The fleet of ships, now including the prison transports, drifted slowly the speck that was Fireshot station. Once, the station had been the pride of the Republic, a deep space installation entrusted with weapons and prototypes deemed too dangerous to be tested anywhere else and staffed by the best the Republic had to offer. Now it was quiet, a sad memory of a time where the Republic had been much stronger. Before Exar Kun, before the Mandalorians, before Revan.
“Before me,” Spike muttered, to himself more than anyone else, Seugtai’s ship only required a small crew, Spike and the old Mandalorian being the only two on board now they had other spaces.
“What was that?” Seugtai asked, leaning around from the front pilot seat.
“Nothing, just me musing on some things,” Spike assured him. “Are you ready?”
“You’re asking me that? You’re the one who’s got the risk here. Are you sure…” he trailed off, before laughing. “Sorry, I was about to say are you sure about this, then I remembered who you are. Go nuts Spike, my helmet’s sealed in, good hunting.”
Nodding once, Spike stepped into the forward airlock of the ship, the inner door sliding closed behind him. As alarms began to sound to indicate the rapidly draining air, Spike checked the few things he had on his person, a huge, long-handled vibro-glaive he had started to grow more and more attached to since he had started to experiment with new and different weapons. It was now the closest thing he had to a primary weapon, one he could use to devastating effect.
Finally, the red light in the airlock turned green, indicating the air had been completely drained and it was now safe to open the door without fear of explosive decompression. The cold no longer bothered him, even as ice formed across his form as he pushed himself out of the ship, aiming himself as best as possible at the speck of Fireshot. A year ago, Spike would have thought nothing about shooting himself out far faster, trusting in his bionics to pinpoint his journey and ensure he didn’t miss. Now however, he’d rather take his time, rather than becoming lost in the depths of space.
For close to an hour, Spike drifted towards the base, using his magic to make micro-adjustments to his course, passing within the range of the stations guns. Even these old relics would have destroyed Spikes fleet within heartbeats as soon as they got in range, which was why it fell to Spike to deactivate them, before calling in the cavalry. Soon, the station loomed before him, Spike tucking his wings in, wrapping them around him as he shot into the hanger bay.
Immediately he felt sensors lock onto him, turbolaser turrets grinding out of hatches in the ceiling and turning to face him. To most it would have been a terrifying sight and sound, for Spike, it was the music of his life.
Unlimbering his glaive, Spike hurled it with all his strength at the closest turbolaser, the blade slicing through it and embedding in the wall behind. Even before it had hit, Spike was moving leaping upwards to the second turret and grabbing hold. By now droid defences were being deployed, two score Mk1 security droids clanked out and opened fire, but more importantly, blocked Spike’s access to the hangers control panel. Spike took them in his stride, ripping a hole in the turbolaser turret, before moving again, springing to grab hold of his glaive, before spinning and ripping it free, landing right amidst the twelve droids.
In moments the droids were down, and Spike was at the controls. As he began to tap away at the keyboard, he heard a blaster being levelled at him, spinning and letting out a roar, expecting to find a droid, pulling his glaive to an instant halt as he saw the blaster was in the hands of a terrified technician.
“Not one step further,” the woman spoke, her voice perfectly level, keeping the heavy pistol pointed squarely at Spike. “You’re Spike, aren’t you? The disgraced Jedi General?”
“I am,” Spike nodded slowly, lowering his glaive. “If you know who I am, you also know that pistol won’t do anything, right?”
“Yes I do,” the woman nodded, not dropping the pistol an inch. “But I can’t let you keep going anyway.”
“You can’t stop me, I don’t want to kill you, so I’m sorry,” Spike sighed, before blurring into motion, knocking the pistol from the woman’s hands with one claw, before engulfing her head with his other and letting his magic flow.
For the briefest of moment Spikes mind touched hers, before she fell unconscious, Spike catching her and laying her down on the deck gently.
“Brave one,” he muttered, turning back to the console and beginning to enter ancient back door codes.
Predictably his actual military access codes had been long since scrubbed, but they were not all Spike had access to. Decades ago, when he and Solaris had called the station their home, his master had shown him the systems backdoors, and now, Spike knew exactly which systems to trip where, and what pieces of code to slice into another to give himself full access.
“Homefield advantage one, Atris’s security, zero,” he chuckled to himself, before throwing a switch, plunging himself into darkness for a split second, before the lights were replaced with the dull red glow of backup power, which in the stations ancient state, no longer covered the external sensors.
Within minutes Spike’s fleet was touching down within the cavernous hanger, his new warriors piling off, a few of them picking up the droids fallen rifles.
“There will be more droids on the way to the bridge,” Spike called out, readying his own weapon. “They may be engaged as you see fit, leave intact and repairable if possible but do not get yourself killed over them. Any Republic personnel who are encountered are to be non-violently subdued. If I find this rule broken…”
Spike let his words hang in the air before turning and breaking into a loping run towards the bridge, a handful of gladiators following along behind him, while Seugtai began to take charge of those liberated from the Black Cage. Spike had given the Mandalorian a carte blanche to ensure the station was swept cleanly, and Spike would not be surprised if more than one trigger happy criminal was felled by a shot from behind instead of the front.
It didn’t take long for Spike to reach the bridge, the droids that had tried to stop him and his men had fallen in short order, and soon Spike was at the blast door, predictably sealed.
“Open the door,” he said calmly, looking up towards the camera. “I would rather keep it intact, but I will break it down if required.”
There was no response for a few minutes, before finally the door began to grind into motion. As soon as it was wide enough, Spike's gladiators surged forward, stun grenades proceeding their entrance, Spike's not taking any chances that this was a ruse.
By the time the door had opened enough for Spike to enter the gladiators had managed to relieve those within of their weapons.
“Good job,” Spike nodded, before tapping the communicator on in his ear. “Seugtai, how goes the sweep?”
“Well, Spike. Resistance is minimal, we have encountered two non-droid defenders, both were stunned. We’ve suffered six casualties so far, but the sweep is almost done.”
“Keep me posted,” Spike turned the communicator off, before looking back to the commander. “It’s good to see you again.”
“And I wish that seeing you again were under better circumstances,” the commander frowned, before unsheathing his sword and offering it to Spike pommel first. “Call off your men, I surrender the station to you in exchange for safe passage back to Republic space.”
“Of course,” Spike activated his communicator once more. “Seugtai, hold for now, we have a surrender. Pull back to the hanger and await further instructions.”
Without waiting for a reply, Spike watched the station commander giving out orders, typing in the droid kill codes into the master panel, before turning back to Spike.
“Ok, we held up our end, the transport?”
“There are a series of hacked prisoner transport vessels in hanger seven, you are welcome to them. But I have another proposition. The Republic has need of your services, of that there is no doubt, and yet they squandered you away, allowing you to garrison this station instead of assigning you some place more useful. You have a choice, go back to the Republic who squandered your skills, which I know are not insignificant, or stay here. Help me run Fireshot, get back at the Sith. I am going to open new fronts against their fleets. Stay here and help me, you all know me, you know I wouldn’t take this course of action if I didn’t believe it to be right. What say you?”
For a long time, no one spoke, the crew of the bridge exchanging glances with each other, before finally the commander stepped forward, taking one more look around the room.
“Spike, I’m with you.”
“As am I,” another man, an ensign by his rank slides, stepped forward as he spoke.
“And me.”
Soon, every member of the bridge crew had stepped forward, voicing their support and bringing a smile to Spikes face. These men and women, some of whom had been stationed here for as long as Spike could remember, had put their faith in him, now he had to prove himself worthy of it.
“Right then, let’s get to work.”
***
Seugtai coughed as he entered Spikes room, a small chamber that Spike had apparently once occupied in his youth. They had been in command of Fireshot for one solar rotation and so far had not seen any indication of a Republic response. Truth be told it had always been the biggest potential flaw in their plan. Fireshot was strong even in its own age, but Seugtai knew Spike would never open fire on Republic troops. It wouldn’t take many ships to retake the station and see all those who followed Spike imprisoned…or worse.
Since taking command, Spike has been in this room, studying readouts of the stations strength, its remaining ships, its crew records, especially for those who had joined since he was last here, as well as hundreds of other smaller things beside.
“So?” Seugtai asked. “What do we have to hand?”
“Not much,” Spike mused. “Two battleships, a handful of battlecruisers, one heavily damaged Command Ship, three Hammerheads, seventeen Praetorians, and enough fighters to equip all ships with half strength wings.”
“Hardly an all-powerful fleet, but it’s better than nothing,” Seugtai nodded. “And your flagship?”
Spike smiled at that, grabbing a dataslate and glancing down at it.
“Harmony has been repaired and refitted, everything on her was given top priority. Apparently it was ordered by the Jedi Council themselves. Atris was going to take her as her own. Honestly, I couldn’t be happier about denying that bitch something she wanted. Petty I know, but still.”
“As long as it didn’t get in the way, I never minded soldiers having their own personal goals during a mission,” Seugtai shrugged.
“Well clearly it didn’t compromise efficiency,” Spike sighed, leaning back and closing his eyes.
“Why did you fight us?”
The question was sudden, Seugtai taking a minute to process what he had heard, Spike still not opening his eyes.
“Spike?”
“You heard me, Seugtai, I know you did,” Spike murmured. “I’ve never asked you properly. Why did you raise arms against the Republic?”
“We wanted to test ourselves,” Seugtai spoke, standing almost imperceptibly straighter as he did, pride filling his face. “Mandalorians are warriors, battle is our way, and only one target could hold meaning with how powerful we had become. The Republic answered our challenge with one of their own, though slow to muster. Their reply was you, Revan and Meetra, and what a challenge it was. The outcome never mattered, we faced you, and we lost, that is all there is to it.”
“You don’t wish you’d won?” Spike asked in surprise, opening his eyes.
“Of course I do,” Seugtai scoffed. “All warriors fight to win, to do otherwise is suicide, but Mandalorians don’t have to win to be vindicated.”
“Do you ever think of what would have happened…if you had won?”
“Where is this coming from, Spike?”
“Harmony is one of the most advanced ships in the Republic, Mandalorians are THE most sought-after mercenaries on hundreds of worlds in dozens of systems. Worlds where Mandalorian defences were repurposed hold out far longer against Sith attacks. Did the Republic winning…did I make this whole situation worse my fighting against you?”
“You can deal in what-ifs for eternity, Spike,” Seugtai chuckled. “What if Exar-Kun had taken Coruscant, what if The Mass-Shadow Generator hadn’t worked, what if a hundred other things had gone differently in either of our lifetimes. The result is always the same, despair that the road ahead has been made harder by past actions. None of them matter. What does matter is right here, and right now. That is all we can influence, and if you spend too much time fretting over the past, you’ll lose your future. You understand?”
“Yeah…” Spike spoke slowly, before nodding and gaining conviction. “Yes I do. I apologise, Seugtai, I didn’t mean to mope, it’s just…”
“One of his many flaws,” Moonstone finished, materialising beside Spike with her characteristic smirk. “Chin up Spike, there’s work to be done you know.”
“Right right,” Spike rolled his eyes before standing up and addressing Seugtai. “Do you have them on the holo?”
“All of the ones I could reach yes,” Seugtai nodded. “Some didn’t respond or have been put to grass by their competitors, but there are enough of them. They’re waiting for you in the comms room.”
“Well lead on then,” Spike nodded. “They know you, might as well kick this thing off yourself.”