
It wasn't Vader. Not the Dark Lord himself at any rate. He could hide himself in the vastness of his own power, but Qui-Gon would know if that man was in the general area. That still meant it could be an underling of Vader, who very possibly wasn't bound to the Rule of Two like the Order of Bane was. And if not Vader, there was still Plagueis, who could definitely hide himself in plain sight.
"I don't suppose there was anyone else you knew that was working with them?" Qui-Gon asked idly.
"No, I kept close tabs on other movements. Or so I believed," Carnon answered in thought. "Perhaps the final member has simply been killing them off to make his escape easier?"
Qui-Gon shook his head. "I may not be able to tell you who exactly killed them, but I do not sense any lingering feelings of betrayal from these corpses. I do not believe there was any in-fighting among them.
Carnon gave him a dubious look. "I've often heard rumors that you Jedi "sense with the Force" whatever you wish, to make people believe your tricks."
"I'm sure you have," Qui-Gon said without resentment or any attempt to dissuade the notion. He was not here to convince anyone. He wordlessly began to head back through the small exit out of the room.
"Where are you going?" Carnon questioned, the others giving the Jedi a confused look.
Qui-Gon paused and looked back with an even face. "Whoever killed this woman went back and went another direction."
"Another thing you sensed with the Force?" Carnon asked with a furrowed brow.
Before Qui-Gon could respond, everything trembled with tremors as a small explosion was heard in the distance.
Qui-Gon and Carnon never broke eye contact, but Carnon looked very alarmed by that. "Right, I'll follow your lead, Master Jinn," he said in acceptance.
Qui-Gon nodded and wordlessly made a hurried leave with the Albingi following behind him.
Meanwhile
Javok Codre, the final human conspirator, took a deep breath and adjusted his hat as he looked down the tunnel he had taken to get here, now made impassable by collapsed rubble. It hadn't been his first choice. There had been shields in that hallway that would have bought him some time, but that was before he had to worry about this attack dog of Vader's.
"Where the karking hell did that bastard of bolts find a monster like her?" Javok murmured to himself as he walked further into the room.
It was an old terminal room, one he and his allies had found early in their operation here on Albingi. It had been in bad shape, but they managed to make it workable again. It was amazing how easy it was to sneak material around these so-called conspirators.
Javok froze as he heard a familiar, ominous breathing in his ear.
He spun around, blaster pistol at the ready, looking at anything and everything that might be Darth Vader.
His eyes settled on the lone vent in the room and realized it was just the air flowing through it.
"I'm losing my mind," he said, rubbing his eyes.
It felt like that very first month after they had all run off together from the Death Squadron for their own ambitions. Every day one or more of them had woken up in a cold sweat, looking around for the wrathful Sith Lord that would surely give them a slow death by crushing their windpipes with his power, if they were lucky.
They hadn't been stupid. They laid low, they didn't advertise or hint they were from the future, or anything else foolish. That was a quick way to get back on Vader's radar. They merely...sought out places and people where their skills would be appreciated.
He fiddled with the controls and cursed to himself as he got a beeping error on the screen and he began trying to get the systems working properly. "Come on, work you piece of junk."
It hadn't really set in yet. His comrades were dead. The operation might still succeed, but they wouldn't live to see anything come of it. He might not.
Javok rubbed his eyes with a deep breath. He knew Vader would always come back to haunt them, to tie them up as loose ends. Nothing short of someone actually putting that monster in a grave would have changed that. He just thought they'd have more time to prepare. That it might even happen during the war, where they could bargain with the Dark Lord somehow.
He sighed in relief as he got an all-clear message. With that, he made his way to a latch and opened it to be met with a strong wind as he looked down a sheer drop to the wilderness below.
This room had been part of an old emergency escape plan for if the Albingi's government building was attacked or in a disaster. It had been left to rot and disrepair, but they salvaged it for their own escape. Originally, this was where people would either get onto emergency escape ships that pulled up next to the latch or the escapees would simply climb down with a rope.
Javok and his comrades had a better idea.
He picked up the jump pack and put it on his back. He took a long look at the three others in the room, unneeded now. "I hope I won't see you all too soon," he remarked as his own farewell.
With that, he stood at the edge of the door and activated his pack to fly out. He righted himself to make a steady descent down to the forested land below. It had been a while since he had any practice with this, and he had to be careful to-
Javok hissed as his feet hit the ground. He didn't break any bones, but it was definitely just short of that. If he lived to see tomorrow, he'd be very sore.
But that was a problem for tomorrow. Today, he had to get moving and moving fast. Anyone might have seen his escape and come looking for him.
If Javok had ever looked up, he might have seen Arden Lynn holding onto the wall above the hatch he had emerged from, her eyes watching him in amusement before she made her own descent. She leaped and fell like a comet, using the Force to slow her descent, landing gracefully on her feet.
With all the calm certainty of a predator on the trail of wounded prey, she followed Javok.