Savage-Time Chapter 25 (Patreon)

[Coruscant, 500 Republica]

Anakin Skywalker

“Padme!” Anakin ran into the apartment looking for his wife, he had to see her before he left “Love where are you?”

“Ani! I’ve told you not to scream inside the apartment like that,” Padme came out of one of the rooms followed by Sabe who was hiding her smile behind a raised hand, Padme put one of her hands on her hip and Anakin would forever deny that his eyes followed the curvaceous figure of his wife “What if someone other than Sabe heard you?”

“Then I would tell them that I have a pet I named after you” Padme blushed as her handmaiden tried her best to stifle her laughter.

“I believe that on certain days I’ve heard this famous pet of his” Sabe quips with a straight face that makes Padme blush even harder.

“Wait Sabe don’t distract me, I’m leaving there is trouble in the Outer Rim worlds... pirates have launched raiding parties in masse, the Hutts have declared that their alliance with the Republic ended with the ceasefire and they’re doing nothing to rein in their people”

“That’s horrible!” Anakin wanted to forget about his mission and stay to comfort his wife but he wouldn’t be a Jedi if he did…he would be less of a Jedi he corrected in his mind as he remembered that Jedi don’t usually marry.

“On the bright side, I went up to master Windu and told him to his face ‘I told you so’ because I totally did, I knew those slugs would betray us sooner or later”

“Ani” The hero with no fear avoided looking into Padme’s eyes as she gave him the ‘I’m so disappointed tone’

“I’m taking Ashoka so you have to cancel that spa day, but hey maybe you can take Obi-Wan and convince him to get rid of the beard, I swear that would make him look twenty years younger”

The sound of his comm interrupted the levity in the room and with a sigh Anakin brought it to his face “Yes?”

“Anakin! You need to hurry back to the temple, the council has received disturbing news. The Sith are moving again, Savage Opress has been sighted on Umbara he is demolishing the Republic forces on the planet’s surface and Quinlan Vos has reported that there are Sith slaughtering the resistance forces that were escorting civilians across the surface leaving no survivors”

“But I was just about to go and hunt the pirates that were wreaking havoc on the Outer Rim worlds, are supposed to just leave them to face the slavers alone!”

“There are more important things than hunting down pirates Anakin, the fate of the galaxy depends on us,” Obi-Wan said with a frown “That is our duty as Jedi”

“What galaxy will there be left for us to protect if we let slavers and criminal scum pick it clean!” Anakin didn’t know why the Council and Obi-wan didn’t understand that the people needed them, that if they just did what was right then everything would be better.

The Sith would still be there no matter what they did, but the people that depended on them wouldn’t be.

“Don’t make me come and get you Anakin, you’re not a little boy anymore” Obi-Wan cut the connection and in a fit of rage Anakin broke the comm with his hand, the world was tinted red for a moment before the soft hands of his wife cupped Anakin’s face.

“Ani, I know this is difficult but perhaps Obi-Wan is right. Without the Sith we wouldn’t even have this war”

“But slavery and criminals would still run rampant in the places the Republic doesn’t like to look, I would know” Anakin hated talking about it, he wasn’t a slave anymore- No! he was never a slave, Watto may have held Anakin’s life in his hands but he never broke his spirit.

Anakin turned around without looking at Padme, he couldn’t bear to see the look of hurt on her face that was surely there. Without saying goodbye Anakin left for the Jedi Temple.

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[Coruscant, Mon Mothma’s Private Residence]

Mon Mothma

Mon had conducted a little party in an effort to obfuscate her real goal for the evening and all told everything was going great, her friends thought that she wanted to talk prices with the Kaminoans, her political opponents thought she would gloat in the faces of the Kaminoans and any spy for the separatist or any other private concern would think that the answer was one of the two.

“I understand that for the time being clone production is set at a minimal and that you have a…surplus of them” Mon was barely able to keep the disgust off her face as she spoke of the clones like they were just another piece of furniture.

“Oh yes, a shame but with the current political climate being what it is, we are sure that orders will soon start again. Chancellor Palpatine has already approached us with another offer that could prove very lucrative” Lama Su took a sip of his drink, his face showing no expression but there was a hint of interest in his tone.

“Senator,” the prime minister of Kamino looked directly at Mon and the hint of a smile appeared on the engineered being’s face “are you perhaps interested in buying our product, or perhaps you wish to commission one for your personal use”

Mon put on a polite smile “I’m very predictable, aren’t I?” the senator smiled at her rhetorical question and continued “yes, I would like to buy some of your clones but with a slight adjustment to their programming and I’m not talking about one of two but as many as you’re willing to sell”

“Senator, we can sell as many clones as you can afford.” There was something dark in the unusually bright eyes of the prime minister “We can just make more after all”

The polite laugh that Mon forced out of her throat made her curse the people that had forced her to go this far, but for the Republic to have a fighting chance she would do her best.

“Please enjoy the party prime minister but I have to talk with some other guests” Lama Su raised his glass in polite ascent and Mon left him to the tender mercies of one of the anti-clone lobbyists that was waiting in the wings for their conversation to end.

The senator of Chandrila joined Bail on the far side of her residence where they could have some privacy.

“How did it go?”

“You know how stubborn Kaminoans are, but I believe that we have reached an accord at least for now. Where is Padme?” lying to her friends pained her but she was protecting them by keeping them away, at least for now.

Bail laughed as he ate a piece of fruit that a serving girl passed to him “She is taking a very deserved rest in one of the top spas of Coruscant, as always she sends her support but at least for today she wanted some peace”

“Peace would do all of us some good” Mon said as she sighed.

“You’re stressed Mon why don’t you go back to Chandrila for some rest, nobody would blame you, we do fine on our own for a week or two”

The offer was very tempting but all of the resources that Mon had been stockpiling were on her home planet and if she wasn’t careful then all the work that she had done would crumble into dust.

“Perhaps once we have some good news” the lights flickered and the wealthy partygoers paused as the emergency lights were turned on, it was then that Mon remembered that for a while now a squad of supposedly rogue murder droids was moving around in the core.

The sound of raspy breathing could be heard all over the place, it was a painfully familiar sound to those few that had bothered to see the atrocities committed by the Separatist’s pet psychopath and someone that Republic intelligence had thought dead on some internal power struggle of the Separatists.

The doorbell rang before it was blown off its hinges, a monstrosity made of black metal that looked like the personification of death walked in flanked by four Magna Guards.

“Sorry to crash the party” the figure coughed as it hunched over, then it looked around and its eyes stopped on Mon’s form. Grievous for there was no doubt in Mon’s mind that it was him, walked over to her, and as she feared for her life and all of her work he paused “Where is Lama Su?”

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[Coruscant, Jedi Temple]

Mace Windu

“You suggest we do nothing?” Windu asked incredulously at Master Yoda “The Sith are moving while we're being held back by corrupt officials and you accept that? We don’t need to ask permission to act”

“Careful you must be, control you your emotions can’t.” Yoda emphasized his point with his cane “Repeating Dooku’s words you are”

Mace Windu at that moment looked as if his old master had delivered a slap to his face.

“Master Yoda our mission is to fight the darkness and we can’t do that from Coruscant,” Shaak Ti commented as she looked for support among her fellow masters “We need to act”

“To blatantly ignore the will of the people we are sworn to protect is to court disaster” Plo Koon said as he looked at the Togruta.

“The public doesn’t know what is best for the galaxy and if you’re worried about popular opinion then I must reinform you of the fact that we’re not very popular right now” Ki-Adi-Mundi spoke in rebuke to Plo Koon’s argument.

Obi-Wan remained stone-faced as he overlooked the proceeding but Mace could feel the conflict in his being, the threat of Darth Maul remained and while not very Jedi like it would be for the best if Mace were to use that fact to help his position.

“The Sith are growing in number, the loss of Count Dooku has made them bold. Savage Opress, Darth Maul, the two assassins on Boz Pity, and the apprentice that was reported on Umbara” Mace looked directly at Obi-Wan as he stated these facts and then for the finishing touch he only had to say one last thing “Revenge may not be the Jedi way but we’re spitting on the sacrifices made by those who died in the line of duty”

The Jedi Council descended into quiet conversations as the masters in the room spoke amongst themselves, Mace sent a thought to Saesee in the midst of it, and thanks to the chaos of the room it went unnoticed.

“I propose that we put the matter to a vote, as Jedi we’re not beholden to the Senate and we will be breaking no laws if we go after the Sith, but I understand that some may have reservations about this course of action.” Saesee Tinn “The will of the majority will decide our actions”

The members of the council looked at master Yoda whose ears dropped as he saw the attention focused on him, wordlessly he accented and so the die was cast.

“All those in favor for taking immediate action” hands started to go up, Mace’s friends and fellow conspirators quickly raised their hands and once Obi-Wan raised his more members of the council joined.

For the first time, they were making the correct decision.

Windu’s excitement was broken when a priority alert came from one of the clone channels, the figure of commander Fox appeared in the center of the room and after a quick salute he spoke.

“The Army request Jedi assistance on Coruscant, a group of infiltrator droids led by a heavily modified Grievous has attacked the private residence of Senator Mon Mothma where several important political figures among them Bail Organa and Lama Su were reported to be”

Commander Fox had barely finished his request but already Mace was on his feet “Send the coordinates to the Temple, I will go there personally”