The mood was dour as Harmony passed through the integrity fields of Fireshot, touching down with a loud creak as overtaxed landing gear struggled to absorb the weight of the craft now bearing now on them. Though the ship had escaped the Sith armada intact, it had not done so unscathed, huge rents in its armour where fighters had managed to get lucky shots, while one of its engines was smoking and leaking fluid, droids already moving forward to begin repairs. Fireshot was made for this, for getting warships back into the fight, but even so it would take time before she flew again.
His ships flight capabilities however were the last thing on Spike’s mind however, exiting the ship following a floating gurney, Tarhal’s body resting atop it. Spike did not speak, nor did Seugtai who followed after him or Moonstone as she walked beside him. This was a funeral procession, one unfettered by the urgency of escape. This was a time of mourning, none wishing to interrupt that.
“You’ve returned!” a voice sounded, the door at the far end of the hanger sliding shut as Herank strode forth, her eyes immediately falling on Tarha;’s corpse, her face twisting into a smile. “And you killed the rug! Oh well done, Spike. Knew you had it in you, seems like only yesterday I almost killed...”
“Shut. Up,” Seugtai, his arm flying out to hover between Spike and Herank, Moonstone clearly engaged in a conversation only the two magic users could hear.
Spike’s face looked like thunder personified, rage clearly boiling behind his eyes, but he did not break stride, did not turn to face Herank or even acknowledge her presence, Moonstone trotting alongside him while Seugtai fell behind, stopping in front of the wizened crime lord.
“It’s not every day we kill a Sith Lord,” Herank beamed, apparently unaware of the effects of her words and utterly ignoring Seugtai’s command.
A single shot rang out across the hanger, Seugtai’s ripper in his hand, Herank collapsing to the floor as a scream of agony ripped from her lips, her hands clutching the wound in her lower stomach. Around the hanger, guards began to move, but a single look from Seugtai stopped them in their tracks, each now sharing worried glances with their fellows. They were part of the criminal syndicate that Herank had secured for Spike’s private war, far more loyal to her than to any other, but they also knew the stories that trailed the old Mandalorian, as well as the dragon who called him friend, none wishing to step in before they had to.
“You...you shot me,” Herank said incredulously, her words coming out as a strained gasp.
“Astute observation, yes,” Seugtai nodded, his helmet betraying no emotion whatsoever. “Now, I assume I have your attention?”
“My attention?!” Herank roared, another scream ripping from her lips as she over-exerted herself. “I’m dying and you want my attention?!”
“The round passed through you, no splintering. It missed vital organs causing only minor tissue and muscular damage,” Seugtai said matter-of-factly. “If I wished you dead, you would be dead. Instead I asked you a question, which I am going to ask again.”
Another shot rang out, this time ripping through Herank’s right knee, fresh screams echoing around the hanger. Segutai listened, before producing a small injector, jamming it unceremoniously into Herank’s neck and depressing the trigger, shooting the contents into the Crime Lord’s neck.
The effect was near instantaneous, Herank’s moves becoming lethargic, the powerful painkiller taking hold as Seugtai stood up.
“That was the only painkiller I have left, which means I need to ask again, you will suffer for making me repeat myself. Do. I. Have. your. Attention?”
“Yes,” Herank growled through gritted teeth.
“Good,” Segutai nodded. “You are not in charge, Herank. I think this proves you have no further power here. The ones you brought into this alliance, who supposedly answered to you, are now far more scared of Spike and I than they are of you, and since fear was all you offered, the money coming from their own actions, you have very little tangible power left. Next time you attempt to rial Spike, I will place a hole between your eyes and flush from the airlock. You can stay as a free woman and continue to fight with us, you can live out the war in a prison cell once more, or you can make a snarky remark now and test me, but regardless, you are no longer on equal footing with the rest of us, and if you make comments about Spike’s fallen brethren again, if you attempt to get a rise out of him again, if you so much as put a finger out of line, you die.”
Seugtai did not wait to hear what she had to say, turning to follow Spike, his helmets rear sensors springing to life with a thought, providing him a perfect view of Herank as he walked away. It was true what they said, he mused. Mandalorians did have eyes in the back of their head, at least when wearing their helmet.
Sighing to himself, Seugtai watched as Herank threw open her robe, a pistol flying into her hands. Seugtai didn’t turn, a blaster bolt ringing out, followed by another, and another.
Herank fell to the floor, her blaster still fully charged and prepared to fire, half a dozen smoking holes riddling her body. Around the hanger, guards returned to a more relaxed pose, blaster rifles cooling as a pair of droids moved forward, dragging the corpse of the once feared Crime Lord towards the station plasma reactor for incineration.
***
Seugtai finally caught up with Spike, standing beside him on the bridge of a small frigate. Tarhal’s body had been secured in the small med-bay before his arrival, Spike not turning to look as he spoke.
“What happened with Herank?”
“I offered her the chance to back down quietly. She didn’t. She’s dead,” Seugtai said matter-of-factly, Spike nodding as he spoke.
“Thank you for dealing with that. You’re just in time to watch me probably make a mistake.”
“I wish you wouldn’t,” Moonstone sighed. “I know Seugtai agrees with me in this, its a risk that...”
“Needs to be taken,” Spike finished for her. “He was Nexu, no matter what path he took, I’m still Nexu no matter what path I’ve taken, but by the letter of the law, only one of us is still Nexu, and he needs to know.”
As Spike finished speaking, the comms officer placed a hand to his ear, nodding as he listened to whatever was sounding over his comm bead, before turning and giving a thumbs up to Spike.
“Drop communication barriers and open bands for holo-transmission,” he ordered, a split second later a soft beep sounding, before a blue hologram materialised in front of Spike.
“Zule,” Spike nodded.
Zule looked older than the last time Spike had seen him, how hair matted and balding in places, scars criss crossing his face, leading to two bionic eyes that gleamed with a fire, while heavy set shoulders seemed to be holding up the weight of the galaxy’s woes. But more than all that, he simply looked tired, just tired.
“Spike,” Zule folded his arms. “Remind me again why I shouldn’t be telling the council about this?”
“Still surprised you haven’t,” Spike admitted. “This isn’t Jedi business. Isn’t Republic business or war business. We only have one thing in common and you know it. We need to mark his passing.”
“Tarhal?”
“Well it isn’t me and it isn’t you, and there were only three of us left, so yes, Tarhal,” Spike rolled his eyes. “Nexu grows smaller, Asho got a burial on Coruscant as a Jedi, Corinna got repatriated as a War Hero. You’ll get the same treatment as Asho did and I don’t care what I get, but Tarhal deserves to be remembered as the Jedi he was, not the Sith he became.”
“What are you proposing?” Zule asked. “You know he’ll never be buried in the temple, nor will he get rights as a general, traitors body’s are burnt.”
“I know that,” Spike snapped, a snarl gracing his lips for an instant before he got it back under control.
“There is no emotion, Spike,” Zule chided.
“Bullshit and you know it,” Spike glared back. “There is always emotion, always has been always will be. ‘There is no emotion, there is peace’. Have you ever listened to that, Zule? No emotion does not bring peace, it brings depression, which breeds resentment which breeds anger. How many fallen Jedi were only set on that path because the Jedi told them for so long that they needed to repress their emotions and the Sith offered them an outlet? How many more could have been spared if the Council taught the true code, Emotion, yet peace. Ignorance, yet knowledge. Passion, yet serenity. Chaos, yet harmony. Death, yet the Force. You must see that there is no black and white, Zule. There’s grey. Light grey, dark grey, middling grey and a million million other spectrums. If we were simple protectors rather than monks, the galaxy would be an easier place, and the Sith would not be the threat they are today.”
“And yet every time throughout history that is tried, your methodology is proven wrong,” Zule snapped. “The First Schism, the Hundred Years Darkness, the Great Hyperspace War, the Sith War, the current conflict against Revan, and that’s just against other force users. The Gank Wars? The Mandalorian Wars? How many other conflicts have arisen because emotions are allowed to run rampant. If the entire galaxy adhered to the Jedi Code as the temple teaches, there would be peace.”
“Peace established on conformity and uphold by the threat of destruction. That is no peace, that is tyranny, it is the cancer of the Jedi, that we call ourselves the ‘good guys’ so that any who fight against us must be ‘bad guys’. There is no room in your mind for doubt, Zule, that is why the Jedi are dangerous, it is why I am proud not to count myself amongst your number anymore, leaving was the right choice.”
“You did not leave, you were cast out.”
“I flew from Coruscant under my steam but regardless, the point is the same. The Jedi are not the shining knights everyone believes them to be, you know it, I know it. The Sith want to dominate and destroy, they must be opposed, the Republic is flawed but it works, but the Jedi are only protectors because they have won, not because of moral high ground.”
“You are naive,” Zule turned his nose up as he spoke. “You always have been, your mind so small that you can only think of yourself. The Jedi must be bigger, the galaxy looks to us for stability.”
“Listen to yourself,” Spike roared. “How is what you preach not tyranny? How is your peace through the threat of violence any different from the peace under threat of annihilation that the Sith promise? The worlds they have conquered are not dark places of permanent violence, they are as peaceful as any core world, but they step out of line, they are punished, just as the Jedi punish any of their order who step out of line. We are the same, and deep down you know it.”
For a long moment, neither spoke, before Spike let out a sharp breath and held his hands up.
“We could have, and have had, this conversation for hours upon hours. I am right, you are wrong, I am wrong, you are right. We won’t solve our differences standing at odds over hologram, and a war is no place for philosophy even if we were face to face. I am talking about Tarhal and his last rites. You know his wishes, or at least I hope you haven’t forgotten them.”
“Of course I haven’t,” Zule sighed. “And you are right, this is no time for this debate. You are travelling to Kashyyyk?”
“I am,” Spike nodded. “The Czerka Corporation holds the world as a slave pen, but I can’t not go.”
“Not anymore they don’t,” Zule shook his head. “Reports are sketchy at the moment, but it seems the Wookies rose up against Czerka, all evidence points to a massive victory against the company, and they’re now pulling out.”
“Republic intervention?” Spike asked, wrong footed by the sudden change.
“If it was, it wasn’t a sanctioned operation,” Zule shook his head, before catching Spike’s glare and sighing. “Did we want to? Yes, but we don’t have the manpower and you know it. The war is taxing us far too much to allow us the luxury of disbanding such practices.”
“Doesn’t change the taste,” Spike muttered. “Regardless, I will be going, he will be buried at the base of the wroshyr-tree of his village regardless of the political situation of the world. If you would come, it would mean much to his spirit...and to mine.”
“Send me the time of your arrival and I will endeavour to extradite myself from my current command long enough to attend,” Zule bowed, before terminating the link.
“You know he’ll bring a fleet with him, right?” Seugtai asked.
“You’re a wanted man, Spike,” Moonstone agreed. “And you just told someone who has never liked you exactly where you’re going to be. He won’t pass that up.”
“We’ll deal with it,” Spike sighed. “I know the Mandalorians don’t have such complicated burial procedures, ‘Not gone, just marching far away’ and all that. I admire it if I’m honest, I really do, but Tarhal wished this, as soon as possible after his passing, to be returned to his homeworld and his family. I failed him once before, I’m not failing in this. You are welcome to stay behind if you wish, Seugtai, I would say the same to you Moonstone but that isn’t viable. But I’m going, regardless of what you attempt to say otherwise.”
“Oh we’re coming with you,” Segutai shook his head. “I just want to voice my concerns that if we get captured again, I’m not bailing you out a second time.”
“Duly noted,” Spike snorted, a small smile crossing his face for what felt like the first time in years. “Pilot, take us out and plot a course. Full hyperspace diffusion protocols, if the Republic are waiting for us, I don’t want them tracing our jump back here easily. Once you have an eta, send a message to Zule, I will provide the frequency and encryption key when ready.”
“Aye sir, taking us out,” the pilot called, the ship rumbling to life as it edged out of Fireshot station and into the inky darkness of the void. After a few minutes of burning away from the gravity well of the world, a klaxon sounded throughout the ship, the hyperdrive activating and sending the ship hurtling towards whatever awaited them at Kashyyyk.