Coruscant... Nothing seemed capable of disturbing another peaceful morning on the capital planet of the Republic. The great upheavals that had once threatened Coruscant were in the past. A measured life had long since swallowed the upper levels of this planet. The other levels, too, lived relatively peacefully. Master Yoda, as was his custom, began the morning with meditation, but something was troubling him this morning. Something strange — something he had overlooked before, but now stood before him clear and precise. The old Grand Master of the Jedi Order suspected something was wrong when Master Yan Dooku, his former apprentice, burst into his room.
"Master Yoda! Master Yoda!" too loudly for such a noble aristocrat as Dooku. He wouldn't raise his voice for nothing. "A Sith..."
"A Sith?" Yoda asked, surprised. The feeling that had visited him during his meditation finally found its root cause.
"A Sith on Royiss-VIII," Dooku said, regaining his lost composure. "The broadcast is going across the entire HoloNet. One of the Shadows is fighting him right now."
"You say one of the Shadows attacked him?" Yoda asked. "But, like real shadows, they should remain unseen. Why did he attack openly? Hmm? And started a broadcast on the HoloNet, at that. Put it up."
Dooku approached the holoprojector, and after about five seconds, a holographic video appeared before them, broadcasting a fight between two: a Jedi and one who could truly be called a Sith. The Jedi was using the Ataru form. His green lightsaber whirled like lightning around the crimson blade of the Sith, who was using... something between Makashi and Djem So. The Sith wasn't averse to using Force Lightning and other Force techniques, trying to kill his enemy as quickly as possible. The aged Master was then drawn to the Shadow's clothing. He had seen it somewhere before...
"Is that Light?" he asked. "Did we not consider him dead?"
"That's right," Dooku said, touching his chin. "Master Jonal added him to the list of the dead last week. It was reported that he encountered a dark Force-sensitive and died heroically while carrying out his mission."
"A strange matter, this is, hmm?" Yoda looked at his former apprentice. "One declared dead, fighting a Sith alive and well."
"Or maybe it isn't Light?" Dooku asked. "After all, among the Jedi Shadows, there could be many with green blades who use Ataru and wear such a suit? Jonal Ezar himself wears one. Some say he even sleeps in it."
"It is Light," Yoda said, closing his eyes. "Alive, he is, and it warms my heart. Good potential, he has."
"Good potential," Dooku snorted. "So you gave him to Lorm Decer, then to An'ya Kuro, and finally threw him into the Shadows altogether? Into a corps where he'll just be doing killing..."
"Do you wish to discuss my decisions?" Yoda asked, looking questioningly at Dooku. "Why I did what I deemed necessary? Hmm? A student learns from his Master. Light lacked confidence in his own strength, and he gained it, having completed his training."
"You simply turned him into a killer," Dooku said coldly.
"No," Yoda replied. "Only choice, I gave him. The decision of what to become, Light made himself."
Dooku remained silent. Sometimes arguing with Yoda was simply unbearable. The old Master could find justification for even his most illogical decisions, one that would convince almost everyone around of their correctness.
"Other Masters, we must inform," said Yoda. "And to Even Piell, send a message — let him prepare to depart for Royiss-VIII," Yoda said. "By the time he arrives, all will be over. But consequences there will be. And deal with them, he must. The Sith's name, have you identified it?"
"Yes," Dooku said, pressing a few keys on his datapad and bringing up an image on the holoterminal. "It is Set Harth."
"Impossible, this is," Yoda said, unexpectedly loudly.
"Why?"
"Set Harth lived nine centuries ago," Yoda replied.
"But the facial recognition system gave exactly this result. See for yourself," he nodded at the Sith, who had paused mid-battle, making it possible to see his face.
"His face, it resembles... But how did he survive?" Yoda asked. "Impossible, this is! A human he is, not a long-lived being."
"According to archive information, the Order sent several missions to Royiss in search of Set Harth. It was assumed he had stolen some Sith holocron. However, the Set Harth discovered on Royiss, according to the Jedi reports, turned out to be a 'bastard of Padawan Harth, whom he fathered on the planet, and who was not Force-sensitive at all.'"
"Did one of his descendants become Force-sensitive? But then we would have known of him and taken him to the Temple... Perhaps he found some knowledge in the Sith holocron?" Yoda said. "Interesting, Set Harth's longevity is. We will have to look into this, regardless of how this fight ends..."
* * *
As for Dun Moch, I thought we were really done with that. I used everything I knew about Ataru against Seth. Was it bearing fruit? So far, neither of us had a serious advantage over the other. His main previous advantage was precisely his "developed body." However, the mind transfer technique in the case of a clone has a significant flaw, and that flaw is habituation to the clone's body. Reflexes, reaction, motor skills of body parts: arms, legs — these aren't things you can simply pick up and transfer. I bet on this and didn't miscalculate. Seth indeed had some problems in this regard. He had only just transferred his mind into a new body and hadn't yet grown accustomed to it, hadn't restored all his strength. This showed directly in the fight: although Seth executed Force techniques excellently (and also on time and lethally), his swordsmanship faltered, and I shamelessly took advantage of that. I'm not a stupid idiot — ignoring an opponent's weaknesses in the name of some honor. Sometimes, of course, you can show off… But even that should be planned, not just a pompous improvisation for its own sake…
On the other hand, when the pompous improvisation is the plan… But that's not always the case, is it? We were moving at speeds unreachable by almost any ordinary eye. The crimson and green blades flashed like lightning. Seth kept trying to overpower me with the brute force of Djem So. Overall, his style combined the power of Djem So with the precision of Makashi, making his attacks incredibly precise and powerful. He struck exactly at the points that were my weak spots, either with a precise thrust or a powerful slashing blow. One of the slashing blows I dodged, slipping right under the blade — the strike was horizontal, at waist level — and then, appearing behind him, I swung my left hand, into which a second lightsaber instantly leaped. A Shiak straight to the back… I thought to end the fight with such an elegant move, but Seth saw through me and ducked, simultaneously executing a "dragon tail," effectively a sweep. Unlike Seth, a Makashi Master like Dooku would almost always act only with the blade, because a true Makashi master focuses precisely on sword fencing. On the other hand, masters like Dooku are one in a million across the whole Order. And only one of them is most famous — Dooku himself. Others can weave into the fight elements not only of Makashi but also of other styles, as well as hand and foot strikes. I recall studying material on Dooku that said he considered all this hand-and-foot waving unnecessary, and if he used it, it was very rare. Here it wasn't classical Makashi, but a bizarre combination with Djem So. And during his life, Seth undoubtedly developed and honed his style.
I didn't dodge the sweep — I just extended my arm forward, and Seth was pushed back slightly by telekinesis. A small fireball, created by pyrokinesis, was sent after him. Seth sidestepped. While dodging it, I tried to close in, but he used Force Lightning, which I caught on my crossed lightsabers, additionally focusing the Force on the blades. Here the Force behaved like a river flowing over my blades, allowing me to better defend against the lightning. Then, with a sharp motion, I threw the discharge aside. The lightning struck a table with food, which, unable to withstand such abuse, fell apart with a nasty sound. I immediately closed in on Harth and now used both my blades… I was much faster now than back then… Training is training, but during a real fight you can best test your assumptions and refinements. One fight with Seth and reflecting on it was enough for me to understand some of my mistakes and draw certain conclusions. So Harth was having a harder time this time, because I was fully capitalizing on the advantage of two blades, attacking much faster than during our last meeting on Tsai, and from all directions at that.
Nevertheless, he managed to attack, and quite dangerously — if not for the modification of my suit, I would have been killed. At least his thrusts were precise, and it was very hard to escape them with ordinary dodging. Seth kept pressing, trying to overwhelm me. I dodged, counterattacked, but still gave ground. Blocking a strike with crossed blades, I jumped back. Seth used Force Lightning again. Landing and immediately somersaulting in the air, I jumped left, avoiding the lightning aimed at me, while focusing the Force… Tables, chairs, other furniture, cutlery, and dishes rose into the air in the hall… An instant, and I launched several pieces of furniture at Seth. He dodged everything, though he cut some things with his blade, and with a powerful leap evaded the lightsaber I threw at him from my left hand. In the air, he jumped onto one of the tables, then rushed at me. I used the Force and returned my blade to me, a couple of moments later blocking his strike with crossed blades. He put his weight, small as it was, into the strike, and he had jumped too, amplifying himself with inertia. This way Harth managed to press me to the floor, landing on top of me. I pushed him off with my foot and immediately tried to take off his head with a lightsaber, but was thrown back by telekinesis. Using my lightsabers to stabilize myself, I looked at Seth with anger… This fight was giving me pleasure, yes, but the enemy seemed unkillable. Neither of us could gain an advantage over the other. And if the fact that Seth couldn't gain an advantage didn't bother me, the fact that I had to fight for so long didn't sit well with me. My strength isn't infinite, and he is far more experienced. If I don't end the fight in the next few minutes, things could turn out not so well for me. And there's no running away…
Not now. I have to move, fight, until the outcome is clear. Because attempting to flee is even worse than defeat or death. No, I have to fight to the end. All or nothing… The one who doesn't overcome difficulties achieves nothing at all. The difficulty on the path becomes the path itself. Spinning the blades, I charged back into battle. Clash, exchange of blows… I had to step back a couple of paces — Seth was still suppressing me with precise and powerful strikes. Realizing that I had my chest covered with something that prevented a lightsaber kill, he started targeting my head deliberately. A couple of times he singed my hair and once nearly destroyed my eyes. I performed a series of Ataru jumps around him and nearly killed him with one of my thrusts. Hutt… I could try using that technique I'd been thinking about, but it's still unfinished. Use it in battle before I've fully developed and mastered it? I'm a reasonable person with cockroaches in my head, sure, but I still hope I'm relatively normal. The technique I was thinking about is my variation of teleportation. According to Kuro, I can't learn her teleportation because she would have had to take me as a Padawan right away. Something about some very wise complication there.
So I decided to develop my own technique and studied everything that could be said about instantaneous transfer of matter from point a to point b. I even came up with a so-called logic of abilities — I felt that my idea was feasible, I just needed to thoroughly study all the unclear aspects… But risking using what I've come up with now would be stupid. No… No time to think about experiments. I have to defeat Seth with what I have now.
"You're getting on my nerves!" Seth suddenly said and raised his hand. I readied my blades. What was he going to do? A wave of telekinesis swept through the hall, and from the edges of the hall, blasters surged toward us — blasters that Seth had taken from the royal guard. Suddenly, more blasters rolled out from the walls of the hall. What the hell? I assumed a stance, understanding what was coming. Seth clenched his hand into a fist, and the blasters fired… All of them. From all sides, at different speeds, blaster bolts of varying power flew at me. I gritted my teeth and began defending myself, deflecting the blaster bolts in all directions, trying to make sure the shots didn't hit civilians. Unfortunately, there were excesses, though the civilians and the military not involved in our fight weren't stupid and had taken cover, luckily because I had scattered a lot of different furniture around the hall while I was throwing it at Harth. Suddenly Harth caught my attention… The blade in his right hand vanished… Where was it? Another second, and I would have lost my head — he had thrown it at me along a strange trajectory. I leaned back, letting the dangerous weapon pass over me…
But a second later, my body was pierced by hellish pain, and the force of the impact threw me backward. Even the armor woven into my suit couldn't fully protect me from the Force Lightning. So he had used the blasters to make me deflect shots, then thrown his blade at me, and immediately after struck me with Force Lightning? Bastard, he did it almost simultaneously! I didn't have enough speed and reflexes to react to all his moves at once, and now I was lying on the floor, writhing in pain.
But "noble" Seth Hart didn't plan to prolong my agony — a moment later, the blasters fired again. I, being tortured by lightning, responded too late.
I also applied Tutaminis to absorb the lightning too late, so some shots hit me, including on unprotected parts of my body. The armor woven into my clothes wasn't complete: it covered my back, chest, elbows, and shins. I decided not to cover the other parts largely because I was afraid — afraid that more armor would affect my movements. And my fears were not unfounded — the Mandalorians in their armor move fast… for armored warriors. I am many times faster than any of them. My advantage is speed, so an abundance of armor would only hinder me. One shot hit me in the thigh of my right leg, another knocked the blade from my left hand when I was distracted by the pain. At least I deflected the shots to my head. But no time to think about the pain from the blaster shots that hit me.
Pain is a lie… There is only the Force… Using Crucitorn, I tried to suppress the pain sensations and charged into the attack. Seth retrieved his blade and prepared to defend. Unexpectedly for him, I dropped mid-charge, and at that moment my lightsaber — the one I had dropped when a shot hit its hilt — flew out from behind my back. If the shot had hit my hand, there would be big problems, but at the last moment I changed the position of my wrist, and the shot struck the hilt, which was made of beskar. So the direct hit didn't affect the blade's functionality… Seth deflected it in surprise… Now! The grappling hook! The device instantly shot at Seth, and I immediately pulled myself toward him — too fast for Seth's perception and too unexpected… He didn't have time to react — with one motion I used Sai Tok, separating his upper body from his lower. A strange smile froze on Seth's face, and both halves fell to the floor.
"Ha… Ha…" I was breathing heavily, my right leg stung, I felt scorch marks on my head, my body felt like it was on fire from the Force Lightning that had hit me. "I won…"
And I nearly collapsed on the spot, but somehow stayed on my feet… I retrieved my second lightsaber, which I had used as a decoy, into my left hand. Suddenly, a strange dark silhouette rose from Seth's body and rushed toward my head. The world changed, and in that same instant I found myself in the middle of a cliff that towered over an endless ocean.
"So this is your Inner World? A reflection of your spirit?" Seth's voice asked me. He appeared before me. And last time, this place looked different. "It matches the character of each sentient being."
"Hmph," I snorted. "You didn't come here to negotiate, did you? You need my body. And quickly, because you don't have much time."
"Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! What a perceptive Jedi!" he said loudly. "Your body is not the body of damn clones that I have to order. This is the body of a full-fledged Gifted. How many midi-chlorians do you have? Fourteen thousand? Excellent… excellent… With your help, I can deal with him… And become one!"
"What nonsense are you talking?" I asked. "With which 'him'? Which 'one'?"
"Oh," said Seth, crossing his arms. "I'll show you and tell you everything if you surrender voluntarily. Understand one thing, boy — I have experience in opposing an enemy's mind."
"And whose mind did you oppose?" I asked mockingly. "Surely the maximally neutered minds of the clones made to order for you?" I asked. "Show-off." I pointed my hand at him. Several lightsabers immediately appeared around him, piercing his body through.
"Bastard!" His face twisted in rage.
"Oh, what's the matter, Harth?" I asked innocently. "Opposing the neutered mind of clones is as easy as anything, but when you run into a real sentient being, you start screaming? To be honest, at first you really did put the fear in me, especially back there on Tsai. I considered you almost a Lord Sith. And, to be honest, I barely survived your attack. But now everything is different." I looked at Seth and smiled. "Time to lighten your soul. Tell me everything. What did your words at the beginning mean, and most importantly, who is the traitor among the Jedi who has been covering for you all this time?"
"Traitor? Among the Jedi?" Harth suddenly burst out laughing. "The only being he betrayed was me. He tried to use me as a threat to your Order, and not just me. He sicced the Shadows on me like unspayed dogs."
"So, after all…"
"You understood correctly, Jedi!"
"And what about your words at the very beginning?"
"Gha… Ha-ha-ha-ha! Why should I tell you? If you want to bury the bastard in your Order — bury him, if you have the strength, and as for those words… Jedi, go to hell. I won't say anything!"
"I thought you decided to take as many sentient beings down with you as possible…"
"You understood nothing," Seth answered me, starting to dissolve. "I will survive. Even if I don't take you over, I still have three clones! I can…"
"Three clones? Why do you think I brought the mercenaries who started shelling your mansion?" I asked him. "On a whim? No. The reason is precisely to eliminate the possibility of you using the ritual, Seth. You might say they are securely hidden, but again — it doesn't matter. And do you know why? Because I came with a Matukai you know. A Gifted… When you don't hold back, you radiate darkness for a kilometer. And your clones probably radiate darkness too. So… Sheygen will handle it, I'm sure."
"You are deeply mistaken!" Harth growled. "I'll activate the transfer ritual right now, this time into the clone…"
"Useless. Even if you succeed — I'll find you in the clone's body. Or, if I can't, someone else will. And you are not Darth Andeddu — you can't possess a clone on the other side of the Galaxy from one edge. I already told you, Seth Hart. It doesn't matter at all who emerges victorious now. I've exposed you to the entire Galaxy! You've lost regardless."
"Goddamn son of a bitch," Harth wheezed. "What did you do to my clones? Why can't I feel them?"
"I already answered that question. Goodbye, Seth Hart. You were an interesting opponent," another lightsaber appeared directly in front of his head, and its activation pierced his skull.
53 BBY. Seth Hart — a dark sider, a dark jedi, maybe even a Sith, given his experience and knowledge — had lost to me. Joy from victory filled my mind, though I shouldn't get too cocky. I still have to reckon with the reality that will set in after the fight…