Star Wars Ranma2
FIRST OF ALL, AN APOLOGY:
When I wrote up my original teaser chapter I made a major, story-changing mistake. I had an event in SW canon that I was using as a target for where in the timeline I would be introducing Ranma into the SW universe. The mistake was that I went by my notes and what I thought the age of Obi-Wan in a comic book series was rather than making certain by double-checking before I started.
Turns out he wasn't 16 as I thought, but 24 and the event wasn't 10 years before the Phantom Menace, but a year, so there was no need to de-age Ranma as I did. Yeah, big mistake, and I'm sorry about that. In other news, did you know that going by the timeline on the wiki, Padme was 14 in Phantom Menace? Umm…A reigning queen that young? Makes her naiveté understandable.
I have gone back and corrected the previous chapter on the age thing, changed the combat between Ranma and Dooku to conform to that, as well as several other points. I urge that you all go back and read the prevalent points before reading this chapter.
Anyway I don't own Ranma, or Star Wars. Oddly enough, I apparently share this trait with George Lucas…weeeiiirrrrrd.
Here is chapter two of Horse for the Force. I realize that I said I wouldn't be putting out anymore chapters for this story, however I have been on a semi-large Sci-fi binge lately, and this was one story that profited from it. This chapter is, I would call it mostly a transitional, expositional chapter, where Ranma learns the local language, has some fun, and Dooku and Ranma start to learn from one another before Ranma is introduced to the wider universe.
Of the two SW crossovers, I have decided to follow this story for now. I want to thank Starboomer, Master Braedan, Drac-Frst, Lokarryn, Just Your Average Dropbear, Valdiusmacto, Druc1fer, DrkShadw and several others for giving me their well thought and articulated opinions about both stories. Reviewers like that, like Mordreek, Naj. P. Jackson, BigCC, Byakugan789 and others of that nature are nine course meals to us writers, regular reviews keep us going, those kinds of reviews make writing even more fulfilling.
This story won for a few reasons/points which were raised that I agreed with:
1. The switch between ki and Force power can be a pretty smooth one in comparison to the magic/Force connection.
2. HP/SW already have several fics going on, most of which are very damn good. Ranma doesn't have any, and never has had any good ones (well, there is one on Anime adventure, but it's just a thinly disguised excuse to have a lot of lemons).
3. Ranma right now is a teenager/young adult, which means I can go write into the good stuff. The canon stuff, the romance stuff, the chaos, and the violence, the glorious violence.
4. With Ranma, I'm not going to feel the need to correct everything about the Jedi order. Just start the ball rolling with a few discussions, then show it going on in the background, as some of the examples of the Chaos Factor at work.
I would like to thank Anothony444, Byakugan789, and Ultimaflare0 for their aid in editing this work.
And now on with the show!
Chapter 2: +12 Kick of Reality Readjustment to Your View of the Galaxy
For a few moments Ranma and Dooku waited in silence. The Jedi Master had several dozen bruises, including one cracked rib and possibly a broken shoulder, but Dooku was keeping the pain at bay with the ease of long practice, suppressing pain being a Jedi trick that every Jedi padawan learned before becoming a knight. Dooku was also smiling, staring at the female Ranma like a man not in lust as most would understand the term but in knowledge-lust, wondering what this youth represented.
In those few moments of peace, while the miners milled around them, the somewhat beyond middle-aged master went through the fight in his head. It was true that both of them hadn't gone all out. The boy had never given off any truly murderous thoughts, simply the most pure sense of enjoyment in battle Dooku had ever felt, so the Jedi master had never felt the need to go for the kill.
For his part, Dooku certainly wasn't out to kill the young woman especially after watching him do that Force shielding technique which in and of itself was something Dooku was eager to learn. The speed technique as well: when Dooku thought of using something like that while using a lightsaber, the possibilities were endless! And is she healing as I watch? That is faster than the best Jedi healer could match, without any conscious effort on his part. Yes indeed, this youth represents a treasure trove of Force knowledge.
He may also hopefully help me with my moral quandaries as well. I cannot believe the Force would guide me to find him, her… that is going to become irritating. Dooku shook his head, returning to his original thought with some difficulty despite his mental training. The odd feeling of the Force during that change, and the change itself, was enough to shake the confidence of any man. At any rate, I cannot believe the Force would guide me to him if I was supposed to learn only his physical skills.
Even better from Dooku's perspective, he had not felt a single flicker of barely anything that anyone could point to and say that the young man had anything to do with the Dark Side. There had been a brief spurt of anger right before the young man confronted him, but that was all. Which given what he might have thought was going on, is possibly understandable. And it did not impact his Force abilities at all.
For this part, Ranma was feeling a little confused. He'd already picked up a few words of the local language, along with a lot of inflection, and he was beginning to understand that he might've screwed up, possibly big time. This old man represented some group or other that most of the miners seemed to respect implicitly, and Ranma had jumped the gun with whatever the old man had tried to do to that woman, who was now sitting in a corner being consoled by two other women. It was true that those women were shooting dark looks at the old man, but for the most part it seemed as if he was well-respected here whatever her beef with him.
And damn can he fight like a bastard! I know I hit him with at least five or six Katchu-speed punches. That should've laid him out, busted at least a few of his ribs but he's still standing! And while he seems a little too welded to that light-blade-thing that is a deadly ass weapon! Ate through my ki shield like nobody's business.
Ranma could already feel her ki healing going to work however, so that was not a major issue. However she did not want to see what would've happened to her body if she hadn't been able to create that technique on the fly. I don't think even the strengthening technique would've stopped it.
She smirked while adjusting her chest a little under her shirt in a way that made many of the men look away hurriedly. His reaction to my changing form was hilarious, but not the kind that I thought I'd get honestly. I mean I know I'm hot in this form, much as that's caused me issues in the past, but he didn't even look at me. Hell, he hasn't looked at my chest even once! No, it was the change which astonished him so much. I suppose that's normal, but getting no reaction at all to my body is kind of weird. Maybe he's gay, ugh… Let's just change the subject now brain…
A few seconds passed as these thoughts went through both of their heads, then there was a clanking noise from the ramp up to the smaller ship the old man had arrived in. Ranma looked up at first suspiciously, then with wonder. A robot, real honest to Amaterasu robot was coming down the ramp.
It was silver in color with a large bulbous head with big wide 'ears' that reminded Ranma of the smaller aliens who had been killed by the raiders rather than captured. Its fingers didn't look like they articulated well, and it had a grill instead of a mouth, set below wide glowing yellow eyes which were indented into the robot's face.
D-25SZX was a protocol droid, and had been a proud servant of the Republic Diplomatic corps for over two-thousand years, over which time he had served with dozens of Jedi Masters. He was a valued and honored member of his classification. He greatly enjoyed missions like these, where he was sent out from the familiar, staid confines of Coruscant into the wider galaxy to provide knowledge and experience to the mission.
Although at this moment 25 was wondering what exactly his current partner for this mission wanted him for. "You called for me master Dooku?" He asked his voice a crackling, elderly sort of tenor.
"Yes, 25. This young man does not speak Basic, instead he speaks a language I've never heard before. Do you think you can place it?" Dooku asked while another man came out of the ship after the android, moving his way.
He was the chief medical officer on the ship, not a doctor by any means, more of an EMT but normally more than enough to handle the scrapes and bruises that would come on a Consular class cruiser like the Kaiseki, Dooku's current ship. He began to run a medical scanner over Dooku, hissing a little at the readout while the droid moved in Ranma's direction.
Seeing the young man's eyebrows rise Dooku pointed to his mouth. "Talk please young man, this droid will try to help us communicate."
Ranma cocked his head, understanding two of the words there, the ones that the old man was using to address him. "Ranma, I'm Ranma, old man." he said pointing at himself at his name.
Dooku did the same, saying his own name, "Dooku, Jedi Master. A pleasure, though one I believe will become more so when we are actually able to communicate."
Nodding, Ranma turned back to the robot which by this point had made its way to him and it nodded his head. "Greetings, I am D-25SZX protocol droid. I am fluent in over 400,000 dialects, and have been programmed with samples of 1,000,000 more. Could you please speak a full sentence to me?"
Ranma only got a few words out of that, but discerned the gist of it. Evidently the old man, 'Dooku?', though if that was his first or last name Ranma didn't know, had called in this droid to see if it could help them talk to one another. "Yeah I doubt you're going to have much luck. No way you've ever met someone from Japan before."
"Well, whatever so yeah I'm Ranma, I came to this dimension, universe or whatever as some kind of magical accident, basically because I…" Ranma paused for a moment and then shrugged. "I was too emotionally hyped up and insane at the time to think about what could go wrong. Gah, admitting that leaves a bad taste in my mouth."
He grinned then, looking around at the aliens in the ship waving at a few of them who looked back. They waved back, with more than one of them smirking at him. The green-skinned girl though stared back in such a way that Ranma had to look away hurriedly, a not-unpleasant shiver going down his spine and a flush coming to his cheeks. "Er, um, n-not that I'm exactly unhappy with this. A whole new universe to explore! Just thinkin' about what kind of martial arts are out there for me to find and incorporate into my own style makes me want ta jump for joy. This is going to be awesome!"
Throughout Ranma's speech the droid had stood there silently. When he finished, it nodded. "Please wait, scanning. "After a moment it began again. "This dialect is not among my known mastered languages, nor among any of the other dialects which I have samples off. Fascinating, a challenge."
Seeing the consternation on Dooku's face (but were his eyes lighting up with even more interest than before?) Ranma shrugged at that, and switched to Chinese. "I wish I could remember what nation sent that monkey off into deep space with a recording of their language, but I can't. Think it was Russia, but I'm not very good at Russian. Hell, can't even remember if the recording was actually sent, or a hindsight thing mentioned in the news."
"Fascinating, the human female can apparently speak two unknown languages!" 25 held up its digits counting off one two and then waggling the third with its head cocked in an interrogative manner. Evidently 'body language, normal human, base' carried over, and the youth spoke again.
Ranma said the same words he had spoken again in Korean then clicked two of his fingers. "Wasn't there some kind of plaque on the moon or something that was sending out some messages? Or was that just in that one movie? Well whatever, the line sounded damn good. Ahem, 'I come in peace for all mankind?'" Ranma grinned and held up her fingers in the peace sign hopefully as he spoke in English again.
There was more than a little bit of laughter at how ridiculous she looked just then from the miners. Ranma laughed too, turning to smirk at the miners before moving back over to the shattered remains of the water container while the droid turned to Dooku.
"Master Dooku, the youth speaks no language that I am familiar with. However, body language, or at least the most basic, ahem, primitive sort carried over. There are also some nuances of tone and inflection that carry over, and I am loaded with a teaching protocol. It will be a challenge, but I believe that I will be able to teach him Basic given time."
"Young Ranma seems to be picking words up quickly, or at least inflection and tone." Dooku murmured. As a Jedi Masters he was of course a master at reading other people's body language, and the youth was something of an open book in that area. At least her face was. His/her body language was silent. There was no hint of anything in her body, save a sort of coiled readiness that Dooku had seen in other incredibly advanced hand-to-hand combatants. "Can you give me an estimate on how long that might take? I wish to speak to Ranma as soon as possible."
"That will depend upon the youth's ability to concentrate and to learn. Add to that…" The droid turned to look at Ranma just as he was heating up the water before splashing it on himself. "I… error, error, error, what just, what just happened... Does not compute! I am a protocol droid, I am programmed to deal with peculiar and unusual of occurrences, yet I cannot, this does not…processors, overloading!"
"25!" Dooku barked, coming up with a solution on the fly. "Put the last 20 seconds into long storage memory, then label it as 'unexplainable mystery of the Force'. You can do that can't you?"
The droid, which had been twitching and shaking his head spinning on its shoulders, slowly stilled. "Memory has been placed into long talk term storage under the heading 'unexplainable mystery of the Force', thank you Master Dooku."
Dooku sighed in relief. Although how a full body sex change, at least I think it's a full body I'm not about to ask, can be done through simple application of cold or heated water is beyond my knowledge as well. Though there is that odd flash of, of laughing amusement when it occurred from the Force. Yet one more question to ask when we're actually able to communicate.
For its part Ranma had simply smirked as the android went into its funk, understanding only one or two of the words spoke. "Sorry 25, but some humans had the same reaction back where I came from."
"25, take Ranma over to a corner and begin to talk to him. Radio the captain to bring out whatever you need as a teaching aid, while I deal with the ship and these gentlemen." Dooku said crisply, reluctantly putting the mystery of young Ranma to one side so that he could deal with the issue on the ship.
He nodded at the ship's doctor, who had ignored everything else to create a makeshift sling for his arm, while also wrapping some bandages around Dooku's middle. Understanding the nod the medic shrugged. "You're good to walk around master, you're not the first Jedi I've seen too, so I know what damage you all can take. Though I wouldn't use that shoulder for a bit, say a week or so?"
"Understood. Talk to the miners, make sure that none of them have any medical needs or require medical attention quickly." With that Dooku nodded once again to Ranma who was being led off gently by 25 back toward where he had been sitting.
Ranma nodded back and Dooku turned to the slavers. "Now, we were talking about where your mining stake was. I realize this might be painful to you, and I apologize, but could you tell me exactly what happened when the Gram and their allies fell upon you? Then, we'll need to go over where…"
OOOOOOO
Several miles below what was termed the normal street level of Coruscant, hidden among the miles and miles of abandoned cityscape, there was a room. This was not a normal room by any means. Scientific equipment lined several walls, along with several specimen containers which held bits and pieces of hundreds of alien races.
The back wall was dominated by a massive Hypercom setup, one that was not on the grid for such. In the corners of the room were large black urns, the stone of them so black they seemed to drink in the light. Here and there scattered throughout the large room were other devices and items, someone's idea of memorabilia perhaps.
And in the direct center of the room facing the open area around the door, there was a throne. It was straight-backed and made of steel of all things, with no cushions on it to soften its surface. The man who had created it believed that such things were unnecessary believing the mind should always be in charge of the body.
The man currently sitting in the chair did not share that opinion, and had placed a small cushion on the seat for now as he read the message from his teacher. It could only be decrypted here in this room, or else he would be up in his own suite, sitting on his own throne, which was much more to his tastes. However, secrecy was bred into his bones by this point, so he didn't object overmuch. His name, though it was not the one he had been born with, was Darth Sidious. He was a Sith, an Order of force users that used the Dark Side, as the Jedi did the Light Side.
To one side of Sidious stood another figure. He was a Zabrak male, whose red skin was festooned with black tattoos all along his body, most particularly his face. This gave his already fearsome visage an even more terrible appearance. His name was Darth Maul.
Yet for all his fearsome appearance, it was the man on the throne who held the power here, not him, and Maul knew it, staying silent as the man on the throne finished reading the message from his teacher and considering its contents.
Excellent, plans are proceeding apace. The Huk war in particular is a master stroke by my teacher. The Jedi will once again be seen as tools of the rich and the Senate, pushing public perception of them further from the justice they are supposed to serve in that area of space. Public opinion, propaganda, and the voice of the powerful, when all of those turn against the Jedi, their doom is assured!
The Senate was almost entirely their tool now, not so much because it moved to their wishes, but because the response of every person within it was calculable. They all had buttons that could be pushed, and Sidious knew each and every one. I can play them like puppets on a string, and we are the masters of those puppets, or rather I am the master.
He smirked a sinister smirk there in the dark of his hood. Even now Plagueis is out in the Outer Rim fomenting further dissent against the Senate, making it seem as if the Republic is not concerned about those planets at all. The seeds of war are growing, and soon these little flare ups will grow in turn. And when they do, Jedi will start to fall. The feel of those points of light going out, it will be… glorious…
Plagueis still serves purpose, especially out in the Outer Rim, yet soon it will be time to take the lead of the Grand Plan solely into my own hands. But not yet. Once the Veil of the Dark Side has grown to completely block out any visions of the future any of the Jedi attempt to see, then, it will be time to remove him. And at the moment, my apprentice leaves much to be desired. Maul is a blunt object, I need to find someone else, and my candidate for such is a fruit not quite ripe enough to fall into my hands just yet.
As if his thoughts on that subject opened Sidious up further to the force the man felt a shiver through his senses. The force was rippling, changing, and the future, which had been so certain, changing with it.
To his side Darth Maul frowned, sensing a shift in his master's emotions. "Master?"
Sidious spoke aloud, using the words to direct his own thoughts more than speaking to his apprentice. "Something has shifted, changed, centered on one of my pawns." He did not use the pawn's name, though it reverberated in his skull slightly, forcing him to realize that some portions of the plan might have to change.
Dooku, something has happened to make him no longer wish to find the Sith. Interesting, and very irritating in the long term. No one else could serve as well as a figurehead on many levels. Hmmm… "I must meditate on this. Give Vilmarh Grahrk his next set of instructions, then leave me."
Even before Darth Maul had left, his master had slipped into a meditation trance. He sent his senses out through the Force, passing beyond Corsucant's system and through dozens more, until his senses finally hovered around Dooku, trying to get a feel on what had changed.
Yet he could not. The ripples in the Force and the future were too powerful near Dooku, they had not settled yet at all. Indeed, they seemed to be growing, changing all the time in a typhoon of chaos the likes of which Sidious had never even dreamed of before.
Some of those eddies Sidious could read still indicated he would indeed come to the dark side though later then the man had expected, but those were few and getting fewer. Some of them indicated he would become the banner-bearer of the Jedi. At the same time others said he would break the Jedi but not join the Sith becoming an enemy in some ways, and an ally for some of his power grabs… very odd.
Hours later the man's senses retreated to his body and he snarled, frustrated. I do not like not knowing what is going on, not knowing what has caused Dooku to change to become a source of, of what I can only call chaos! Chaos can serve our purposes, but it is not easily directed, especially when we were not the one to set it into motion in the first place! I need to think on this further, it is obvious that these ripples are not only affecting Dooku, but others as well and the change in the future will grow immensely. I need to put surveillance in place to observe anything to do with Dooku. Luckily, I already have people in place on Malastare, we will see what they report.
OOOOOOO
As the Jedi master moved off deeper into the ship, Ranma and the droid were being observed.
Twila'Cren was a Twi'lek, a native of Ryloth who, much like many of her race, had left Ryloth a slave when she was six or seven. She had been trained to dance and to pleasure her master in any way he wished, yet thanks to her master gambling her away against an undercover lawman, she had eventually been freed. But though free, Twila had no real skills except dancing and other… similar talents to pay her way.
Thankfully since she had been freed Twila had been able to choose who she danced for, and she was good enough, and pretty enough to have her choice of jobs. Twila'Cren had actually enjoyed her time in the mining camp. Most of the miners were decent enough people, and the master of the bar she had worked at was a tough old coot who liked to look but not touch with a silver tongue and a steady aim with a stunner. Until the Gran slavers had killed him.
Once the slavers had landed, Twila had resigned herself once again to be a slave, while inside her soul died a little. But the redheaded girl had given them all hope when she broke out of their cell, and then she delivered!
Now she cocked her head thoughtfully, staring at the youth who was now talking to the protocol droid. So, the young male that was so instrumental in the battles after we were freed was also the young girl who freed us in the first place. Though very odd, that makes this easier.
And I think that he or she deserves a reward, Twila thought, straightening her spine resolutely as she made her way up through the hangar Bay towards the remarkable human male. I don't have money, but I noticed her glances in my direction, and his too, so there is one method of repayment available to me. Besides, in either form he/she's rather good looking, it could be fun…
With a faint smile on her face she moved towards the droid and the human male, who saw her coming. She smiled wider as Ranma blushed, looking away quickly. Evidently he was much more innocent than most humans she'd met, and certainly less-confident when it came to the opposite sex than most humans his age tried to appear. That could actually make this more fun, still he does have a pulse. She thought, giggling as he glanced down at her chest before looking away hurriedly.
25 noticed the human's change in body language and turned, staring at the Twi'lek who had walked up. "Yes, can I help you miss?"
"This human, I heard him give his name as Ranma, he does not understand basic?" She asked, cocking her head to one side while her lekku, which she had hung down her front now rather than back, twitched.
"That is indeed correct, it is something I am endeavoring to start to address. Are you volunteering to help? I have to inform you that unless you have an ear for languages yourself, it will be very difficult."
"Nothing like that no. But body language, or body signals, are they the same?"
"So far they seem to be, at least to a certain degree. Of course even within a given species each planet will develop subtle differences in body language, even certain distinct body signals, such as the charm signs of Coruscant, or the finger signs of Atuapu. And from there clothing and coloration also differ from one society to another in conveying signals. Of course in this case that is immaterial, but it is something to bear in mind once we are able to communicate verbally to a higher degree."
"I just want to make certain that there is going to be no misunderstanding of what I'm offering." Twila said smiling faintly as she gently pushed the droid aside to stand in front of Ranma, who was still trying to look anywhere but at Twila, blushing hotly with one leg crossed over another.
Twila leaned over his makeshift chair, one green-colored hand lifted, touching his jaw and gently turning his head back to look at her. She stared into his blue eyes, searching for something even Twila didn't know the name for then smiled. "You saved me from a life of servitude and worse, and I would repay you in the only coin I may."
Ranma stared at her, shrugging incomprehension, even as his blush deepened.
"As I said," the droid from behind her said, sounding test. "He cannot understand Basic, I think he understands the words for 'you' and 'I', but that is it, your sentence and your intent… oh my." The 'oh my' was a response to Twila suddenly leaning forward, pressing her lips against Ranma.
Though Ranma had no idea what the alien girl had been saying, there was no misconception possible in the kiss she was giving him. The alien girl's lips tasted of cinnamon and spicy hot pepper, a very strange combination that was somehow distinctly alien, not that Ranma had anything to compare it to. This is my first real bleeding kiss, Sanzenin can go freeze, I'm definitely not counting that shit's kiss!
Ranma kissed back, clumsily at first but learning quickly, trying to emulate what the girl's lips, which were so soft, was doing only in reverse as it were. When the girl's mouth opened slightly against his and her tongue, which was longer and thinner than a human's, tapped against his lips, his lips opened of their own accord, and his tongue slid out, caressing and questing into the girl's mouth as his arms rose, moving around her. His leg fell from his waist, and he pulled her down onto his lap.
Twila was now enjoying this immensely! The boy had started off rather clumsily, but he was almost as good as Twila now her down. She began to grind her waist against his, feeling his rising reaction to her against her own panty-clad center. Good stars, he's certainly well above human norm in that area, and if he learns everything else as fast as he learned how to kiss mmmmm…
For Ranma, the floodgates had opened. His repressed libido roared out, breaking his self-control as he gripped the girl's waste hard, holding Twila against his chest and waist as the kiss deepened. She was lithe and desirable and she was grinding against Ranma in such a way as to stop all of his higher brain functions. All he felt now was this raging torrent that had to be released.
It was only 25 speaking up that caused that torrent to recede in both of the participants, his voice even dryer than normal. "I am not a master of human or Twi'lek mating rituals, save where it may impact diplomatic discussions of course, but isn't it normal to begin the mating dance in private rather than in public?"
Twila'Cren slowly pulled back, breathing deeply her eyes half-lidded at the sheer passion of the kiss they had just shared, a small yet incredibly and joyous smile on her face. Oh yes, this was going to be fun! She looked around however at the crowd of miners, most of whom looked like they wanted to whistle, while the women were either giving her a thumbs up, or simply staring in astonishment.
"The droid's right." She said, reaching down to take Ranma's hand and pull him to his feet. "Let's go find one of the rooms around here, I think that will be a better environment for our… discussion… than out here in the open."
Ranma finally broke out of the daze the kiss had put him in, tearing his eyes away from the green-skinned girl's beautiful face and body with more difficulty ever run into when trying to control himself before. As soon as Ranma did so, his senses flowed back to him, and he blushed scarlet, realizing the two of them had been making out in front of an audience, which acted like a cold shower on his senses.
What am I doing!? I barely, hell I don't know her at all, hells, I don't even know her name for certain! Damn I really am a pervert like Akane said! No, wait she's the one that started it, I just, I just lost control.
That thought finished the process of bringing Ranma completely back to himself. If there was one thing that Ranma did not like, it was being out of control of his own body. Even when he gave himself to his instincts completely in a fight, it was his mind and his combat instincts rather than his body. But right then, when that girl had kissed him, all the hard-fought control over his libido he'd worked on since arriving in this universe had disappeared.
Was I really just about to hop into bed with a complete stranger? Do, do I really want the first time I, I make love to someone to be with someone I just met literally a few hours ago? With an effort of will Ranma regained control of himself, pushing his desire to the girl down, making his physical reaction to her recede as well.
"Wait." he said holding up his hands, breaking the girl's grip on his hand and ignoring the pouting look on her face with difficulty. "Just wait. I'm not that is, I don't want." Ranma paused. "I, I don't want my first time to be with, no that's not right either, I mean you're beautiful but I…" he stuttered to a halt again when the girl leaned in, placing her forehead against his staring into his eyes, that faint, almost sinful smile still on her lips, which looked so kissable it was really distracting him. There was no comprehension of his words in those eyes, though Ranma guessed that she thought he was giving her compliments.
Despite his body telling him to grab the girl and start kissing her again, Ranma gently pushed the girl back by the shoulders, looking at 25. "I don't want my first time to be with someone I just met." He said, enunciating each word clearly, hoping the droid had absorbed enough of his own language to get some sense of what Ranma was saying.
25 cocked his head, then said. "I believe the youth is trying to say something, perhaps you should back off a moment miss?"
Twila did not want to back off, her body was literally on fire from the kiss she'd exchanged with the young man, and she couldn't understand how the youth had regained control of himself so quickly. Still, she did as asked and Ranma breathed a sigh of relief.
He talked to 25 for a few more moments trying to convey what he wanted to say, but 25 didn't have enough of the vocabulary base from any of the languages Ranma spoke to understand. Desperately Ranma looked around, staring at the miners who had, now that the floor show was done, gone back to their business for the most part. He saw one couple, an older man and woman who were talking to a younger man and bounded over to them, leaving 25 and Twila behind him looking bemused.
He stopped nearby, looking at their hands and breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the both of them were wearing rings. Tapping the older man on the shoulder he said, "Excuse me." Then he pointed down at their rings tapping his own finger.
The older man frowned looking over at 25 who had come up behind Ranma. "What is the young man trying to ask, he wants my ring?"
"I do not believe so no. Judging by the context, and the fact that he has been trying to convey something about an unwillingness to perform the mating ritual with the young Twi'lek here, I believe he is trying to say that he wants to say something about relationships."
The older man nodded, looking over at his wife who frowned then smiled a little and held up the hand bearing her ring finger. Her husband put his own hand in hers, and they held them out to Ranma. Ranma nodded then tapped their rings and looked at Twila. "I want something like that, I don't, I mean you're beautiful and I'm sure it'd, um, y'know be fun and all, but I, I want to be in a relationship with someone and build up to that point…"
He tried to use gestures to convey this meeting, doing a sort of dance with one hand, continually pointing to where the couple was holding hands. After a moment Twila finally got it, smacking her forehead. "Are you serious? You want to be in a relationship." She turned to the droid. "Pull up some videos of couples going on dates or something similar on that datapad of yours."
The droid did so before pointing to them. He had quickly found several and clicked through them while Ranma looked on. They began with a couple on a date moving to a couple holding hands, and ending with a traditional wedding on Chandrilla. Ranma nodded along at the sequence, though paused it before the marriage sequence, switching the datapad back to the video showing couples on dates.
"So you'd prefer to date someone?" Twila said sighing faintly, the last of her own ardor having cooled noticeably. "That's a problem, because I'm really not interested in a long term thing. I wanted to reward you for saving us." She slinked forward, touching Ranma's jaw, enjoying the fact that he blushed immediately, desperately looking away from her chest region. "And that offers still open…"
"Oh give over Twila," said the older woman, pushing at her shoulder slightly. "The young man wants his first time to be romantic and with someone he truly cares for, he doesn't even know you yet. Why don't you want to date him?"
"Well for one thing," Twila said, stepping back and putting her hands on her hips to glare at the older woman. "I think he's going to be involved with the Jedi. You know how they are, no attachments. And, even if he isn't going to be involved with the Jedi, I don't think he's the type to be tied down to one planet. Whereas I would rather like to find a single job and stick with it someplace safe."
"Don't we all," said the old miner shaking his head mournfully remembering the loss of their home. Even if they went back, it would never be the same, too many friends had died when the slavers arrived. "If you're just interested in 'rewarding' him though, I don't think you need to worry about that. He doesn't seem to be the type to need repayment for a good deed."
"It's not just because I want to reward him, no." Twila said tartly. "A larger part of it is I don't like being indebted to anyone, my whole race is indebted to too many. And far too many people would hold such debts above my head." The fact she had thought it would be fun was also in there, but not something she wanted to share right now.
"I don't think the idea to do that would even enter the young man's head." Said the older woman, watching as Ranma looked between them his brows furrowed as he tried to figure out what they were saying. "If you want a one night stand with him, just say so."
"Can you find some video or other to describe a one night stand?" Twila asked, turning to the droid once more.
25 shrugged. "That might be a little too sophisticated, but you're welcome to try."
Twila did so, putting together after a few moments a sequence of videos. It showed two people meeting in a bar, getting to know one another, then heading towards a bed, before fading to black. Then they were shown exiting the room, immediately going their separate ways.
Ranma blushed throughout the movie, which was a little odd Twila then he frowned as the two figures moved away from one another going their separate ways. He shook his head looking at Twila. "I don't want that." He said, and Twila frowned before sighing.
She pointed again at the video and then pointed to herself indicating she wanted that. She smiled at him, indicating that really was what she wanted, and then slowly ran her hands down her sides tantalizing him, while her lekku twitched slightly, sending a message all their own to those who could read such.
For moment Ranma simply stared at her hands as they moved down Twila's body, resting on her sides then her hips, and then moving back up again, tantalizingly moving to her stomach right below her breasts before moving away. He gulped, then stared at her, at the video, and then finally closed his eyes, shaking his head rapidly. "No." No matter how good looking she was Ranma didn't want his first time to be with a complete stranger who he'd never see again afterwards.
A few of the miners nearby, and one or two of the crewmen of the Jedi's ship shook their heads at that, muttering to one another that Ranma had to be insane to pass up what Twila was offering. A few of the women thought it was romantic, but made no move to offer to date him, and more than a few also though he was being stupid, though admittedly for more convoluted reasons than the men. But Ranma was resolute.
Seeing that Twila sighed, nodded her head in understanding. "I actually respect that, and if I was looking for a relationship at this point, you better believe that would be a mark in your favor Ranma, but I'm not." She leaned forward, kissing him lightly on the lips pulling back before either of them could get to into it. "It really would've been fun though."
With that she moved away, shaking her hips just slightly more than normal to make certain that Ranma knew what he was giving up. The groan of agony behind her was all she could have wished for, as the Jedi Master returned to the hanger bay.
A few hours after that incident, Ranma and 25 were still talking in a corner of the hangar bay while elsewhere on the ship event continued apace.
At Dooku's command the Kaiseki stayed where it was, where Dooku hoped to keep it until the freighter jumped into the Gran system. Dooku hoped to see what this ship's arrival in his destination would cause before revealing his own presence. If he was lucky someone would recognize it and call it by name, giving him even more leverage to work with. He already had two of the astromech droids from his ship working on cracking the captain's personal files, and they were making decent enough headway, but every little bit helped.
Most of the crew of the ship had congregated in the hyperdrive system. It was a very makeshift job, and the captain was not at all happy about it, which the captain, Michael, made certain that Master Dooku was aware of the moment the Jedi master explained his plans to the man. "This systems been shot to hell sir, frankly I wouldn't trust it at all. We might, just might, get a single jump out of it but that's about all, but what condition the ship'll be in when we come out of, or even where in the system, that's up in the air."
"It would be that inaccurate?" Dooku asked somewhat dismayed. He had thought his ruse an excellent idea, but it didn't seem to be a viable one.
"Sir, we'd need a full engineering crew and parts to get this running again, that's the truth of it. Right now I would not trust it with my life, let alone the civilians or yours."
"Your devotion does you credit captain, thank you. If that is the case, can we transport all of the miners on the frigate? Including the prisoners?" Several crewmen, including one who had confessed to being the ship's communication officer, had surrendered, and surprisingly been taken captive by the miners during their takeover of the ship. Those prisoners, the ship, and the captain's logs would give Dooku enough hard evidence to really hammer the Gran government in his negotiations.
The man winced. "I don't think so sir. We could possibly head for the nearest Republic planet, but even a short jump like that with this many people would overload our atmospheric systems."
"You said we might be able to get one jump out of it, could we jump there and get repairs?"
"Not with any speed sir, which given the plan of your schedule is of the essence I'm afraid." Michael frowned, thinking hard, going over what he knew of the local star systems. "I think there are a few Alderaan Ranger ships near here, helping local law enforcement groups hunt down pirates. A few of them could have the carrying capacity for the miners."
Dooku frowned closing his eyes for a brief moment, sending his mind out into the Force. Then he opened them, nodding decisively. "Can they be here in the next few hours?"
"I… I think so master Dooku, if I get the message off quickly. Why?"
"Just a Force premonition, I believe that this slaver ship's friends are searching for it along its route." The miners represented a financial resource after all, as did this ship, an even larger one at present. "I will need your crewmen's aid to take statements of the miners, all of whom will be going with the rangers. I will also canvass the prisoners, four of which will be joining us, as will young Ranma."
"I'll get right to it then sir." The captain nodded crisply moving away, already talking into his communicator summoning up his crew from various areas of the ship. As he moved out of hearing range however Dooku could still hear him start to mutter under his breath. "And if that kid goes anywhere near my engines, I'm going to whack him upside the head with a spanner!"
With that being taken care of, Dooku talked to a few of the miners once more then sifted through the prisoners for three more to add to the communications officer. After that, Dooku made his way back down to the hangar bay, where he was unsurprised to find Ranma and 25 talking. 25 was holding up a large tablet and showing images as he enunciated words carefully, with Ranma doing the same. "Have you made much progress?"
"Master Dooku." 25 said turning his head to them as Ranma did the same. "Yes, barring a few interruptions we've made very good progress. Young Ranma learns remarkably quickly, and seems to retain knowledge far better than the human norm. Nonetheless, I believe it will be at least a week, possibly two before he is fluent in Basic enough to communicate effectively."
"Two weeks?" Dooku said surprised. Most of the time when younglings had to be taught Basic it took months. And wasn't it supposed to be that the older a person was, the harder they found it to learn languages? "Do you think that is normal for his race, or is it just Ranma?"
"I believe it is just Ranma, Master Dooku. All the body language I'm getting often is the most basic of human standard as I said earlier."
"I see." Dooku said with a nod. "Very well, continue. We will talk soon." he said to Ranma nodding his head at the youth.
Ranma nodded back with a faint smile before turning to 25, pointing at Dooku as Dooku walked off. "Tell me about him, and this Jedi thing."
25 shook his head. "You do not have the words yet for that." He said in a sentence that Ranma had heard before and understood the meaning of. "Let us continue for now."
Ranma rolled his eyes but did so, starting to do some sit-ups and push-ups in place as he looked at the images while listening to 25 describe them. The droid had mimed him doing such things when it began to notice Ranma becoming antsy and inattentive. Man, if only the teachers back at school could've let me do this kind of thing in class, meh too late now.
Within an hour, a few more small frigates arrived. Two of them quickly took off the miners, including Twila'Cren much to Ranma's relief/regret. Two of the others slaved the larger ship to them, then all four went to hyperspace quickly, their destination Alderaan. A planet known for its devotion to diplomacy and peace, Alderaan was both home to the Rangers and a planet which routinely was used to house evidence or witnesses in cases ongoing against members of the Senate or other planetary governments, its own government's probity unquestionable by any save the most corrupt.
OOOOOOO
Several days passed by with the ship in hyperspace which Ranma put to good use studying the local language almost all the time. By this point Ranma was becoming more fluent in the local dialect every day, adding words to his growing vocabulary. He still screwed up a lot of the specific words, and his general knowledge of this universe was still lacking tremendously, but for only a few day's work the ability to speak at all and be understood was still an achievement.
Despite the droid's aid in helping him and his general awe of being in space however, there were some aspects of it that Ranma just could not get used to. Getting out of the sonic shower, Ranma shook his head. How the hell these people think that's a real shower is beyond me.
Ranma understood the need to conserve water aboard a spaceship, after all you could only have so much interior space. But the entire 'sonic shower' idea was just weird! I don't actually feel clean, not really. Worse, it don't exactly help with my self-control issues.
He was still dealing with 'odd' dreams every night, and more often than not had to clean his sheets before leaving the small room he had been assigned upon coming aboard (more of a closet in size really) before starting his day. Luckily there weren't any girls among the crew to cause him to react, giving him more time to try and get a handle on that kind of thing. But his body's control wasn't coming nearly as easily as his emotional control.
On the other hand, I bet if I did try to have an actual shower aboard the ship, the heating or something would break. Stupid water attracting portion of the curse!
It was all too easy for Ranma to remember the hundreds of times water simply reacted oddly in his presence. Traveling uphill was one, splashing far harder off the pavement just to get him or one of the other cursed individuals rather than splashing like normal another. Or the one time he tried to take a shower at in the boy's bathroom at school. The water, which had until then been warm enough to make steam as it fell out of the tap, had a bare few minutes into Ranma's shower turned cold as the heater broke. He'd had to break several people's legs that day…
Out of the shower he pulled on a shirt one of the ship's crew had given him. It was a little tight, hugging him like a second skin, but Ranma didn't mind. At least I'm not trying to wear it in my female form, that I'd have a problem with.
Now, he thought, stretching and cracking his neck and shoulders, 25 said I should probably talk to some of the crew to, what was it 'get used to lingual shifts' or something? Don't know what that means, but whatever. Once fully dressed, Ranma moved through the ship, nodding his head at a crewmen moving about the business, an alien that looked sort of like a grasshopper standing on his hind legs called a Verpine.
The crew of the small cruiser was composed of six, three human men and three aliens. Apparently two of the aliens were technically female, including the Verpine, but their forms were such that Ranma couldn't think of them in that manner.
A few minutes later he entered the bridge of the ship, which was a small area only big enough for one observer, the captain, and three other stations, with very little room in between. The captain of the ship, Michael, turned as the door to the bridge opened. He nodded politely at Ranma though internally he was still wondering what exactly the younger man was. Jedi master Dooku was obviously fascinated by him, and the captain had heard all about Ranma saving the would-be slaves. But his strange abilities, and of course the curse threw Michael off, as it would anyone.
"25 said I greed to talk, learn more, is okay?" Ranma asked in his pigeon Basic.
Michael nodded. "That's fine, er and that's need there, not greed. We're in hyperspace right now so we don't have much in the way of duties except to watch our boards for anything going wrong. Ask away." He smirked a little, deliberately waggling his eyebrows, knowing Ranma was far better at body cues then at verbal ones. "Though I'm surprised you don't want to talk to Carson, he'd be happy to talk to you all you want."
Carson was the cook aboard the ship. He was the only one who had not been involved in repairing the hyperdrive of the slave ship, and as such hadn't met Ranma before Ranma came aboard. When he did, Ranma had just had splashed himself deliberately to deal with Twila and a few of the other girls trying to get a rise out of him. Carson believed himself a suave womanizer, and had immediately hit on the small busty redhead only to be turned down via a kick to the crotch.
The younger man smiled showing all of his teeth for a moment as he reached down to the small handrail separating the operations area from the observer's position. The metal under his grip bent easily under his hand, and he cocked an eyebrow. "Dead male what say?"
"Nevermind!" Michael said waving his hands quickly. To his other side the other crewmen laughed at his misfortune.
The Mon Calamari communications specialist waved his hand. "Do not mind the captain." He rasped. "He is a typical Corellian, they always think they are more amusing than they actually are."
"As a captain of the Republic fleet I am above such slander, but as a Corellian I take offense at that remark, and will have my revenge." Michael laughed.
"Corellian," Ranma said mouthing the word a few time before getting it right. "Human world?"
"One of them is, er, Corellia's the name of the system, and one of the planets." Michael said elaborating slightly. He turned to his computer, punching in orders, and a small hologram of a star system appeared in the observation area causing Ranma to turn around and look at it.
"Corellia." Michael said as he stood up from his chair to come over, pointing at one of the planets. "This is my home planet, Corellia itself." pointing at it, the hologram obligingly enlarged at his touch. Then it was substituted for several pictures of the planet itself, showing forests, mountains, oceans and blue skies along with several large but seemingly beautiful cities.
Ranma stared at it, a wide smile on his face. "Beautiful." he said in Japanese then tried in basic. "Er, more than pretty for un-living things?"
"Beautiful or gorgeous or I suppose. In terms of planets picturesque?" Michael guessed.
"All of above." Ranma said with a laugh causing Michael and the helmsman, another Corellian, to laugh as well.
Michael went on, shrinking that planet and pointing to the others. "Selonia, Drall, Tralus, and Talus. The Five Brothers, they're called. Selonia is the home planet of the Selonians."
A image appeared, standing taller than a human set next to it for comparison. It had fur and coloring that reminded Ranma of otters or maybe stoats. "Huh. Two… er… people… in one system, normal or not?"
"Species. Very normal, most planets, while governed by one race or another, will have a smattering of other races represented among its population. If by that you mean if it's unusual for a planet to be the home system for two different species, well, that is unusual. But humans didn't originate in Corellia, the Selonians and the Drall did."
Another button popped up an image of a Drall, which barely reached the human's waist. It was a furry mammal looking alien which again didn't wear any clothing, though with his fur, it probably didn't need any.
"Huh." Ranma mused, staring at the image.
Michael turned the hologram back to the system, and continued on, speaking about the planets, and the fact that two of them, Tralus and Talus, had been colonized originally by humans from Corellia.
"What this?" Ranma asked as Michael finished speaking about the Twins, pointing between them at the point directly between the Twins as they moved around one another.
"Ah, one of the greatest mysteries in known space, Centerpoint Station. All three species that live in Corellia believe that someone created Corellia using Centerpoint Station somehow. After all, no other system has ever been found that has five planets capable of bearing life, let alone three that could support the evolution of intelligent life."
He laughed quietly. "Of course, even though billions of scientists have studied it for thousands of years, we're no closer to figuring out its secrets than we were in the beginning. There's a sect of Corellians made up of all three races, that look on it as a mystery and as a point of pride. That we were brought together for some reason, some destiny in the future."
"Create?" Ranma asked sharply. He hadn't actually understood a lot of what Michael said, in fact he was only getting one out of every four words or so, but that word came through clearly. "Create system? How?!"
"Like I said, no one knows, but It's not normal for that many life bearing planets to be in the same system, and the system itself has some other anomalies, like Centerpoint itself, and the Twins."
Ranma frowned. "Strange, yes? Not normal?"
All three of his listeners laughed then, even the Mon Calamari. "Definitely not normal." The sensor specialist said.
Ranma turned to him. "Your home where?"
"Dac. We too share our system, and our homeworld itself, with many other intelligent races which have evolved within its waters. Though not without tension it must be said." His voice was dust dry even for a Mon Calamari as he referenced the state of fragile peace that existed between his people and the Quarren. "An aquatic world," he said simplifying slightly at Ranma's look of incomprehension.
Michael tapped a few more buttons, and pictures of Dac came up, showing a planet almost entirely dominated by blue sea.
"All planet water?" Ranma asked in shock.
"There are a few places of rock and earth yes, but mostly it is just water. Our first cities were underwater, our first civilizations too, before we learned to make them float. We were extremely advanced before we went to the stars because of the need of our environment."
The picture slowly moved away from the planet, showing the massive rings around it, man-made space stations ringing the planet. "What those?" Ranma asked staring at them intently.
"Construction rings for the creation of starships." The Mon Calamari said. "We have a thriving mercantile fleet, as well as explorers and a defense fleet."
Michael nodded. "The Mon Calamari are reckoned as some of the finest ship engineers in the known galaxy, though very rarely do they sell their ships to others. Not even the Republic has access to their ships. And they are also rumored to be the slowest." He teased, looking over at the coms specialist. "Every ship they make is seen as a work of art, and that kind of perfection takes time."
"Amazing." Ranma said shaking his head. "Ship and stuff so different here."
"Your people haven't started to make their own ships?" Michael asked. Ranma had not opened up about his origins, but his lack of Basic made everyone assume he was from some backwater way out on the Rim.
"We not go past moon." Ranma said with a shrug. "Sent unmanned, little things, to see what out there?"
"Probes?" Michael guessed.
"That work." Ranma said with a shrug. He smirked then at Mon Calamari. "I visit your world, I go swimming, good fun! Have to be in female form for that though. If most people you, I not get hit on, right?"
"Yes, what is with that?" The Mon Calamari asked, voicing a question that the entire crew wanted the answer for, while ignoring the second part of what Ranma had said, since it was true. Humans and many other races might find one another attractive, but Mon Calamari did not find human attractive or vice-versa in the main. "I've never heard or seen of anything like that, changing from one sex to another upon the application of water. Which were you originally?"
Ranma laughed. "Been wonder why no one ask that. I born man first, then idiot father take me on training journey. I then… hmmm…"
Realizing he didn't know the words for curse or magic Ranma frowned tugging at his pigtail as he began to think how to explain. He decided he couldn't explain the actual magic of it, but maybe he could explain how it happened. "We go to training ground, it have lot of poles stuck in water. Job was to fight one another on the poles, not get wet follow?"
"Pretty much." Michael said with a grimace. 'But you seriously need to work on your grammar before you talk to anyone important. I know that they're not supposed to, but I think even Jedi Council at least make first impressions on how people talk."
"Jedi." Ranma said. He had made the connection that the Jedi were an order of ki users, who served this universe in some fashion as a police force or diplomats, though what the Force was and why he was getting quasi-religious overtones when hearing about the Order eluded him. "Have lots of questions about them. I explain first then you explain Jedi?"
Michael looked around at the others, who all nodded. "We won't answer any questions that we don't want to, but yes, we can talk about the Jedi."
"Okay. Anyway, my father big time idiot! He not listen to a warning about the training ground. Training ground each pool have something different …" Ranma frowned, realizing he didn't have the right word, substituting "died from water?"
The Mon Calamari frowned. "'Drown'?"
Ranma nodded. "Drown in them. Weird forms, weird creatures, small creatures, large, not matter, all die in water. Anyone else falls in water take on form of what die there. I start winning against father, smack him into pool of drown…" Ranma frowned again, thinking of how to explain, then brightened, smacking one fist against his palm as he pointed at the hologram thing. "This have picture of animals?"
Fascinated and wondering where this story was going and frankly thinking most of it was made up Michael nodded, and showed Ranma how to work the controls. Eventually Ranma found something that looked sort of like a bear. "I knock my father into a pool, and he came out looking like this creature."
"That was a much better sentence." Michael said nodding his head. "You're learning quick! Quick question though, how big was your father before?"
"Come to think of it, where does the mass go when Ranma changes forms? Ranma's what, four, six inches taller in his male form?" The Mon Calamari asked.
"Oh that's easy," Duncan, the helmsman said. "It goes straight to his tits!"
"I've talked to you about that kind of language before on the clock Duncan." Said Michael glaring over at the man, while Ranma looked as if he was trying to work out what the guy had said. "You're just lucky Ranma didn't understand what you just said, or else he'd probably kill you right now."
"Oh come on you know it's true!"
"Doesn't matter if it's true or not, we're a diplomatic corps crew, not some low life pirates. When you're on duty you watch your language!"
"Or?" Ranma said, having finally worked out what Duncan said, reaching out with two fingers again to bend the separating rail out of shape once more. "I watch it for you, yes? As for father, he big fat man, but mostly muscle." Ranma said rather grudgingly.
"But still there must've been some kind of mass conversion correct?" said them on Mon Calamari.
"I don't know what that is." Ranma said with a shrug.
"Now there your grammar was much better." Michael said with a faint grin. He could also tell that the boy's accent was beginning to resemble that of a Corellian. Not that Michael had any problems with that of course. He frowned for a moment thinking how to explain what the problem was from their perspective, then nodded. "Duncan, stand up for second."
Duncan groaned, but stood up. He was a larger man, very much given over to fat, the only one among the crew who was really overweight. "He weighs more than I am understand? His mass is more." Michael said pointing first at Pearson then himself.
Then Ranma understood, and he laughed. "It magic, it doesn't have to care about mass. Who knows where it goes." Ranma shrugged, using the Japanese term for magic since he didn't know the word in Basic.
Even so, the meaning of the word came through and once the crew took his meaning they all shivered a little. "That is honestly terrifying." Said the Mon Calamari, who doubled as the ship's second engineer. He knew what kind of energy was created by that kind of matter conversion.
Ranma shrugged. "It's just the way it is. Now…" he grinned. "You answer my questions yes? Republic, what is it? How many planets, how many people?"
"Species again, and thousands, hundreds of thousands." Michael said with a shrug. "Can you read our language yet?"
Ranma shook his head but the Mon Calamari raised his own hand. "We can set him up on the hologram device in the sitting room. That's easy enough he can watch some of the history vids and get some more info that way."
"That work." Ranma nodded, having gotten the word video, and hologram device.
"We'll set that up down in the lounge then, and either of us, Master Dooku or 25 will be available to answer your questions, okay?" Master Dooku had after all said that they were supposed to go out of their way to help Ranma understand Basic, and this seemed to be part and parcel of that.
Ranma nodded. "There anything I can do for you guys? Lift stuff?"
They all shook their heads and Ranma shrugged. "All right, I owe you a flavor, okay?" Michael nodded, understanding Ranma meant 'favor', and Ranma left the bridge.
OOOOOOO
Several hours after he had left the bridge Ranma leaned back rubbing at his forehead thoughtfully. The historical videos that the crew had set up for him were very informative. They were also bizarre. Ranma was no politician, nor was he a history expert or anything like that, but there were several themes that he noticed throughout the videos. One was the sheer, ever-growing size of the Republic. Ranma didn't know a word even in Japanese to describe how monstrously huge it was. So many damn races and worlds, Blessed Amaterasu, I never imagined anything like this!
Anyone else would have been intimidated by the size of the universe he had suddenly found himself in, but Ranma frankly did not think like other people. He saw all of these different races as opportunities, opportunities to find new martial arts and figure out a way to integrate them into his own style. But the history of this Republic, all of the wars and all of the collapses followed by it coming back and the place of the Jedi in it, all of this was strange. The videos made assumptions of what its watchers would know and Ranma didn't know those things, or at least that was what he hoped.
As he was about to get up and head to the training area to work out, mainly to clear his mind, the hatch to the lounge opened and Master Dooku walked in. "Ranma." he said with a nod. "I understand from the crew that you are able to communicate well enough that we can understand one another now?"
"Understanding you is easy, getting grammar and words right hard, harder?"
"The second one yes," Dooku said with a nod. "Even so, remarkable progress for under a local week. Still, I did not come here just to congratulate you on your progress. I have some questions for you, and I imagine you have some for me."
"I do, but you go first." Ranma laughed, picking up his glass of water and miming pouring it over his head. "Age before beauty."
Dooku smiled politely, shaking his head internally at the youth's odd sense of humor, a sign of his wild nature. A Jedi he could never be, yet with my own reservations of the order these days, that's probably a good thing. "My first question I suppose is a series of small interconnected ones. I use the Force. When you made those shields of yours against my lightsaber, what was that?"
Ranma held up a hand, closing his eyes for a moment before opening them with a smile. Rather than one large ball of ki, which he could've created easily these days, several small lights appeared at his fingertips, and he began to juggle them from one finger to another. "This is ki. My life energy, my power, like a robot? If a human, or alien I suppose…"
He stumbled a little there before going on. "If someone can learn how to use, it they can… use… it, gah." He frowned, having wanted to say 'someone learned how to call it up they could manipulate it'. "Trouble is I know how to explain it, but I don't quite have the words yet."
"Eventually however your vocabulary will be large enough." Dooku said with a nod, reining his curiosity with all the skill of a Jedi Master, having already learned something, perhaps. "This is only our first discussion trust me. But you call it ki, life energy? Can anyone learn to use it or is it only available to a few?"
"Ki what it is in my first language, life energy what it translates to in Basic." Or English too I suppose, but meh. "Learning about it hard, but no special skill needed save being fit and spending time."
For a moment Dooku was silent, taking in the idea that Ranma had not been born with the ability he showed. After a moment Dooku changed the subject, wondering if the boy knew of the connection between the Living Force which was found in all living beings, and the Unifying Force which resided the rest of the universe around him, the Force of star, rock, and the galaxy as a whole. "And would you label that the same energy that is all around us?"
"That what I call chi." Ranma said with a nod. "I not use it."
"Why not?" Dooku asked intently, leaning forward at this sudden observation.
"Several reasons." Ranma said with a shrug. "First, back home, if do that hurt the… the area… I think, around me. For another, here the feel of the chi here different, more…" Ranma frowned again slapping one hand on his thigh angrily. "I not know… er…My feelings, it change it, yes?"
Throughout this bit of frustrated discourse Dooku was watching Ranma for any sign that the Living Force in the boy was responding to his emotions, but was astonished to see that it was not, not even a flicker of it. Either he has incredible control, or his emotions are completely disconnected from the Living Force within him! Fascinating. "Yes, that is normal here. Are you saying it is not normal at home?"
"Yep. Is that why you not react when I change to female? Need to keep emotions under control?"
Dooku recited. "There is no emotion, there is peace. Also, ew." He smirked at the last words, watching as Ranma laughed.
Then moved by a Force led instinct, Dooku recited the Oath that all Jedi vowed to follow when they made the change from padawan to Jedi. "There is no emotion, there is peace. There is no ignorance, there is knowledge. There is no passion, there is serenity. There is no chaos, there is harmony. There is no death, there is the Force. That is the oath of the Jedi. It keeps us from the Dark Side, from falling into dark emotions and letting our emotions affect our actions and the Force."
"That sound stupid." Ranma said bluntly, having sat silent as Dooku recited the lines from memory. "Emotions part of life. Teach control and understanding, teach venting possibly, but not allowing to feel, not allowing to understand? Stupid."
Dooku frowned. Of all the things about the Jedi, the way they dealt with emotions was not one of the things he had questioned about the Order. "Perhaps you'll change your mind when I tell you about the Force?"
"I open to listening." Ranma said with a laugh. "But I know about emotions affecting ki."
"How so?" Dooku asked, leaning forward intently, his eyes narrowing.
"It my turn to answer questions." Ranma said firmly smirking at the old man. "You've asked several."
"I recall that you asked a few yourself Ranma." Dooku said with a smirk, "But ask away."
Ranma laughed. "Same question back at you. What do you call chi, what do you call ki? What do you use? You made those things fly apart, attack me! No martial artist could do that, could create wind and then throw them maybe, but, but will them to attack? Strange."
Dooku nodded then it moved his head hands and feet into what Ranma thought of as the lotus position. He closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them, his hands beginning to glow green. "This is the Force. You seem to separate the Force into two categories, your own and that around you. That is not the case. Or rather it is the case and it's not. The Living Force is within all living creatures, but it is but a small sample of the total Force the total Force is woven through everything in this universe. Do you follow?"
Running his finger along his pigtail Ranma frowned in thought. "Think so, not getting all the words, but enough. This Force, tell me about what you believe."
Dooku nodded and went on to describe how the Jedi saw the Force. He could tell that some of the information was disturbing Ranma, though not why, and vowed to question the boy could much more closely when he was fully up to snuff on Basic.
After he finished Dooku asked, "Now, you tell me. What do you know about emotions affecting your ki?" Dooku was almost desperate to learn the techniques the boy obviously knew with the Force, but he had to make certain, had to know where the boy's knowledge came from first. Or else any chance my sharing them with anyone else from the Order will die stillborn.
"Using emotions to power ki easy yes?" Dooku nodded. It was a fact that strong emotions could allow someone to connect to the Force easier than quiet contemplation or control. It was one of the reasons why the Dark Side was so insidious or at least it was supposed to be according to all of the records.
"But the more you use a single emotion to call on your ki, the more that emotion controls you. Eventually, it starts to… to wipe out all other emotions. I knew a girl…" Ranma frowned, looking away for a moment, his hands clenching with remembered anger for a moment before he shook it off. "I knew a girl who was falling into that trap and a boy who already had. He used depression to power his attacks."
"Depression?" Dooku asked, astonished. "I have never heard of such a thing!"
Ranma shrugged. "Self… hmm self-killing?" Dooku frowned, making a go ahead gesture, not certain what word Ranma was trying for there. "It took him over even more than anger did the girl and faster. Some days depression all he could feel. Make his attacks powerful, but him predictable. He was a… Friend, enemy rolled into one?"
"'Rival' I believe, and that first would be self-'destructive' …"Dooku mused. "We might have to come back to that point."
"I thought of him as rival." Ranma said with a shrug. "But he go behind my back and…" Ranma frowned waving that off. "Anyway, girl was having same trouble. First time I met her, she was quick to anger, but also had some nice moments, could control herself. Two years later, she stronger, she able to call emotion attack into being far faster, stronger attacks. But no longer in control, anger slowly controlling her."
Dooku frowned thoughtfully. "Do you think with anger there could ever be any kind of control? Or do you think it would dominate anyone?"
Ranma cocked his head frowning at the question. "If by control you mean control of emotion, if it all you use to power ki eventually no. Hate all you feel eventually. It is a corrupting effect. Besides, anger make, makes you a better warrior maybe, but not better fighter."
"Your grammar in particular is all over the place, present and past definitive is definitely in need of work." Dooku mused. "Still, you've given me a lot of food for thought already but I have one last question."
"My turn again." Ranma said with a smile.
Dooku frowned but nodded. He wanted to simply ask his questions and have the youth answer them, but he knew this had to be a two-way street. Ranma was not a Jedi, and did not respect him automatically as Dooku had gotten used to, and Dooku could not afford to alienate him. The Force sent me to him for a reason, I cannot simply demand answers from him, or else I might push him away. "Ask away."
Ranma shrugged, martialing his words and making an effort to get them all out correctly. "I suppose both questions tie into same things. One, I want to know more about the Jedi Order, its place in the galaxy. And want to know why the Republic not have a real galactic police force. I looked at those words up on purpose, it is very strange to me that the 'government' doesn't have some kind of military force to keep the peace. There have been wars lately?"
"The Stark-Hyperspace war and a few other violent conflicts yes." Dooku winced remembering the role he had played in one such. Dozens of Jedi had died then, and many more Mandalorians. "And that question my young friend, is one I have often wondered."
Ramos shook his head. "You Jedi being police Force, it doesn't make sense. Martial artist not police force, never enough of us, and you be diplomats too, why? Need bigger forces unless they are one of you for every hundred? Or if every government works well with you?"
Dooku barked a laugh that had absolutely no humor in it. "I understand your point, but that one is one I cannot answer, at least not without sounding like one of the video documentaries you have been watching. Again I think that will have to wait until you familiarize yourself more with this universe. Still, for first talk I believe we've gotten quite a ways. Now would you be willing to answer my question?"
Deliberately using the same words Dooku had a moment ago, Ranma nodded. "Ask away."
Smiling at the jibe, if jibe it was, Dooku asked, "How long would it take you to teach me some of your ki techniques? You're stronger, faster, your reaction time's the only thing that I can keep up with. I think all of that can be attributed to your ki techniques, but if the Force is the same as ki, then it is possible I could learn them."
Ranma frowned pulling it his ponytail thoughtfully, again putting his words together carefully. "Some techniques are easy to learn once you know how to use ki, but I'm not certain how that reacts to you and your use of the Force. They could help, or could hinder. How did you first learn to connect to Force?"
"Through meditation, through thoughts of clearing the mind feeling the Force around you and letting it fill you. Meditation is the very start of the process. Concentrating and directing the Force comes later."
Ranma frowned. "That sounds more like a monk than martial artist. Not know any monks who use ki, will have to think about it. You have any videos that show start of training?"
"No, I don't have anything like that on this ship, all such training videos are kept in the Jedi archives. There are some books about it, but you can't read Basic can you?"
"25 and I am concentrating on how to speak it. Then I learn reading, so can translate some of my own books." Ranma smirked, reaching into his ki space pocket and pulling out a book, watching as Dooku's eyes widened. "That a ki technique too." he explained, and watched as the old man's eyes lit up with knowledge-lust. "That one easy enough to understand, difficult to do first time though."
Dooku nodded, trying not to show his astonishment too openly as he looked at the book which should never have fit into the pocket that Ranma had just pulled it out of. He thought at first that that was the 'magic' Ranma had mentioned about to explain his 'curse', but no the boy said it was a ki technique, which meant it might be learnable by Force users! That alone would be a major help. "And these are?"
"Medical books." Ranma said, bringing out a second book, followed by a third, and comics. "Art of War. Comic books, other things."
Dooku nodded staring at the books then at the ki pocket then at Ranma, making a note of the one called Art of War, assuming that it was a book on the youth's martial arts, or perhaps the thinking behind the multiple styles the youth used. "Let us make a deal my young friend. You will remain with me for as long as it takes you to learn the local language and to read it, during which you and I will continue our discussions about this. I will teach you about the Jedi, about the Force, and about the galaxy as a whole if you have any questions beyond what our videos can show you. And you will teach me about ki."
Ranma cocked his head thinking hard. "I teach you some ki, but not until I learn about Jedi. You good, but oath bothering me, and government too."
"Trust me my young friend you're not the only one bothered by that one." Dooku said with a laugh. "I will take an oath to never abuse your teachings if that is what it takes."
"That a start but wait for next time yes, give me another few days to learn the language at least, to better figure out the oath." Ranma nodded.
"You'll have all the time in the world alas." Dooku said with a laugh. "I will have other duties once we exit hyperspace. I have a corrupt government to bring to heel, with the aid of the testimonies of the miners you saved and the ship you helped them take."
Ranma laughed evilly. "Have fun."
"It's not my idea of fun." Dooku said with a laugh, "but I will get some satisfaction nonetheless."
OOOOOOO
Dooku was unfortunately correct. Upon exiting hyperspace into the Malastare system, the Jedi master went on a diplomatic offensive that left the Gran Protectorate's government reeling. After two weeks of hammering them, the Senator of the sector, which had been chosen from Malastare, had been forced to step down due to public disapproval for his actions and for his personally having a connection to a slave ring, which was proven by the captain's files.
The planet's government as a whole had also been implicated, and to keep that from getting out agreed to sharply curtail their expansionist policy. They also had to agree to Senate oversight of any further expansion plans, and a Senate backed teams of investigators would be going through all of the government-owned mines and other industrial assets. Dooku doubted they would find anything though, since by the time the investigation team could be put together, any slaves would have been removed. After all, there were still the 'protected' Dugs.
Dooku's heavy-handed pressing for more and more concessions angered many of the Gran government officials, but there was nothing they could do. Dooku had already sent off a copy of the evidence against the Senator, along with a copy of the captain's personal logs, which constituted the majority of his evidence save for the miners themselves, to the Senate. The miners had begun to go public with their story on the HoloNet with the Alderaanian government's tacit backing. It was a major scandal, one the Senate could not sweep under the rug like it had so many others thanks to Alderaan's King and Senator pushing it as hard as they could.
But the Protectorate itself would remain in power, and at least half of those involved in this scheme would continue to retain their power base despite the loss of face. The evidence against them from the former captain's files was nowhere near as solid as it was against the Senator. Worse, I doubt we will be able to save very many personal slaves as Twila used to be. Those kinds of slaves will slip through the cracks no matter what we do. Slavery might be outlawed by the Galactic Republic as a whole, but there are glaring holes in that law, starting with Ryloth itself.
The Twi'leks had no other major export that could bring otherworldly interest to their planet and had never developed the ability to make their own ships or even hyperdrive ships. Slavery was their primary export long before the planet joined the Republic. While the Republic itself outlawed slavery, it looked the other way if Ryloth dealt with the other galactic powers out there, such as the Hutts, the Outer Rim territories, the small but growing Corporate Sector, and the Hapes Consortium.
Worse in my opinion is that slavery isn't as uncommon as people think even in the Republic itself! Oh, it's illegal to buy or sell slaves in practically every Republic system, but actually owning them isn't illegal. So you can just buy one elsewhere, bring him or her in like an indentured servant and you're protected by the law, as if people are property! The Gran and others are especially guilty of this.
And of course even if the Republic tried to crack down on that, we'd run into horrendous opposition. Too many senators, corporate leaders and other influential people 'know someone' who has a slave, and the slave is perfectly happy under their care of course! The Senate lacks the will to do change its own laws, let alone try to help the Twi'leks figure out some other export.
Dooku saw this as a sign of the Republic's deep and almost institutional corruption, which brought to mind the Jedi Order's place in it, and the fact that the Order had begun to run into the fact that enforcing the Republic's laws was not the same as upholding justice dozens of times over the past few years, and that the Order itself was seen as interfering outsiders. Such opinions were getting louder as the Senate began to become more and more openly corrupt and factional.
Enough, Dooku thought to himself pushing away from his recorder where he had just written up another report for the Jedi Council on his mission. He wasn't done his mission, not yet, the droids were still pulling more and more information off of the captain's logs every day, and that was allowing him to continue to hammer the Gran government.
Until that flow stopped, Dooku would continue to drop tiny little bombshells into the halls of power here on a day to day basis. Time for my daily exercise with young Ranma. Every night Dooku returned to his ship, where he remained despite the government's protests that they could have put him up in a hotel or villa to talk or train with Ranma for at least an hour or so every evening.
Training with Ranma was very much a mixed bag for the just past middle-aged (and let no one tell you different) Jedi master.
While he couldn't truly add any new skills to his lightsaber abilities, or use his Force abilities given the fact they were sparring in an enclosed area keeping up with Ranma's speed and the strength of his blows, even when he wasn't going all out was proving a tremendously difficult exercise for Dooku. And though Dooku would not admit it, he needed the physical exercise, and the outlet for his irritation after hours upon hours of deliberating and pontificating and talking endlessly with the government officials, the news reporters covering the story and the public.
Ranma too seemed to get quite a bit out of their spars and began to anticipate Dooku attacks, in particular coming to understand the different styles of lightsaber dueling to a degree, their strengths and weaknesses, which was astonishing to the white-haired Jedi. Dooku had never seen anyone with a learning curve for combat like Ranma. Indeed, it dwarfed the youth's ability with languages, which itself was astonishing.
But it was the discussions with Ranma which Dooku came to enjoy the most. Sometimes these were simply the exchanges of stories. Ranma would tell of some of his adventures in his old dimension, while Dooku would do the same, covering his years as a padawan, his exploits and his mistakes both. The two of them had talked about Ranma's origins, and had come to the conclusion that Ranma had indeed somehow jumped dimensions. While mathematically conceivable, this of course wasn't something Dooku had ever heard of before yet it was the only possible explanation.
Some of the adventures Ranma shared were equally beyond Dooku's comprehension. He didn't know how people could act like Ranma described he and his fellows sometimes did and get away with it. The curses however worried much more, so much that it was visible on his face despite his Jedi self-control, a human teenager turning into a small black pig, or a young woman turning into some other kind of little creature, which for some reason Ranma had trouble describing. The idea of that much mass somehow disappearing with the application of water was surreal to the Jedi master, and very worrying too.
The martial arts techniques on the other hand, those were not only impressive but verifiable. Ranma demonstrated a few of them for Dooku, not just the enlarged ki space, which in itself was quite simply a game changer if the Jedi could learn to use it. But also the Breaking Point technique, and his own durability, the real reason behind that particular Amazon training regimen.
That durability had startled Dooku immensely when he came upon Ranma testing it against blasters.
Flashback:
"Are you certain you want to do this?" Michael asked looking askance at Ranma who was holding his hand out to one side in the small mechanics room onboard the Kaiseki. "I mean, I get that you think your body's durable and all, but blasters aren't toys."
"I am." Ranma said. "Better know quick before later."
Michael sighed but nodded bringing up a blaster that he had taken from the ship's stores. He wasn't a good shot, having never really practiced with blasters all that much, diplomatic corps crews were not often called upon to fight after all. But from one end of the small room to another he could hardly miss. "Okay, don't say I didn't warn you, and if Master Dooku finds out, this was all your idea."
Ironically as he said that Dooku opened the door behind him. But before the older man could ask what was going on, Michael raised a blaster to his shoulder and fired.
The red pulse of plasma energy shot out, smacking into Ranma's outstretched palm and causing Ranma to wince slightly, wringing his hand out for a moment before opening his palm. As Ranma had expected the blast didn't do much. It had left a small sting and the feeling of heat, as if his palm had touched hot glass, but that was about it.
Dooku paused in mid-shout, mouth agape before his self-control reasserted itself. He strode forward, waving Michael aside when the captain noticed him and made to explain himself. "Another martial arts technique?"
"Endurance training," Ranma said with a nod still wringing out his hand. "A little pain, but that's all."
Dooku opened the youth's hand to stare at the palm where the blaster bolt had hit only to shake his head in astonishment. There was a small burn there, which he noted was already healing, but that was all. "I think that alone my young friend is a technique I would be most interested in learning."
Flashback End
It wasn't only in the realm of martial arts/Force techniques that meant their talk mattered more to the Jedi master.
Ranma had a very odd outside perspective of not only the Jedi Order but the Republic, and indeed simply how things were in the universe that sometimes gave him insight into things that Dooku took for granted. For example, Ranma asked at one point how different star systems communicated with one another. So Dooku had described the Holonet, the vast communications network that allowed every planet in the Republic to talk to one another via hyperspace-based communications.
When he had described it Ranma had asked who ran it, and when told that it was the Republic itself, the central government that ran the HoloNet stations Ranma frowned, and asked "so they be able to hear in on anything they wanted to?"
Dooku spent about twenty minutes trying to reassure the young man that was impossible, but by the end of had convinced himself that it probably was possible. And a major concern if he wanted to keep Ranma's presence a secret which he instinctively did, all of his instincts were telling him to do that, a sure sign of the Force making itself known. Sooner or later that secret would be out of the bag, but until then Dooku wanted Ranma to acclimate himself to this universe and learn what he could from the youth and vice versa.
OOOOOOO
Ranma looked over with a smile on his face as the door to the exercise room opened, absentmindedly ducking his head to one side and reaching out with the flick of a finger to smack a little training ball away when it tried to capitalize on his inattention.
Dooku frowned thoughtfully, looking at the 20 training balls in the air around Ranma, who didn't seem any worse the wear for their attentions. "You know you're supposed to use those when you're blindfolded yes?"
To his surprise Ranma replied. "I did that already today. This is a speed exercise, not a sitachill exercise." He frowned, knowing that word was wrong.
"Situational, or awareness." Dooku enunciated then smiled. "You're getting even better at speaking, good."
Ranma shrugged. "Learning is somewhat easy, but speaking is harder." He looked at Dooku thoughtfully. "You in mood for train, or talk?"
Dooku frowned. He'd been hoping to get to this point with Ranma for a few days now, but honestly after the week he had had Dooku decided he was not in the mood. "Exercise first I think, then talk."
Ranma nodded agreeably, moving over to take his stance as the training balls all scooted back to the small egresses that held them during downtime. Dooku calmly pulled off his robe, setting it aside as well as his normal lightsaber picking up two of the training sabers kept on ships seconded to the Jedi Order, just like the training balls.
He held one out towards Ranma who shook his head. "It interesting, but I'm not ready for it yet." He smirked. "I hurt myself more than you."
Dooku nodded, set it aside then brought his own lightsaber to power before flicking it up in a salute." Might I ask that you refrain from hitting my face?" As the youth opened his mouth to respond he went on smoothly, interrupting any kind of joke the lad might have made. "I have diplomatic meetings to see to this evening and every day for the next few weeks, I can hardly show up to them with bruises on my face."
Shrugging, Ranma bowed, and the battle began.
Several hours later the two of them met up once again in the training room after having taken showers. Dooku was as he had thought, bruised and battered somewhat, though Ranma had thankfully refrained from hitting his face as Dooku had requested.
Ranma on the other hand was severely singed in places from the lightsaber. He had wanted to see what the lightsaber would be able to do to them without a ki shields in the way, and now knew: if that lightsaber had been at full power, Dooku would've eventually been chopping off limbs. The extra endurance and durability that he had learned after reconstructing the Amazon's Breaking Point training did not avail him long against a lightsaber, unlike the blasters.
With a weary chuckle, Dooku moved over, pressing the button which raised the seats and the rest of the furniture once more. Sitting down, he motioned Ranma into a chair across from him. "Ahh, I think I needed that. Now, I believe we were talking about meditation, and the differences between your type of meditation and that the Jedi use."
OOOOOOO
"And so this mission will conclude most satisfactorily, though some of the Senators allied to the Protectorate will have egg on their collective faces since the Gran senator was hip-deep in the expansion project, as well as the slavery that was mandated by it. Unfortunately, I will still be here for a while to make certain that the lesson sticks."
Several days later Dooku sat once more at his desk, though this time he was not talking to any local minor functionary, or writing up notes for the Senate, he was talking via Hypercom to several members of the Jedi Council. These were some of the most respected and experienced Jedi Masters of the Order, though not all of them fell under that category in Dooku's opinion. The two main members Grandmaster Yoda and Master Windu did however and it was to these two that he addressed his words.
Throughout the discussion of his mission Grandmaster Yoda sat silent, his ancient eyes closed as he took in his former padawan's words. Now, as the other Masters talked amongst themselves about how the fall of a sector senator could possibly open a power vacuum in the Senate, Yoda opened his eyes. "Something else on your mind you have my former padawan. Connected but not part of your mission, to do with the saved miners, it does. Share this you should."
Dooku smiled thinly. "I do have something else on my mind Master yes, but with respect, I prefer not to share it over the Hypercom. I would like to share it in person, primarily because I have recently learned something that makes me distrust the sanctity of messages such as this."
Mace Windu stared at him in surprise. "What do you mean? Why would anyone want to listen in on Jedi communications?"
"For thousands of reasons." Dooku said shaking his head. "Surely you know that Master Windu. The Senate has factions, factions which will of course be following the movements of Jedi as a matter of course, and it is the Senate and the Republic itself which run the Hypercom."
"Nonsense." Said Adi Gallia, a master Dooku felt was too young and untried to be on the council, despite her skills in diplomacy. "The Senate doesn't control the entirety of the Hypercom, only a few select bands."
"Yet it does control the Hypercom stations, and the underlying software." Dooku countered. "Those we cannot be certain of."
"Enemy you see when none there is ." Yoda said frowning heavily, but there was no censure in his voice. Rather his eyes were locked on Dooku's face, a thin but actually quite warm smile on his ancient face. "On this matter, your concerns we will understand. Looking forward I am, to seeing you in person. Know what is on your mind, I would."
Dooku nodded his head wondering how that meeting would go. Ironically he was looking forward to it too. Ranma had no respect for anyone who didn't earn it from him personally. And his last discussion with the youth had been rather amusing, filled with tales of his adventures back in his own dimension having to do with the 'grandmaster' of his martial arts style. And Dooku, showing a bit of mischief that was not in keeping with his normal personality, had decided not to give Ranma any kind of description of Yoda or the other Jedi Masters. It would be… interesting to see his reaction to them, especially the diminutive Yoda, considering his past with this Happosai creature.
"I look forward to that as well Master." Then Dooku sobered. "I have heard whispers and seen several news reports about violent attacks by the Yinchorri against other Republic worlds? What is the Senate doing about it?"
"The Senate is not going to be doing anything, there is no clear consensus, and none of the world's so far attacked have powerful enough backers or senators to Force the Senate into action, indeed most of the attacks have occurred against pirate or known smuggler's dens, which have won the Yinchorri some goodwill from the Senate. Despite this, there's no doubt their depredations will escalate in time. If so, it will be up to us to keep the peace," Mace said. "I have assigned Naeshahn and his padawan Ebor Taulk to look into it."
"It is far too often up to us to keep the peace." said Dooku sharply. "Either the Republic needs to start building up a larger military force of its own rather than continually relying on us, or we need to start training our Jedi to a higher degree for combat missions, Masters."
"That thinking is premature, there are flare-ups like this every hundred years or so." Said Oppo Ranisicis. Yoda and Mace however were both silent, standing back from the debate.
Dooku shook his head. "The corruption within the Senate is becoming more and more obvious my fellow masters, and we are more and more being seen as a tool of the Senate rather than the people! I have talked to Gran here, to people who espouse views that they wanted to move against the corruption in the government here. But they were afraid that the Senate would not stand for it, that they would face us at the conference table against any such move."
"We are on the side of stability, that is what we must hold paramount." Said one of the Masters, named Koth if Dooku's memory served, a friend of Windu's and another one who Dooku felt should not be serving on the council. "Nor is it our task to police the Senate itself. We are servants of the Republic. Where the Senate needs us, we will go and keep order."
"No!" said Dooku sharply. "We are servants of the Light side of the Force, and we are supposed to be servants of justice and the people. In nowhere in there is the Senate or its members and their various demands mentioned. Even the Republic itself isn't mentioned, it's just that the Republic has been the best way to serve justice and law for so long that we have blinded ourselves to the creeping corruption at the highest echelons of its government!"
"A discussion for another time, this is." Yoda said suddenly. "Too much emotions there are tied into this. Too close to this issue you have become my former padawan. The greater good and the larger picture you must start to see."
Dooku frowned, but sighed. This was a conversation he had Yoda had had several times since the disastrous Battle of Galidraan which had started Dooku's thoughts in this direction. "You are right master, my emotions do carry me away, but that does not negate anything that I have said."
"On the contrary it does." said the Lannik Master Piell sharply. "Remember your oath to the Order master Dooku. We are not the leaders of the Republic, merely its guardians."
Dooku drew himself up staring hard at the other master. "I do not need to be reminded of my duty or my oaths. I do not think…" he said looking over at Yoda. "That I am the only one whose emotions are running high on this issue, perhaps I have brought it up too often. We will leave it for now. What did you mean when you said would that the Jedi were going to have to handle the insurrection?"
Mace spoke up, from where he had been silent watching the other Masters talk. "As Grand master I sent two of our Jedi in to arbitrate matters, once they report we will consider further."
For a moment Dooku had a premonition, so strong that he thought at first it had come from the Force, but no it had only come from his own mind, and his understanding of the Yinchorri mentality. Those two Jedi will never return. Looking at Yoda now he saw that his master was tired age and authority weighing on him heavily. And I think Yoda suspects that.
"I cannot say that was a good idea Masters, the Republic has its own diplomatic corps to handle things if talk at all can solve the issue. At least without involving the larger factions the senate has begun to split into. In any event Masters I should be here for a few more weeks, unless you wish to send someone to relieve me?" He added hopefully, hoping to lighten the mood of the meeting.
It worked, and there were more than a few chuckles, including from his old Master. "Stay on station you will." said Yoda shaking his head. "More knowledge of the situation you have, contacts you have made. Foolish we would be to remove you at this point." He then gained a very sharp look indeed as he stared at Dooku. "Talk in the future we will in person about many things my former padawan."
OOOOOOO
At the same time Dooku was talking to the Jedi council, Ranma was out and about the spaceport for the first time since they arrived. He actually wouldn't have ventured out now, except that Michael and Duncan had invited him out with them, first insisting that he needed new clothing, and second that he needed to get away from the ship for a while.
Between them the two Corellians had paid for several new t-shirts for Ranma, along with a leather jacket, the sort that many spacers seemed to wear. They also bought him some new pants and a hoodie, though Ranma thought they were rather ridiculous, and it would've taken an army to part him from his silk pants. They also tried to buy him a set of bra and panties as a gag gift, but after Ranma threatened to break their legs, that stopped.
Now Ranma glanced around the somewhat dingy bar that Michael and Duncan had dragged him too. It was a large place, Ranma estimated the cruiser could have fit in here comfortably. It had three stories, the topmost of which Michael had said was devoted to inhalers and other recreational drugs, the idea of which made Ranma shiver. He had seen the destruction a martial artist could do while drunk, what one could do on the equivalent of LSD was horrifying. The second floor had a large open area in the floor which allowed the people up there to watch what was going on down below.
The first floor was dominated by several bars along its walls, though one of them seemed to be somewhat special, since it didn't have any stools in front of it. The upper body of a droid with six arms and two heads was stuck on a conveyor belt of some kind, moving it along the bar while it took orders, its arms a blur behind it. There were several dozen speakers sticking out of walls from where Ranma was sitting, providing a musical background to the horrible din of hundreds, possibly a thousand or more voices.
It was interesting, but not really Ranma's scene. That and the music sucks here! What the hell is that stuff, techno-pop babble crap… ugh… So glad I have my CD-player with me. Pity Michael made me leave it behind damn it, my ears will have their revenge!
At first Ranma had thought they were just going out to see the sights, maybe get out past the city limits into the wilderness Ranma had spotted a time or two. Ranma had never liked cities, not even Tokyo, which Nerima was technically a part of, and this city was no better. Instead, here they were in a place that was so like yet unlike many such establishments Ranma had been in with his father it gave him an odd feeling of nostalgia and irritation from those memories.
Irritation because many of those memories ended badly, with Ranma dragging back Genma to their hotel. Nostalgia from some other memories of the places: his first pit fight, which was damn fun at the time, and the few times his old man had taught him things in places like this, such as how to spot concealed weapons. Not that I need that now, Ranma thought as he sat alongside Michael, drinking a glass of water. Everyone here's armed!
That was very true. Most of the men here went about with blasters, a few carried large knives as well, even the dozen or so women among the patrons carried weapons. Michael had told him that this was a spacer's hangout, where offworlders came to burn off some energy while in port.
And of course most spacers carried weapons these days. There were dozens of star systems that didn't have some kind of danger, be it from oppressive governments, smugglers, pirates, criminal gangs and so on, but they were in the minority. So it simply made good sense to most spacers to be armed whenever they could. Even Michael and Duncan had weapons, though Ranma didn't honestly think they knew what to do with them.
Here and there through the crowd droids moved. Most of them were designed to look like human women in body type, their metal casing and faces giving the lie, and Ranma wondered why someone had designed androids that looked like that. Actually come ta think of it, I don't want ta know. Nor do I want ta think too hard on why they look like human women on a planet where humans ain't the majority. Ugh…
Through the throng however Ranma saw a commotion occur around a droid that was definitely not like the others, something that thankfully took his attention away from such thoughts. It was one of those little short dome-shaped ones called astromech droids. Though this one wasn't like the two that made up the majority of the cruiser's maintenance crew along with the Verpine.
The color scheme on this one was red, gold and black swirled in a chaotic pattern, making it stand out. On its dome it carried a tray on a holder welded into place and on the side it had a small slot that was apparently for money, given that people were dropping bits of the local currency into it before they grabbed a drink from the tray.
As Ranma watched, a human patron reached over grabbing up several drinks and turning away seemingly without paying. The droid danced in place, the lights around its top blinking while it possibly said something in those beeps his type used to speak, which Ranma couldn't hear over the sound of the crowd. It moved forward, banging into the legs and rear of the human, who turned, snarling.
The man reared back for a kick, but the droid dodged to one side on its little wheels, then, while the man was trying to regain his balance a small door on its side opened up. A mechanical device of some kind popped out on the end of a servo-arm, and an electrical charge jumped from it to the man's thigh, causing him to bellow in pain and tumble to the floor.
One of the locals moved through the crowd, gesticulating angrily at the droid, helping the human to his feet and then waving an angry finger at the droid for some reason as the human looked vindicated. Ranma didn't know why the human wasn't getting in trouble for not paying and didn't care. He was more interested the local.
As Ranma watched, he smacked a small silver disk onto the side of the droid, then used a remote control of some kind. The droid's lights dimmed noticeably, and it seemed to sag almost on its treads. It moved off docilely, and the local turned back to the customer, saying something that again Ranma couldn't make out.
Hmm… interesting. Little guy had spirit in him, it, whatever, but that thing on its side seems to've taken the wind out of his sails. Wonder what it is and what an astromech's doing here at all. Aren't they supposed to be used on spaceships? Can't understand why one'd be used here.
"Earth to Ranma, you listening?"
Ranma turned back to the table, looking over at Michael. "What?"
"I was saying are you interested in making a little money?"
Ranma shrugged. "Depends on what you have in mind."
"'This place may be one of the higher-end establishments that cater to spacers, but it's still got a few gambling opportunities. One of them's an arm wrestling competition held here every night at the same time. You go 12 rounds against other spacers, then you go against a Wookie, and then if you beat him, you go against the owner of the bar. Of course, few people get past the Wookie. Each round is worth more money, you follow?"
"I follow now why you wanted me along." Ranma said dryly. He shrugged. He'd done pit fighting and some underground street-fighting with his old man when he was younger, it was a quick and easy way to earn some cash so he had no issue with that. "We split 50-50?"
"Come on, Ranma I'm the one that knew of this place 70-30."
"I'm the one doing the work." Ranma replied firmly. "50-50."
"60-40." Michael's smirking. "Consider the 10% you paying us back for the clothing, and you said you owe us a favor."
"50-50, and I not tell master Dooku. I think the Jedi not care for gambling yes?"
"That's dirty." Michael said growling a little. "Didn't think you had it in you."
"Been manipulated and used my whole life over." Ranma said with a grim smile. "I don't mind you taking some, but I take half."
"50-50." Michael nodded. He did not want to know what the younger man meant by saying he'd been manipulated and used all his life. Ranma was remarkably silent about his past most of the time, but the flashes he let out were sometimes humorous, sometimes bizarre, and sometimes worrying, like that last hint.
"I'll go sign you up for tonight." He winked and Ranma and Duncan. "We might even get a little bit of local company, you know? Like that Twila girl."
Ranma blushed hotly at the memory, while Duncan rolled his eyes. "Why you turned her down is beyond me, kiddo." Duncan turned back to his meal as Michael got up and headed towards the bar at the far end of the smoke stained and darkly lit room, while Ranma went back to crowd watching, with a purpose now.
A few minutes later, just as the droid he noticed a few moments ago passed behind him Ranma leaned back nonchalantly. His head smacked into its side, knocking the odd cylinder stuck to its side off slightly. Out of the corner of his eye, Ranma watched as its lights started to light back up to the level they had been before then stopped before dimming back quickly. It rocked in place, making a light warbling sound, as if questioning what was happening.
It's amazing how alive the little critters can make those noises sound, Ranma thought. Aloud he asked, "So, what you in for? You not like the other serving droids yeah?"
The droid beeped at him low but irritable now, and if the droid could snarl with beeps, Ranma somehow felt it would be. Ranma's smirk widened a little. "Would that be something like 'what you think I'm here for stupid human, my stupid owner sold me'?"
The droid beeped again this time slightly more conciliatory. "Nah it cool, I be called lot worse than that. What's your name?"
The droid played some of the local music then some Ranma recognized from the background music of the bar and Ranma frowned. "Music? Song? Tune?"
As he said the word 'Tune' the droid played something like a gong sounding off. "So Tune, that's cool name. Definitely better than making a name out of yer line or whatever. You happy here?"
The droid beeped again this time going back to its other more growl tones. "Thought not. I'll see what I can do about that, lay low about being free for now, and we'll see."
The droid beeped as if it was trying to sniff in disdain and moved off through the crowd but Ranma simply shrugged that off. "What are you up to kid?" Duncan asked, having watched all this in silence.
"Most ships need astromech droids right? Eventually I want own ship, so droid."
"That's putting the hyperdrive before the ship you know." Duncan said, amused. "Ships cost a lot, especially if you want one with its own hyperdrive, and especially if you want one large enough to live on comfortably that isn't so old it'll fall apart on you the moment you turn your back on it."
Ranma shrugged. "I see a chance, I take it. Droid still come in handy whatever happens."
A few minutes later as Ranma continued to drink his water slowly, Michael came back. "All right," he said wringing his hands together in delight. It's all set up, and I even got good because you're a mere human, and…" He trailed off, glancing at the water in Ranma's hand. "And I said we were signing up a female friend of ours, since that got me the best odds of all. So…"
Ranma growled a little, staring around at the mass of aliens and humans, and having no desire to deal with wandering hands or anything of that nature, having seen more than a few women in the crowd having to deal with such. Still, the payoff will be worth it. "I go and change, but I take seventy instead of half."
Michael winced, but given the odds he'd gotten, he and Duncan would actually still make more money if Ranma entered the contest in his female form. "Alright kriff it, just get outta here and change the contest's gonna start up in five minutes."
"Good, there something I want to buy anyway." Ranma smirked then moved away through the crowd, exiting the bar for a moment before coming back in his female body.
A few moments later a tinny robotic voice rang out from the speakers. "Ladies and gentlemen, it is nine o'clock local time, and that means one thing, the arm wrestling competition is about to begin! Will the contestants please line up to the right of the bar-droid?"
Ranma got up, nodding at Michael and Duncan who both wished her luck. Ranma simply smirked, moving over to take her place in line. The line formed along the bar with the droid's body stuck into a conveyor belt. It began to repeat itself as each contestant filed by. "Please remove all outer clothing to make certain that no devices have been used to enhance strength forearms must be bare."
In response Ranma shrugged off her jacket, tossing it back towards Michael. She ignored a few whistles of appreciation from a few human males nearby as they gawked at the formfitting nature of her undershirt. Then he laughed as he heard a few loud smacks as some nearby women took exception to the noises.
As Ranma waited for his name to be called, she thought about the glass of water he had been drinking earlier. Now, if this place was back on Earth it wouldn't have mattered how long I spent in female form, that would've splashed on me somehow triggering the change. Here the water attraction portion of the curse doesn't seem to be active. Interesting, I wonder if it would come back if I tried to stay in male form for too long.
A few seconds later Ranma heard her name called, and moved out to the table designated while the crowd of onlookers to her right facing the four tables set out for the competition and the bar behind them began to pass bets between them. Ranma noticed Duncan and Michael both working the crowd a little and groaned aloud.
If they make too much money on me, Murphy 's Law is gonna kick us all in the ass and something's gonna happen. I wonder if it'd just happen to them and not me since they're the ones doing the betting. She scoffed at that shaking her head. Yeah right, since when does Lady Luck ever miss an opportunity to kick me in the balls?
He sat across from some strange werewolf looking alien. It had bluish fur, a full mane of hair, and wore pretty much the ubiquitous spacers outfit, jacket, pants and undershirt. "A human female!?" The werewolf growled. "Really? How drunk were you when your friends signed you up for this?"
"I'm not drunk." Ranma said with a smile. "Don't worry about me doggy."
The werewolf growled in laughter at what he thought was false bravado, set his arm on the table and waited for the signal. Ranma did the same, gripping her opponent's hand firmly, not even noticing as the werewolf tried to tighten his grip at an attempt at pre-contest intimidation.
As soon as the watching droid said "Contestants, start! The werewolf growled in shock and pain as the back of his hand slammed into the table.
The droid moved over on its axles along the bar. "Contestant Rico Zeis is out in a new record for swiftest first round victory!"
"I wasn't ready!" Rico growled, setting his hand again on the table. "Again!"
Ranma shrugged put her own arm back on the table and as the werewolf growled "go!" once again slammed his palm down onto the table with barely any appreciable effort.
"Contestant Zeis, this contest is over. Please vacate the table."
Since there were four other matches going on at the same time Ranma's quick victory hadn't actually been noticed by many of the crowd. Most of those that had seen it assumed that his second victory had been the only one. A few of the onlookers noticed, including one or two humans who frowned wondering how the young woman had done that, but all of them eventually put it down to the Shistavanen being drunk.
Ranma's anonymity ended with the next match, when he was matched up with a Gran who looked like he did construction work for a living, bulging muscles on his arms to go with his bulging stomach. Despite this, Ranma dealt with him easily smacking his hand against the table within a few seconds of the match starting.
As she was walking to the semi-finals, Ranma heard some mutters about him, causing her to chuckle internally. "Maybe she's from a high-grav world, human just on the surface you know?"
"Or maybe she's got a robot arm under synth-skin."
Ignoring these speculations, she sat down from across his opponent, some kind of lizard creature that stood taller than most humans by a foot, dwarfing Ranma slightly. The creature hissed, shaking his head. "I know not what you offered the Shistavanen, but you have nothing to offer me. I wish to rip that Wookie's arm off, and you are standing between him and me."
Behind him, were several other lizards, hissing and whistling to one another in their own language. They sort of reminded Ranma of newts with their faces, but not quite, sort of a cross between newts and alligators. But that didn't matter right now. "Don't even know what a Wookie is," Ranma said cheerfully stretching her shoulders a little before placing her elbow on the table. "Sorry you not going to face it."
The alien, a Trandoshan, glared at him angrily thinking the human female was making fun of him with her accent and not knowing what Wookie was. They were rather distinctive after all, much like his own people. And the hatred between their races was also well known.
Before the droid had sounded the start, the Trandoshan began to push against Ranma's arm, trying to twist and grip Ranma's hand in such a way as to cause pain, but Ranma simply bore it stoically. He's definitely stronger than the others, but I would say he's not even as strong as Kuno back home, and he was the weakest physically of all of us. Akane'd rip his arms off for him like he wants ta do to this Wookie, whoever that is.
Ranma twitched her arm slightly, and the Trandoshan's arm noticeably dipped before he got control of himself and tried to push back. Ranma held their hands there grinning into the Trandoshan's eyes for a few moments before slamming his hand down on the table causing cheers and cries of consternation and howls of shock to reverberate throughout the crowd.
The Trandoshan roared, getting to its feet reaching across the table with both of his arms towards Ranma, who kicked out of her own chair and leapt into the air above its arms. A kick smashed into the lizard's face, flinging him backwards, his nose and jaw shattered.
Ranma stood balancing on the table for a moment looking around at the crowd and shrugged her shoulders. "Sore loser?"
For a moment the crowd had been shocked into silence by the sudden outbreak and cessation of violence, but now there were roars of laughter and cheers of approval. Ranma ignored it all, dropping to the floor as the lizard aliens took their compatriot and dragged him off. From where he was sitting nearby Michael cocked his head at Ranma who shrugged. "He live, I pull my kick."
A few moments passed, and Ranma was then ushered to the finalist's table, where a huge furry creature was already waiting for her. Ranma cocked her head and asked, "You a Wookie? That lizard guy not like you."
The massive furry beast made loud growling noises, though it didn't sound angry, more amused if Ranma was reading it right, and she shook her head. "Sorry I not understand your language. I'm learning Basic, it enough?"
The Wookie chuffed, nodding his head and reaching out to pat Ranma with a hand that would've driven most humans to grunt at least while Ranma simply smiled. "Still not getting it."
"I think he's saying he liked the way you dealt with the Trandoshan kid," said an older voice. Ranma turned slightly to see a large, middle-aged human male coming through the crowd from a back room. "You beat the Wookie, you have to face me next, but you've already given a damn good show."
Ranma shrugged. "I martial artist, I a lot stronger than I look."
"Truer words I've never heard." The man laughed then nodded at the droid set into the bar. "Start the match."
Ranma was surprised by his opponent's strength but not really impressed. The Wookie was far stronger than the 'Trandoshan' had been, possibly through training or possibly through body type. Yet compared to Ranma, he was only almost up to Akane's level. "Sorry furry dude," said Ranma in her own language, shaking her head before switching to Basic. "But you lose."
With that Ranma began to exert his own strength, slowly but surely bringing the Wookie's arm down despite his best efforts. It took Ranma a few moments mostly because she didn't want humiliate the Wookie as she had the Trandoshan alien.
When the back of the Wookie's hand finally tapped down there was a cheer from the onlookers. The Wookie stood up, cocking his head to one side, and nodding his head, reaching across to slap a hand on Ranma's shoulder before heading off without another word.
For his part, the owner of the bar now looked rather astonished, shaking his head as he laughed. But his eyes were not smiling as he looked at Ranma. "No human's ever been able to out arm-wrestle a Wookie! Have you been gene-enhanced?"
"Just a martial artist." Ranma said with a laugh. She threw back her red hair, smirking up at the taller man. "So I wrestle you now yes?"
"Arm wrestle," the owner said, smirking a little at the innuendo for a moment since he certainly would have liked to 'wrestle' with the short redhead, preferably on his bed. But from the redhead's expression it wasn't a come on or anything, just a word missing from the sentence.
Sighing he nodded at the droid on the bar, which pressed a button on a small control console behind it. The table where Ranma had faced the Wookie and the floor several feet around it rose two feet into the air allowing the crowd to see what was going on much more easily.
Stepping up to the side of the raised dais, the owner of the bar pulled on his elbow for a moment, and suddenly his skin seemed to come off, leaving a fully articulated mechanical arm behind. There were some murmurs of that from the crowd, but mostly the sounds were amused, to the tune of 'ahah' as if the watchers had just worked out a trick.
Michael moved through the crowd as they all began to exchange further bets. After all it wasn't every day that someone got past the Wookie to the proprietor of the bar. "Kid, you might want to throw this match now." He whispered into Ranma's ear.
Ranma cocked her head at him. "Huh, why?"
"That cyborg's probably got his arm's limiter off, that's why. He'll rip your arm off!"
"Limiter?"
Michael rolled his eyes at Ranma's naïveté. "Robots are stronger than most species out there, and can be enhanced further through further engineering. So cyborgs outside the military have to have their limiters set by the government of the world they're on." If those limiters are removed, the individual faces revoking of his citizen's license, and expulsion from the system. Of course those laws, like most, depended on the government's willingness to care about enforcing them. Here it probably wasn't enforced, which made the bar owner's use of his arm sharp practice rather than illegal. After all, he didn't need to warn his opponent as he had by removing his arm's synth-skin.
Ranma shrugged. "Doesn't matter. Always wanted to see what I'd do against Terminator." Michael furrowed his brow, not getting the reference but Ranma ignored him waving the man off as she moved towards the table. Ranma had seen the original Terminator movies when they came out, having snuck into the movie theater while on the training trip with his old man, shirking a few hours of training for once because he'd heard so much about them. They had scared him when he was a kid, the unstoppable robotic menace destroying humanity and all that. But as he grew older, he'd desired to see what he could do against them.
As Ranma sat down the people around him the crowd continued to trade bets, many of them moving purposefully towards Michael and Duncan. He figured though the two of them could handle the betting themselves, and ignored them to stare at his opponent as he sat down, setting his robotic arm on the table.
Ranma gripped the cyborg's hand, and both of them looked over at the droid stuck into the bar. "Contestants are you ready? Then begin!" The match started, with the cyborg immediately going on the offensive trying to push Ranma's arm down.
Ranma grunted a little as the cyborg's arm actually made her strain a little but not that much. She held her hand steady shaking a little in place as the cyborg owner of the bar exerted his full strength. After a moment though the man realized that Ranma's arm wasn't moving. "What the hell are you?!"
"I told, I martial artist." said Ranma, and now beginning to go on the offense. For a moment the cyborg's arm was stuck at halfway down, then Ranma slammed it down, causing a loud screech of metal to come from the man's elbow. Terminator can eat that! Ranma crowed internally.
While Ranma stood up and waved at the crowd, which was cheering him or groaning in agony depending on which way they bet, the cyborg frowned angrily at his arm, which was shorting out at the elbow. "Dammit." The man looked back at Ranma then sighed, motioning Ranma to follow him towards the far end of the room.
They passed through the crowd, with Ranma receiving many pats on the shoulders for her show. One person however tried to pat her on the rear as she went past. That man went flailing by a backhand smacking own arm away with such force he lost his balance and went sprawling to the ground.
People around him began to laugh at the man's misfortune and Ranma moved on, with Michael and Duncan quickly pushing their own way through the crowd. Their pockets were bulging with the local currency, but that was a paltry sum in comparison to the amount the house would have to pay out to them given the odds Michael had gotten on Ranma before she joined the contest.
The man stepped around one of the other bars, a small half-circle set at the far wall from the doorway into the bar. Reaching down below its top for a moment the cyborg flicked on a scanner. Ranma stepped onto a stool right in front of him, cocking her head. "So, now I get my money?"
The man waved her off for a moment staring down at a small screen set discreetly below the top of the bar. Dammit she's reading as human! If Ranma had in fact been an android with a covering of synth-skin, the man would have been able to get out of paying since such couldn't be used in physical contests, but she was reading as fully human. Muscle mass and strength were off the scale, but there was nothing unusual about that.
He sighed, flicking the screen of before looking up at Ranma, Michael and Duncan. He wondered idly whose idea this was, it certainly wasn't the redheads. Her wide disingenuous eyes just didn't seem the type to think this scheme up. "Look Ranma, I don't have enough money to pay the entire amount you're due. I can pay in small installments, or you can take what I have now, and become a part-time owner in the bar for a bit until the rest is paid off."
"I not care so much about the money." Ranma said with a shrug. "I want to buy one of your droids. The astromech, Tune."
The bartender frowned. Calculating in his head he realized that would actually let him a little ahead, though he wasn't about to say that aloud. "An almost brand-new droid like that, that'll take more than what you're owed."
"If it was new it would, but it isn't, that droid is secondhand at best already. You've made modifications and the previous owner probably made modifications, which knocks down the price." Michael said speaking up now. "Ranma's owed 70% of the take, that droid should cover it, especially since it was repurposed to a task it was never designed for."
Ranma shrugged his shoulders again. "Just want the droid, and a meal too maybe. I'm hungry." Not that the local food looks all that appetizing, but meh, I've eaten worse on the road. Though looking into the different types of food available in this universe is up there with finding different martial arts styles to learn.
"All right," the bartender said with a sigh, realizing he wasn't going to get anywhere here. "He's been trouble anyway, take him and good riddance. As for you two, wait there I'll bring out your money."
While Michael and Duncan sat at the bar, Ranma moved through the crowd looking for Tune. He ignored the sound of mutters around him from those portions of the crowd that were unhappy about how the betting had gone. More than one of them was trying to work up the courage to try and take it out on the short human female, but after her show of strength that wasn't an easy task.
It took Ranma a while to find Tune, who was serving a male alien with octopus like tentacles growing out of his head. So many weird ass aliens around, still, bet humans look just as weird ta some of them. He approached the droid from behind, reaching down to pat it on the head underneath the tray stuck there before reaching further down to pull off the small cylinder that was stuck into its side. Immediately the droid's lights lit up to full power, and its dome-shaped head turned quickly, it's visual recorder turning to look up at her.
Ranma grinned, holding up a thumb to its sensor. "Told you I'd get you out of here. So what you think, want to come with me and see the stars again? Or stay to wait tables?"
The droid beeped at Ranma quizzically, warbling a noise that sounded like a question.
"Oh yeah, you don't know yet." Ranma said with a laugh. "I'll show you later, but I'm the same person who talked to ya before." The droid warbled derogatorily and Ranma smirked. "Yeah I know I'm different, but I just bought ya, and you can get out of here, get explanations later, yeah?"
That seemed to do it for the droid who warbled again this time in clear agreement and quickly made to follow Ranma. Behind the droid the alien with the tentacle head stood up, frowning angrily as the droid moved away from his table. "Hey comeback, those are my drinks!"
Ranma turned to him smiling and grabbing the tray off its holder over the droid's head, holding it out to them. "Sorry, he not work here no more."
The alien took a moment to look Ranma over, smirking a little. "Well as an apology, why don't you come over and have a drink with me instead? Are you with anyone right now?"
Ranma frowned angrily, realizing she was being hit on but before she could respond in an appropriate manner, such as kicking the man in the balls, a female voice from behind her spoke out. "She is not, but you are. Or were, you bastard!"
Smirking, Ranma turned to stare at a girl his own age, and surprisingly size too. She had creamy sort of mocha-colored skin, a very good looking athletic sort of body, and was an alien. It was kind of obvious what with her having no hair and several horns sticking out of her head which made it look like she was wearing some kind of crown. She was still very pretty though, not as pretty as Twila had been, but still a cut above most of the girls elsewhere in the crowd.
The man obviously thought so as well because he backed up rapidly. "Sorry babe, I, that is, I thought you had stood me up! I've been here for like 45 minutes!"
"You've been waiting for about five." Said the girl flatly. She then turned to the redhead. "Now as for you…"
Ranma backed away quickly holding up her hands while Tune made some noises that sounded as if the droid was amused by the goings-on. "I not lead him on or anything, I just here to get droid I win on bet. I not interested in guys."
"Oh." The girl said blankly, staring into Ranma's very honest looking blue eyes, before shrugging her shoulders. "Whatever powers your engines I suppose?"
A voice from behind Ranma spoke up. "Hic, you can 'ardly blame 'im, I mean, look at t'ese t'ings!" One of the people that had bet against Ranma had found enough liquid courage to start something, but instead of trying to take it out on her physically the man had decided to get his money's worth another way. Before Ranma could turn she felt two hands grabbing at her chest from behind.
Swiftly Ranma turned around, her elbow coming around at speed to slam into the man's head, sending him rocketing sideways with enough force to take six other people to the floor from the crowd around them. "Hands off!"
While the alien girl nodded in approval and moved over to further remonstrate her boyfriend, some of the people that Ranma's molester had taken out with his fall stood up glaring angrily at her and pulling out weapons. "What the fuck bitch! Isn't it enough that you cost us money, now you have to knock us around too!""
"No matter how strong she is she can't stop a stun bolt. I say we get our money's worth another way!" One of them said, raising a blaster. Even as a booming voice came from the speakers shouting about how violence was not allowed here and a few bouncers moved through the crowd purposefully the man pulled the trigger.
Ranma leapt upwards as soon as she saw the man's finger twitch, and the blue corona or stun energy passed directly below her, unfortunately knocking out several in the crowd. Their friends turned, raising their own blasters and firing back, and suddenly there was a massive bar fight going on, blue corona's flying everywhere and knives off as well.
Ranma dropped down onto one of her attacker's heads, bearing him to earth. At the same time, her arms flashed out to both sides smacking into and lifting up two others, throwing them aside.
Behind her, Tune raced forward, knocking several people over in his haste to follow. But Tune's treads were not really made for any kind of close combat, nor was the droid large enough to have much mass behind its charge. The droid lost its actuator arm when tried to clear its way and was quickly knocked
Having heard it's warbling cry Ranma leaped backwards. Lifting the droid up easily in one arm Ranma jumped back over several dozen heads, landing lightly on a bar to scan the crowd while tucking the droid underneath one arm. The droid was now warbling incessantly, sounding irritated and worried, but Ranma ignored him scanning the crowd for Michael and Duncan.
Both of them had already been knocked to the floor, one of them was unconscious and the other was holding his head groggily. "Maybe they got hit by a stray stun bolt or something." Ranma mused as she landed next to him. Picking them up one after another she talked them on her shoulders then made for the door. She'd had enough fun for one night, and after all she had to protect her investment.
Ranma raced through the port and a few moments later they reached the Kaisenki. The droid, which had been tooting incessantly to be let down now stopped, its eye on the ship. It tootled a question, and Ranma laughed.
"I not with the Republic if that what you asking, I'm just a friend at the moment. Eventually I want my own ship, why I thought getting you a good idea."
The droid twirled its head around whistling an affirmative. A few moments later Ranma had dumped Duncan and Michael unceremoniously in one corner of the machine room, noting absently that their pockets were no longer bulging with money. They seemed to have a goodly amount still, but a lot of it had been removed before Ranma could get to them. "Oh well, not my fault."
She set Tune down as well, frowning as she looked through the electrical appliances in the tool shed. She held one up that she had seen the mechanic of the ship use once on a droid, holding it out to Tune. "This let me talk better with you?"
The droid whistled an assent, and a small hatch on its side opened showing port. Ranma and nodded, and plug the end of the thing into it. Almost immediately the scrolling of messages appeared. "Are you really human? No human is as strong as you have shown yourself to be! Are you a Jedi? Normal humans cannot jump as well as you did in the bar. What happened to the human that I talked to the first time? It's obvious you are not him, he was male, you are female, are you siblings?"
"Heh, I answer all questions, but first, you know about the, the Force?" Ranma stumbled over using that term for what he did, but he had to fit his abilities and of course the magic of his curse into the local dialect he supposed.
The droid answered in the alternative, and Ranma placed the small scanner on its head for a moment, while he recited what Dooku had made 25 do to stop the droid's brain from exploding. "Prepare folder in memory for Force powers, unexplainable."
With that Ranma moved over to small drink dispenser, warming up some water and dumping it over her head. He became a she, and the droid whooped, burbled and shook in place for a moment before calming down thanks to Ranma's warning. As the droid's flashing started to slow down Ranma smirked at him. "I told you I was one to talk to you."
About an hour later, Ranma was carefully going over the droid, removing the tray holder and money box as well as giving it a thorough cleaning. While Ranma had no idea about electronics back in his own dimension, and had even less here, he could do this kind of low-scale maintenance easy enough.
At the same time he and the droid kept up a conversation via the screen readout that was hooked up to Tune's head. "That's what I hope to do yeah. Making money won't be hard so long as I can find underground fights or something like that, so money might not be an issue. Hopefully teaching myself how to fly starships won't be too hard. But before that, I'd really feel better if you had some self-defense."
/Agreed, I will look up ship types to see if I can find a match for your needs, a small freighter or large independent spacefighter type might be best. After that, finding a training program for you will be easy enough. As for myself, I would rather like some defenses as well. I will check local merchandise and see what I can find, though I will not find much on Malastare. Gran frown on droids having weapons, as do many species. These days it is also becoming a political as well as safety issue. One of the core worlds underworlds might be the best bet for that kind of thing, unless you allow me to, the human phrase is 'think outside the box'/. The droid replied.
"Heh, go ahead Tune, I'd be interested in what you come up with." Ranma looked up as the door to the maintenance area opened and Dooku looked inside.
The older man looked from Ranma to the, to his mind, garishly colored droid, to the two crewmen groggily moaning in the corner going through what looked like a stunner induced hangover. "I don't want to know, do I?"
"Probably not." Ranma replied, as Tune played a sound that sounded remarkably like a Bronx cheer.
OOOOOOO
This place wasn't so much hidden as simply unknown. From the exterior of the building it looked like any other portion of the senatorial sector of the giant city that sprawled across the entire planet of Coruscant. Anyone who saw it from the outside would simply see a portion of the Banking Clan's suites, and would see the windows that such men demanded to stare out across the cityscape.
The interior was very different. The windows, which were supposed to look down onto a highway far below, were in fact blacked out. Another portion of the room was dominated by its real windows, which allowed the people within to stare out and across at the Jedi Temple with no one seeing them in turn. This was not a view most Senators or their functionaries would've found agreeable, especially in this day and age, where the Jedi were often seen as nuisances, outsiders or meddlers.
But the owners of this particular suite very much preferred it this way. After all, keeping their eyes on their enemies was a necessity. Especially now, when events had been set in motion to trap some of them.
Two men stood there, the two men known as Sidious and Maul. As before the apprentice was barely able to contain his anger, his all-consuming fury a volcano constantly threatening to erupt. After only a few brief moments of staring at the Temple he asked, "what will the Jedi do now, master?"
"Do? What else can they do, but my bidding?" Sidious moved away, moving towards a chair that made no bones about being a throne. Though far simpler than most such, it seemed to somehow convey a sense of dark power that the other possible throne hidden far below the surface level of Coruscant had. "There will be much discussion of course but for all their talk there is only one conclusion at which they can arrive at: they must confront the Yinchorri. The loss of two of their own and the threat the Yinchorri pose will force them to do so."
Sidious sat down in the chair, turning to address Maul as his hands rested on the armrests. "From this will result one of two things, either of which will benefit our plans. Either the very stubborn and warlike Yinchorri, whose inconvenient resistance to mind control could present a problem in the future will be brought low or…" And here he smiled, and never was there a smile more sinister. "Jedi will die."
"Master, send me, I…"
"No the time is not yet come to reveal our presence. Get me the Devaronian. I want to make certain he is prepared."
"Yes master." Bowing his head lightly, the Zabrak moved away from the throne.
A moment later a small hologram appeared on a portable hologram device. As soon as the image of the bowing Devaronian appeared, the human male spoke again. "The Jedi will be coming soon. Are you certain that you're ready for them?"
"The Yinchorri are hot for blood they are prepared you bet." The Devaronian said his voice almost jovial. Though whether or not that was an act or his accent in Basic was not clear. "But what of Vilmarh's fee? Vilmarh is to be trusting you, but you are not trusting Vilmarh to even see your face? What is with that?"
"It is better that you don't know my identity." Sidious said coldly. "It is better still that you don't fail me. Do I make myself clear?"
The alien demon could not keep a small shudder from showing and he bowed even more deeply. Even so, his voice came across again as jovial. "Yeah, yeah, clear as ice crystals. Vilmarh was meaning no offense. Don't you worry boss, Jedi will be dead quick-quick."
"Very well, we will speak again afterward."
"Please master!" Said that the Zabrak as soon as the transmission cut off. "Let me go to Yinchorr, I…"
"Patience, my apprentice. Distasteful as it may be we must let intermediaries like Vilmarh be our hands for now. Our time will come, but it is not yet."
With that Sidious leaned back for a moment, thinking. The Jedi were almost certain to ask for Senate aid in blockading the Yinchorri, which would cost Chancellor Valorum much of his political clout to achieve. That would be the first step to his own eventual rise, as Plagueis had planned. Yet for some reason, his mind kept going back to the ripples surrounding Dooku. A few of them showed glimpses of others interceding before the Chancellor could waste his political capital to send in the Republic Fleet.
That would mean that the Chancellor would retain much of his influence which would push back his own ascension to that seat. Yet try as he might, he could not see a point where that future, once set in motion completely, could be derailed. So, how best to turn it to my advantage? Best to wait and see what races in fact take part in such a move, if it occurs at all. And possibly set in motion events on Malastare to keep Dooku's attention closer to home? No, I'd have to use outsiders or risk revealing my contacts in the Gran government. Dooku is too smart for me to risk that, though I could simply contact him myself if he does not contact me to aid in whatever he has planned… hmm…
On the other hand, the Yinchorri could be useful to us in the future. They are strong, determined, and their ability to ignore Jedi mind tricks and manipulation is admirable in a slave race. They could be enhanced further. And using bands of them elsewhere, even after someone else intervenes, could be used to show both the Chancellor's ineptitude. After all, if he had acted quickly, the Yinchorri could've been contained much more easily. And it would also distance the races involved from those who continue to face Yinchorri pirate raids.
After a moment he spoke again. "I have a task for you apprentice, contact the Teeth of the Krayt. I have a task for those slavers."
OOOOOOO
Looking up from going through some more history videos on different Jedi lightsaber weapons, Ranma cocked his head looking at Dooku who had just walked into the sitting area. "You look…" he frowned, thinking of the word he wanted in Basic. Despite all his progress, it still wasn't an automatic thing with him. "worried, irritated?"
Dooku smiled briefly, but it didn't stay on his face for long. He had just gotten off the Hypercom with Master Yoda, asking about the news broadcasts which had been dispersed all over the galaxy. "If you can read that in my face, it's obvious I need to practice my control more. Still, I would like to talk, if that is alright?"
Ranma stood up resolutely, moving over and grabbing the training lightsabers from where they hung nearby. "No. We fight, you vent then we talk." He shook his head. "You Jedi, you not have much control over emotions. It all pile up inside, stupid, but if you vent it much easier to deal with."
"You need to work on keeping control of your voice when you are excited." Dooku sent a faint smile. "But I do need to get control of my emotions." Since meeting Ranma he had learned enough about what Ranma called the corrupting effect of anger to no longer be interested in the Dark Side, and he had no wish to fall into it accidentally now.
Ranma shook his head. "Control yes, not forcing away. Forcing away all it does is come back." Ranma grimaced. "I learned that hard way."
"There's a story there that you haven't shared yet." Dooku murmured.
Ranma looked at him his eyes narrowed. "Not one I want to share, not with Jedi. You lot too against emotions already, don't want to share that one."
Dooku's eyebrows rose, but he didn't question it simply taking his position across from Ranma and bringing up the training saber into a guard position.
Hours later, Dooku sagged against the bulkhead for a moment breathing deeply. Ranma had actually taken it easily on him now, knowing that Dooku couldn't use any of his Force tricks on the interior of the training area and had stayed mostly on the defense for the entire fight. It wasn't Ranma's normal method, but it had allowed Dooku to gain control of himself, and to, in Ranma's words, vent.
"Thank you." he said sighing deeply as he found himself once more centered. He reached out for the Force, feeling it flow into him in a steady, uninterrupted and calm stream.
Ranma nodded in response. "You still want to talk?"
"I am afraid I have to." Dooku sighed. He gestured Ranma to punch the button that would raise the sitting area up once more, noticing with something far too close to envy for his state of mind that Ranma wasn't even sweating after their exercise. Of course I wasn't using any of my Force abilities, but still that is a little humbling. And it shows he has become more used to my abilities than I am to his.
Ranma look up to from him from where he sat as Dooku sat down across from him, striking before Dooku could speak. "We've talked before, but we haven't talked about why you're so welcoming to me. Think that is mixed up with all of your questions about ki techniques, but I need to know why."
"That wasn't what I wanted to talk about, but I suppose it's a good starting point." Dooku sighed again. "Have you come to an opinion about the Jedi Order?"
"Beyond my opinion about you not teaching control rather abstaining from emotions you mean?" Rama asked dryly, having concentrated to get that sentence out properly. "I admit that the Sith, they sound like, well like one of my old acquaintances but with actual skill behind the anger and a lot of nasty techniques besides. And I even understand why you guys think that abstaining might be a good idea, but it's a very stupid, short-sighted solution."
And it wasn't even worth thinking about in Ranma's opinion. He had already decided he would never share what his father had done to him with the Jedi or with anyone else in this galaxy. He didn't know if the Youthful Mind or Imperial Favor technique would work on other races, but he wasn't willing to find out.
"I am slowly coming to agree with you about that, your arguments about it are valid at least for humans on a psychological level, though why it had never occurred to us to look up the long term effects of enforced apathy and emotional dissonance is beyond me. I am uncertain if they would be valid for other races, I haven't studied the psychology of every other race that has representatives among the Jedi of course. Abstaining from emotions might be easier for them. But that is not what I meant. I meant about the Jedi Order as a whole."
Ranma paused pulling in his ponytail. "I am not a political person or an… analyst." He had to search for that word for a moment looking at Dooku when he said it and smiling when the older man nodded indicating he had remembered the right word.
"I understand that Ranma, but you mentioned several points that caught my attention in our earlier discussions, your point about the Hypercom, where you wondered if a bug could be placed in the base program to let others overhear any messages sent, it was well-founded. What did you say at the time, the outsider sees most of the game? That is what I want from you."
Ranma frowned. "What are you asking exactly?"
Dooku frowned as well looking down at his hands. What am I asking exactly? When he spoke it was low, almost a whisper, and he didn't look away from his hands. "I have questioned the role of the Jedi Order in the galaxy for several years, our direction within the Republic. For too long the Republic has been in stasis, and corruption has set in. The Jedi Order is slowly becoming a part of that corruption, if we are not already a part of it. I have seen the corruption in the Senate. I have seen the corruption of the guilds, the clans, the corporations, the factions. I have seen the growing anger in some systems, even entire sectors, against the Senate and against the Jedi, who they see as the face of the Republic."
"Worst of all, I have felt the stagnation within the Order, that we are becoming as hidebound and separate from the general populace as many accuse us of. I have asked the Force often for some sign to tell me if there was a solution to that problem, if I should keep following the Order or, or do something else with my life."
Dooku did not want to come out and admit that he had been possibly two or three more weeks away from deciding to search out the Jedi's natural enemies the Sith. He had believed that their presence would either make the Jedi order grow again, or Force the Republic as a whole to grow, much like competition did on the economic level. Now however, he did not believe that any longer, or rather he hoped that Ranma represented something that could kick-start that growth without the death and destruction the Sith might cause if they returned.
"The last time I searched the Force for an answer I felt your presence. That was why I found you and the miners. I believe that your being here in this galaxy serves some kind of higher purpose, and I want to know what you think I should do." Dooku laughed ruefully. "Talking to you has already convinced me that one of my choices going forward would never have worked out, and you've opened up several avenues of research into the Force and the Living Force inside of us all in particular that I never even contemplated. But those do not answer my big questions."
Ranma stayed silent for a moment staring at the older man. Okay, I did not expect that! The idea I'm here to serve some Force-given higher purpose gives me the heebie-jeebies. Still, I sure as hell am not gonna do anything I wouldn't do otherwise, and it makes me even more leery of teaching anyone else my ki techniques. But, but if all I'm here for, if all Dooku wants from me is my thoughts on the system, that at least I can do with a clear conscience.
When he spoke he reiterated what he had said before, each sentence coming out carefully constructed. "I am not a political analyst, nor am I a Jedi. I barely have enough understanding of the galaxy to understand what you're talking about when you say the Senate or the Republic. But I will say what I think if that is what you want."
Dooku nodded. "That is indeed what I want."
"Okay. One, the bigger a government is the bigger a bureaucracy is the more corrupt it will become. That something lots of empires and countries learn back home." Ranma started without further preamble, thinking of China, Rome, the Mongol Empire, even the Persian Empire. "The Republic is huge, too big, too old, corruption is simply part of it now. It's made worse by the fact that the central government doesn't actually have much power that isn't tied into that corruption. It relies on the Jedi for its strength. It makes you the face of its laws and its wars, and when things go bad or even when they go good for those in power, it is you who take the blame."
Dooku nodded having come to that conclusion himself since this mission began and he had talked to some of the locals as he had said to the Jedi Council several days ago. He sighed, closing his eyes. So we truly have become part of the problem.
"However, that not your place." Dooku's eyes shot open and he stared at Ranma who laughed cynically. "You're not an elected official, you not a part of the Senate, trying to reform it from within, that not your place. You as individual need to think only of the Jedi's part of the system. Need to…"
Ranma paused gathering his thoughts before going on, his words once more controlled. "You need to start to act separately from the Senate. Start to get to know the common people, live among them, not separate yourselves. Something separate, something foreign like that, it, will simply allow distrust, even hate, to fester."
"But that goes back to the Senate." Dooku protested. "It is too often the Senate that tells the Jedi where to go. If we can but reform the Senate, or…"
"But it is the Jedi who listen to those orders." Ranma cut him off quickly. "They can keep telling you, but you can stop listening. You all need to take a stance of your own, figure out individually or as a group a view of what is right and wrong. Take a stance of your own or you're just following someone else's view and they control you like that." He frowned angrily. "I am not getting this across well, my emotions get in the way of my converting my words to Basic." He said enunciating the words clearly. "But I hope you understand what I'm trying to say. It is not your place to reform the whole thing, you may be a Jedi master, but you're not a God. You can maybe help reform of the Order itself though."
Dooku sigh. "Only if it is wishful to be reformed."
"Then you do what you can as an individual, you make a stand for yourself as what is right and wrong. I never said it was easy, I just said it needed to be done. If you lot think that the Force is supposed to guide you, you listen to it, you go where this Force Wants you, no longer accept simple jobs from the Senate, just, just do what is right, not what is easy!"
Ranma rubbed one hand through his hair knowing that he wasn't getting the ideas across that he wanted to, and inwardly really wondering how anyone could think that that chi could have a will like that… although Ranma was starting to feel something in the air of this dimension.
Dooku frowned. "So where would you begin?"
"Training in emotional control, and getting rid of this no attachments, no passion crap, makes you into fucking robots." Ranma said bluntly.
"You really have a problem with that don't you?"
"People with no attachments to people or places are outsiders, outsiders are never trusted, not really. Worse, if you have no real stake in anything but the Order then you are not a part of the Republic, merely set to the side. People need to see you as force for good, not force for same-old, same-old." Ranma replied, using a phrase that at least got the meaning of 'stasis' across.
For a moment the two of them were silent contemplating what had been said. "I am not certain I can agree with that." Dooku said at last. "I might've come into the order late, but I'm not… is that really the source of the Order's apathy? Because we don't care enough, we don't have a large enough, large enough stake in the Republic?"
It was a disturbing thought on many levels. Such a simple concept, yet the ramifications were so huge. "Reforming the Jedi could take centuries." He said aloud not really addressing Ranma at the moment, but simply speaking his thoughts. "We seem to have slipped into this apathetic stagnation over thousands of years. It could take that long to bring us out of it."
"Remember, I said it not be easy, it just needs be done." Ranma said with a shrug.
Dooku laughed quietly. "I suppose so." He looked at the youth. "That of course means you would not be willing to join the order even if I could try somehow to get you in?"
Ranma laughed wildly. "Hell no. I'm willing to work with Jedi, but I want to explore the galaxy, want to do it on my own terms. I have my Code, I not bow to yours."
And despite me turning down that Twi'lek girl, I really would like a girlfriend eventually. Don't know about the whole marriage thing, my Nerima experience sort of killed my interest in that. But a stable relationship in the long term would be nice, and sure as hell can't happen if I agree to that whole 'no attachment' thing.
Dooku nodded then looked up as the captain Michael came in. "Yes, Captain?"
"Sorry to interrupt master Dooku, but some news just came in over the Hypercom. The alien Yinchorri have attacked a planet, we're so close we're probably one of the first systems to pick it up. I thought you'd want to know."
A moment later Ranma and Dooku both stood in the command deck, watching the news. It showed the Yinchorri attacking several peaceful planets, the attacks covered by news crews on the ground and defenders themselves trying to get messages out to the Republic as a whole before the videos went blank. The fact the newscaster then went on to some bland news from some other planet with as much interest and energy as the previous one, a Chandra-fan, had covered the news about the Yinchorri was both jarring and damning in Dooku's mind.
Dooku looked up over at Ranma watching his hands clench and unclench. "Calm yourself Ranma, remember our conversations on anger."
Ranma whirled to him, one finger raised in Dooku's face. "That is part of the problem with you Jedi! There are different types anger!" Ranma paused gathering himself. "There are different types of anger, different types of love and different types of people too! You try to make one size, abstaining from all of emotions, fit all! Stupid! Righteous anger is in not dark or evil! Anger at person if he has done evil is no evil! Hate is curse, hate and anger sometimes together, but not always. I feel righteous anger when I see that, there nothing wrong with that! If you feel nothing when you see that, you sick in head, not living, but already dead!"
Dooku looked down at the finger in his face and then up at Ranma one eyebrow raised until Ranma moved it away. Then he nodded. "I suppose I can understand your point, but I am uncertain that most Jedi would, or even if they did could keep themselves from not falling to the Dark Side."
"I'm not most Force users, I'm not a Force user at all, least not the way you people think about it." Ranma growled. "So…" he said looking over at the picture still playing "what are you going to do about this?"
"What am I going to do about it?" Dooku asked. "I still have my mission here. The Jedi Council will probably send in a small group to try and deal with this, though what that will entail I don't know."
"Not what I was asking. I was asking what you as a person, was going to do. These Jedi the council send, they your friends they your allies, what are you as a person as an individual going to do? 'For evil to triumph good men must do nothing', that a saying from my world. Who cares if the Jedi Council sends others! You are here, you are a good fighter you go do what you can as a person!"
"We are about two hours away from the Yinchorri system my Lord, but it's not on a hyperspace lane. That's probably why it wasn't discovered centuries ago, but it's actually pretty close." Michael said his tone neutral. He served the diplomatic corps, and the Jedi in particular, if Dooku said to go he'd go but he wasn't about to give his own opinion unless he was asked for it, whatever that opinion might be.
Dooku turned back to Ranma staring into his blue eyes, seeing the challenge in them. The words Ranma had spoken reverberated in his mind, and he suddenly had a Force vision, of Jedi he knew cut down, dying, not so much overmatched then brought down by sheer numbers. With that vision came certainty. I can stop this, and I will. Yes, this was why he had thought the Force had led him to Ranma, this, the ability to change things even in a small way for now, showed that he was on the right path.
"Captain, how long would it take to rig this ship for battle?" He asked, turning back to Michael.
Michael shrugged, looking slightly shifty. "We took on some small turbolasers from the Alderaan Rangers when we met with them sir. It would take us about 45 minutes or so to set them up, the ships has control and energy runs we can change to suit weapons. But we'd have to do it here on the ground we couldn't do it while we were moving."
He turned to Ranma shrugged his shoulders as Ranma's looked as if he was about to volunteer. "It's not just about lifting heavy objects or anything, and it'd be exterior work for the most part kid, sorry but I'm not going to put my people in harm's way like that. "
"That's fine captain," Dooku said before Ranma could replied though he looked more understanding then he had a moment ago. "That will allow me to get in touch with some friends. You said yourself Ranma, for evil to succeed good people must do nothing. If that is the case, then perhaps I can get some other good people to realize that this problem with Yinchorri is one they need to step up and deal with now rather than later, and possibly more."
Ranma cocked his head not understanding and Dooku waved him away, not wanting to share more than that for now since he wasn't certain this part of the aspect would work. "I'll be in my quarters Captain. Do what you can to prepare the ship for combat."
OOOOOOO
A few moments later Dooku sat down in front of the Hypercom system, not calling the Jedi Council but a friend he had made on the Senate. "Senator Palpatine, do you have time to talk for a few moments?"
"I have been better my friend," said Senator Palpatine of Naboo, a man that Dooku had been introduced to by the head of the Banking Clan.
He knew Palpatine as a man whose thoughts on the senate dovetailed with Dooku's. Though looking back on it, Dooku was now certain the man who introduced them had his own reasons for his low opinion on that score.
"There is a bit of a kerfuffle in the Senate at the moment as you no doubt aware." Palpatine suddenly smiled, slightly wider than his normal politician's expression. "Especially considering that you caused some of it. Senator Ainlee Teem was very well-connected here in the Senate, the proofs of the allegation of slavery against him was damning to much of those connections, and when he was recalled, sacked and imprisoned, that acted much like a concussion missile in the Senate. The reverberations of it are still echoing here, not helped by all of the other issues covering at the same time of course."
"Unfortunately my friend I did not call you to talk about my own exploits, but rather one of those other issues, the Yinchorri. Can you tell me if the Senate is at all close to coming to an agreement on what to do about them?" Dooku asked.
"Between the two of us, I'm afraid that the Chancellor's position isn't strong on that issue." Palpatine scowled. "Many of my fellow senators cannot see the threat Yinchorri aggression would mean in the long term. They have too small a population, they are too technologically dependent on others to be considered a major threat, and of course, there is the problem of what to do even if we interdict them, all reasons that have been trotted out time and time again since this crisis began. The Chancellor is gaining ground, but it is slow going."
"Indeed? Then I will call him next, I have an idea on that score of my own, and one that might serve better in the long term than sending in a Republic Intervention Fleet." Dooku mused.
"You're being rather mysterious my friend." Palpatine asked, smiling conspiratorially and leaning toward the pickup slightly. "Care to let me in on it?"
"All I will say I am going to put my weight behind an issue that has been brokered about in the Senate for several months now, at least on a limited basis. You may wish to wait until this bit of excitement is over before deciding whether you want to be part of it."
"I see…" Palpatine frowned then shrugged a small smile still on his face. "Very well then I look forward to hear about how you happened upon the kidnapped miners by the way. Hopefully the next time you are on Coruscant we will have time to sit down and you can excite me with a tail of Jedi-daring do."
Dooku laughed. "We shall see my friend. Until then." With that the two men ended the communication, with Dooku immediately redirecting his call to the Chancellor's office, using a Jedi Code to bypass the man's secretary and send an ID to Valorum so he knew who was calling.
A moment later the Chancellor appeared looking harried. "Master Dooku, I am always happy to hear from a Jedi master of your eminence, but I have already informed the Jedi Council of that I am doing all I can to try to…"
"Councilor, I have no wish to add to your work, in fact I am calling to tell you to stop trying to put together a quorum on the Yinchorri issue. I am going to try to put together my own bit of alliance for that issue. However, later on, you may be called upon to back an addendum to a certain law passed about a year ago now…"
It took Dooku about an hour to talk Valorum around, but in the end the Chancellor agreed that Dooku's idea sounded viable, if he could put it together. The cost down the line might be big in terms of the old demilitarization plan that the Chancellor's office had followed for centuries, but that had already begun cracking, as Dooku had pointed out rather pointedly. And when told who Dooku was willing to bring in on this, Valorum acceded to his request quickly.
After that, Dooku set up a conference call to Khedive Candobar Inglet of the Sluis Van Congregate, and Governor Shrook'an of Dac. Inglet was the head of a family that owned a large majority of the Sluis Van shipyards, which in turn controlled 80% of the Sluis Sector's economy, which gave him directorship for the sector. The Sluisi owned and operated a large defense fleet entirely separate of the ships they sold the small Republic navy, something they had been able to get away with since the Sluis Sector was on the Outer Rim.
While Dooku had only ever met Inglet personally he knew Shrook'an was the head of the Mon Calamari and Quarren party that were the most leery of completely joining the Republic, and thereby being tied entirely to its laws. Specifically, the laws which would force them to open their planet to foreign companies which might wreck their economy and the laws which would force them to turn over the defense of their planet to the Republic, adding their defense fleet to that of the Republic. That was one idea the Mon Calamari and Quarren, who often butted heads on practically everything, agreed on: they did not want their home system only guarded by the small republic navy and the goodwill of others.
Before either being could speak, Dooku began his pitch. "Gentlemen. I have recently been reminded of a saying I first heard as a youngling: that for evil to win, good people must do nothing. To that end, I am leaving Malastare, where you no doubt you both know I have been… rather busy, to aid my fellow Jedi in dealing with the Yinchorri's militaristic expansion. For governments of course, it isn't that simple. You need to have something to show for every action you take, and there is one law which you both wish to see changed, correct, or rather enlarged?"
Both beings glanced at one another. The Mon Calamari and the Sluisi might be in the same business as it were, but they didn't really have anything to do with one another economically. While both sectors were on the Outer Rim, they were nowhere near one another in terms of their places in space. Nonetheless, their economies were generally similar, and one issue in particular they had brought up in the Senate sprang to mind immediately, as Dooku had hoped. "You speak of the Arming Rights allowed to the Trade Federation's merchant ships."
"Indeed. While I still feel that particular issue was badly handled, I think that we can all say that it is not just the Trade Federation's shipping that has run into issues from pirates." He waited for both his listeners to laugh as their species allowed, and then went on. "Both of your senators have pressed for the right to arm those of your own merchant ships that travel beyond your sectors, or for the right to provide security ships to such, correct? I believe that, in return for your aid in dealing with the Yinchorri crisis I can see the senate extend that law to include your own ships."
"Not enough," Shrook'an said. "I understand the threat the Yinchorri pose in the long term if left unchecked, but the Senate will not agree to it for various reasons, both self-serving as well as good and decent ones as they see it. The pacifistic segment in particular will not like it."
"They will, if your warships, not only your defense fleets, but the armed merchant ships once you arm them, can be called upon to aid the Jedi in our roles as peacekeepers. Even the Alderaanian government would like that idea. I had thought about calling upon Senator Bel Iblis of Corellia, and I will extend the arming rights to include ships of the Corellian government's own merchant ships, but they are too far to send aid against the Yinchorri. I believe, with Jedi backing, the Chancellor's aid, Corellia and even Alderaan and other planets which follow pacifism would back the idea."
The Sluis Sector was right next door to the sector holding Yinchorr. They could get a fleet there within a bare few hours via hyperspace. The Mon Calamari could use the Overic Griplink to get to the Perlemian Trade Route, then come the rest of the way more slowly.
It took several more hours to convince both leaders of that of course, Dooku had been right: they couldn't commit their forces without getting something out of it, no matter how good the cause. But eventually the two of them agreed, with reservations, to send their fleets in. The upside was too good, and Dooku's numbers when it came to the Senate matched up too, which had been the holding point.
At the end of the discussion Dooku sent off two copies of the agreement, as well as the addendum they would be pressing into the Arming Rights law that had so favored the Trade Federation. All three men smiled at one another, knowing they had just done something good, not just for their own people or even in terms of standing against the Yinchorri, but possibly going forward into the future. "Gentlemen, thank you. I look forward to meeting your fleets in the Shili system five hours from now."
Both beings nodded, and Dooku sat up, closing his eyes for a moment and sending his senses out into the Force. The sensation came back immediately that this action of his was what he was meant to do and he smiled, touching his lightsaber lightly before marching out of the room.
OOOOOOO
Sidious frowned, leaning away from the pickup. Thwarted by the chaos still rippling in both the present and the future around Dooku, Sidious had been unable to get any idea of what the Jedi Master was planning.
Yet even so, I was able to discern that it is not Dooku himself, but something connected to him, to his current work and his ousting of Ainlee that is the source of those ripples. I need to see what my agents on Malastare have come up with, I need to have an idea of what Dooku found, or perhaps who he found, to steer him away from searching for the Sith and to change him so much.
Several moments later while Sidious was still concentrating on the ripples Dooku's actions were causing he felt several of them solidify. He frowned, first in consternation, then after a moment with a sneer.
Interesting, and rather brilliant in a way. But, oh but…heheheh… there are several ways this can be manipulated to the Grand Plan's advantage, oh yes… heheheh, Dooku might not come to the Dark Side, but still, this, this can indeed be turned to my advantage. I think I can 'get behind' the resumption of that debate, oh yes. It might seem a good idea now, but later on…
Deep in the dark of his senatorial suite, Sidious began to laugh quietly, before shaking his head and getting back to work.
OOOOOOO
A bare day after deciding to aid his Jedi brethren Dooku's ship met up with the two fleets of the Sluisi and Mon Calamari. The two fleets combined numbered around forty-five warships, mostly heavy cruiser and frigate classes with a few dedicated carriers for space fighters. Ranma stared avidly at the screen in the observation sector of the bridge, watching as the ships flew past. At the same time Dooku was on the Holocom with the two admirals. "This is not going to be a standup fleet action, not unless we need to. Essentially what we are going to be doing is simply keep the attention of the Yinchorri fleet on us, while my Jedi brethren do their part."
He tapped the screen, and an image appeared, appearing simultaneously on the hologram projectors in the two admiral's command centers. One of them was a Mon Calamari, whose skin was pocked along one side. His name was Arikakon Baraka, a middle-aged, thoughtful and well thought of commander.
His counterpart, Tuvou Sitoris had served the Sluis Sector Navy as one of its admirals for many years, commanding dozens of anti-pirate actions. But neither of them had commanded a mixed unit before, nor a fleet on the scale that had been gathered here.
Dooku hadn't either of course, but he was well read and figured that between them their makeshift triumvirate would be able to figure out the correct tactics. "What I propose is for us to come in out of hyperspace at speed, cutting across the system like so." He said gesturing into his own hologram, which was faithfully copied by the hologram projectors on the other two ships.
"First will be the Sluisi, because your ships are faster, thus harder to hit. But you'll come out in such a way that you won't actually be attacking anything, nor will you be in any danger of becoming bogged down. Instead your task will be to skirt around the outer system for a few hours pulling as many of the Yinchorri ships after you as possible."
"Those ships in turn will be jumped by my fleet yes?" Questioned the Mon Calamari.
"Indeed. I have studied their psychology, and they are unused to thinking of themselves as anything but the alpha predators. The challenge of you fleet will bring the Yinchorri out to attack us, pulling them out of position and unable to affect what is going on around the planet."
"And our own tactics after battle is joined?"
"I will not be in any position to give advice or commands gentlemen, since I will be taking my own ship deeper into the system. I believe once in the system I will be able to sense where my fellow Jedi are, and thus where to go. Once my ship leaves the fleet, it will be up to the two of you to decide on your tactics."
The two admirals looked at one another than Arikakon smiled, his eyes swiveling for a moment. "You have seniority my friend, but if I may add some advice, my ships can take much more of a pounding than you might think. And whatever Master Dooku says, we should possibly think about destroying their mobile forces."
Sitoris closed his eyes his upper body moving sinuously from side to side in the hologram for a moment. Ranma watched his lips quirking at how much the motion made him look like a snake waiting to strike. Pretty damn apt right now.
After a moment Sitoris nodded. "Yes, that is true. We will need to also think about destroying the orbitals, if we are to make certain the Yinchorri do not attempt further military conquests. To that end, I believe there is a maneuver that could be used against creatures as aggressive as the Yinchorri…"
About an hour passed while Ranma sat silent, simply listening to Dooku and the two admirals bandying ideas around until they had an idea of the tactics they would use. The conversation wound down after a time, with all three of them happy with their strategy for the coming campaign. As they were about to sign off, Arikakon looked at Master Dooku. "Do your Jedi allies know we are coming?"
"I have been unable to contact them. I'm afraid that they are either in communications blackout prior to their arrival, or have already arrived." Dooku sighed faintly. "We will have to simply trust in the Force."
OOOOOOO
The Sluisi fleet flashed out of hyperspace going to full normal drive quickly, racing forward. Made up of mostly corvettes and frigates they had a major speed advantage over the Yinchorri ships stationed around the main hyperspace outlier for the system. The Yinchorri ships, around twenty capital class ships, were larger, heavily armed and armored, but not very fast. The Sluisi dodged through and around the defenders heading deeper into the system before making a wide turn back outwards, pulling the defenders in behind them, the Yinchorri giving chase.
They disdained the one ship that wasn't moving with the others, instead making straight for the inner system. There would be a lot more glory to be attained in facing a fleet rather than a single fleeing vessel.
Soon the two fleets were well out of position to interdict the single cruiser. Dooku watched for a moment on the tactical display as about thirty minutes ticked by with more and more of the Yinchorri ships moving out to try and engage the Sluisi from deeper in system. But the Sluisi under Sitoris were as sneaky and tenacious as they could be. Their course were constantly changing slicing in and out of the inner regions of the system back out to the known hyperspace jump points. This action kept the Yinchorri's attention fully focused on them while Dooku's cruiser kept on moving deeper into the system, no longer facing any defenders themselves.
A few moments longer passed, and Dooku, his senses extended out into the Force around him, nodded at last. "Make for Yinchorr captain, the homeworld of the Yinchorri. I sense at least eleven of my brethren there, several of which I know personally and one I know very well indeed." Interesting that Qui-Gon would have been chosen for a mission like this…
Michael nodded, and the ship changed course slightly. A few moments later the other jaw of the assault struck.
The Mon Calamari ships came out of hyperspace on the coordinates sent by Admiral Sitoris. Built mostly of heavy and light cruisers, the second assault group came out of hyperspace practically on top of the Yinchorri ships trying to close with the Sluisi. The two fleets immediately began to exchange fire, but the Yinchorri were mostly out position to defend one another, and were shocky from the sudden assault from a new direction. Their fighters were also all out of position to defend the capital ships, a bad thing when the Mon Calamari ships had full fighter crews on their own ships. Four Yinchorri capital ships blew up quickly, their shields overwhelmed by turbolasers and photon torpedoes, their hulls unable to withstand the pounding. Two others drifted all systems dead, all weapons gone. And then the Sluisi turned, launching their own fighters and turning back to attack the pursuers who now found themselves trapped and out of position.
Dooku nodded, having watched all this in the tactical display. "Well done, the Yinchorri fleet will suffer tremendous losses, and are caught between two fires, unable to concentrate on either. That will keep our own force's losses down"
Ranma nodded too. "Nice tactics. I don't know much about fleets but even I can tell the lizards are in a bad way."
"About twenty minutes away from Yinchorr, Master Dooku. Do we have a specific target in mind?" Michael asked.
Closing his eyes Dooku once more sent out his senses, trying to get a read on what was going on in the planet that was quickly becoming larger in the viewscreen. The Yinchorri of course were almost blank in the force, which was a given since they were immune to Jedi mind tricks. Evolution can be odd like that, he mused smiling faintly as he remembered Yoda telling him about an odd animal he had run into once that actually pushed the force away from it.
However Dooku could sense the Yinchorri when there were large numbers of them in one place, and he felt all the Jedi very near one of those concentrations. "Head to the mountains along the westernmost continent, for now, and captain, I suggest you start powering up the weapons systems and make certain the shields are at full power." Help is on the way my former padawan, Dooku thought to himself, not sending the thought out for concern that he would distract Qui-Gon at an inopportune moment.
Behind him, Ranma turned and left the cockpit, cracking his knuckles as he closed his eyes, centering himself. While Dooku had been trying to put together his alliance to aid his fellow Jedi, Ranma had tried to exercise and sleep to get his mind off things. But every time he did, his mind would go back to those live newsfeeds from the Yinchorri attacking other planets.
Ranma had seen a lot of odd and weird stuff in his time, but true evil or war? The former he had rarely seen, and the second he had never seen. He had never even killed before taking on the slavers on their ship. Yes he'd come close several times, a few would-be molesters in China, and of course his battle against Saffron and Herb though the second wasn't nearly as close as the first.
Part of him was anxious about this, yet another side didn't care, or didn't care about the size of the conflict. Large or small, Ranma was confident in his skill, and more importantly the Code didn't change. If you are prepared to take a life, you're prepared to lose one. The strong should protect the weak, not prey upon them. These Yinchorri had done that, they had killed, slain, stolen from, and made war upon innocent civilizations, those who could not fight back!
A crime that Ranma could liken only to things he had seen once or twice on news the few times he was interested in watching it back in his old dimension. At the time, those things had seemed so far away and so unimportant, which Ranma put down to the Youthful Mind technique his father had used on him. He'd simply been unable to comprehend that there could be a connection between what he saw on the TV and Ranma himself.
If I had known then that kind of thing was real, would I have done anything about it? No, wrong question. It's never what you could've done; it's what you're going to do now. Remember these are the same bastards who attacked those other planets, remember that this isn't a spar, this isn't a game, this is real, they've got to be stopped, and I can help do it.
Centered, his emotions under control Ranma unlocked his ki, what Dooku called the Living Force, from his habitual control, breathing deeply as it began to overcharge his body and sense. He cracked his knuckles, his blue eyes shining with ki-light for a moment. "Time to party."
OOOOOOO
The team of Jedi that had been sent to find the command center for the Yinchorri had run into issues almost from the get-go. They had been attacked the moment they came out of hyperspace for one thing, nearly losing one of their cruisers to the fire which had come at them from several dozen capital ships. Those ships had then launched fighters which made a bad situation worse.
Master Windu and his ship had been forced to hyperspace through a planet, something most intelligent spacers would never have even attempted. Yet under the masterful hands of Jedi Master Saesee Tiin they made it through, even heading down to the surface of the planet Yinchorr, that race's original homeworld, unseen. They had hidden their ship in the mountains, before moving off to try and find the Yinchorri command center, which would house the Council of Elders that ruled the Yinchorri.
Master Gallia fared even better, having tricked one of their pursuers into destroying two others before getting away cleanly. Despite Jedi master Plo Koon at the controls however the third cruiser fared poorly. It was only a bit of trickery thought up by Padawan K'kruhk that allowed them to survive. They had lost all their escape pods, but were able to land in the cruiser itself.
None of their separate missions had gone as smoothly as hoped of course, but neither had they found their objective, the command center where the rulers of the Yinchorri could be found. After numerous adventures apart however, they had all come together once more on Yinchorr, more because Mace and his group had run into more trouble than they could handle than because they had narrowed down their search. The Yinchorri had found their ship, destroying it before starting a search which inevitably found Mace and his fellows.
None of them had died thus far Mace was pleased to feel, watching as more of his fellow Jedi arrived opening up an assault on the Yinchorri attempting to encircle Mace and his group. Yet that reinforcement seemed to be in danger of becoming overwhelmed itself.
"Master Gallia and the others have diverted the attack from us." He said as he raced up a stone column sticking out the side of a mountain over the small pass where the battle was taking place. "But they'll need rescuing themselves if we don't act. Master Tiin, stop that tank, Qui-Gon, Obi-wan, follow me! We'll link up with the others."
With that he Force Jumped downward, slicing through two Yinchorri with his lightsaber at once, before blocking and diverting the laser blasts from a few others into some of their fellows. The congested nature of the terrain played to the strengths of the Jedi somewhat rather than that of the Yinchorri save for their numbers.
As Master Tiin was dealing with the tank, Windu was about to greet his friend Master Koth when both of them stopped suddenly, staring up into the sky, sensing the arrival of another Jedi over the tumult of the battle. In the air above them another Consular class ship appeared, this one fitted with weaponry which began to lay down covering fire. Windu and Qui-Gon looked at one another, and Qui-Gon frowned. "Master Dooku?"
"And someone else…" Master Windu said thoughtfully, absentmindedly blocking a blaster bolt with his lightsaber, sending it back towards his attacker. "Someone whose presence in the Force is unlike any I have ever felt before."
OOOOOOO
High above the battlefield Dooku looked at his young friend, frowning slightly. Ranma's presence now and his grim visage was something that Dooku had not seen yet on him, and frankly it transformed the young man into a warrior. If Kiima or the other Phoenix people had seen it however, they would have recognized the face of the man they had begun to call the Godslayer.
Yet despite the youth's change in demeanor, despite the fact his emotions were subdued now, Dooku trusted Ranma to do his best to aid Dooku's fellow Jedi. There was something about Ranma, the sheer scintillating nature of his presence in the Force, his connection to the Living Force that told Dooku he was more than up to this battle. "Are you ready?"
In response Ranma smiled at him thinly, punched the open code for the hatchway and leaped out without a word. In mid-air Ranma turned, shouting, "Ask the Yinchorri if they're ready for me!"
Below, the padawan K'kruhk had been separated from his master by several yards. He swung his lightsaber around, killing one of his attackers but then his lightsaber suddenly gave out upon hitting a cortosis shield. The Yinchorri wearing it laughed, raising its spear for a finishing blow. "Die Jedi!"
K'kruhk's master, the human Lilit Twoseas turned, her eyes widening as she threw herself forward placing her slight body between the killing blow and her padawan. "K'kruhk, look ou…!"
That was as far as she got before a cerulean sphere of pure Force energy the likes of which none of the Jedi there had ever seen, giving off a feeling of confidence and fierce joy somehow, slammed into the Yinchorri about to spear K'kruhk. It hit like a turbolaser round blowing the Yinchorri's head off as if it had just been hit by a turbolaser blast.
Ranma landed next to the Jedi who had been in a bit of trouble, rolling and leaping up quickly, his legs flashing out like two pistons to slam into two more Yinchorri hurling them back, their chests broken as he grabbed a spear that had been thrust into the ground by the padawans foot using it as a springboard.
He spared a brief nod to the alien Jedi that he had just saved. "Watch your back, yeah?" With that he was gone leaping away deeper into the battle.
"What?" Mace Windu muttered from nearby, shaking his head in astonishment not in keeping with his normal self-control. "What was that!?"
"I don't know, I've never heard of anything like it, but that, that did not feel like the Dark Side." Said master Koth, frowning thoughtfully as the two moved back to back. Their lightsabers moved as one, their movements choreographed through the Force as if they were one being, one mind for a moment. Like this they were unassailable, lightsabers flashing bouncing blaster bolts back to their owners, deflecting spears, cutting Yinchorri apart, covering one another perfectly. "But again it is no Force power I have ever seen or felt before. That makes it suspicious."
For her part, Lilit Twoseas had known that she had been about to die. Unable to bring her lightsaber to bear to defend herself or him she had interposed her body between him and the spear. But now, now suddenly that future was gone. It was changed by the human whose strength in the Force was reverberating through her senses. He's a fountain of the Living Force! I've never felt the like! Where did he come from!? I. he saved my life, he saved my life…
Ranma ignored the Jedi's odd looks in his direction simply nodding when he randomly caught them looking at him through the battle. He continued to move through the battlefield, tossing the Yinchorri about like they were weightless, killing more than a few with punches or kicks but mainly concentrating on drawing their attention away from the beleaguered Jedi.
He stopped next to one Jedi master that looked like a demon from Christian mythology, bald, with two horns thrusting forward down from the side of his head. Yeesh, wonder if I'm gonna find an alien race that looks like something from Japanese mythology, like onis or devil horses.
Master Tiin did not look away from his task, slicing apart a tank at the back of the Yinchorri column which was trying to range on the Jedi further down the gorge. Seeing this, Ranma smirked leaping up onto a tank's front, grabbing its barrel and with a grunt of effort ripping the entire turret off the tank, using it as a giant halberd for a moment slamming it down into a few Yinchorri making pack they of them.
Live by the sword, die by the sword you bastards! He thought grimly. He grimaced as he took a few shots in the back from another Yinchorri, but the blasters didn't do much damage thanks to his endurance technique, and he turned, hurling the turret at his attackers, killing a few more.
"Not bad," Tiin muttered, moving to support Ranma. He was not one to look a sudden gift horse in the mouth like this, and besides, he liked the youth's style, nor was he getting any sense of anger or hate from the youth. Brute force and power, that's the way!
"I believe it is time to fall back," Mace said as he and Koth joined up with two of the other masters, frowning slightly at Two Seas who was smiling wider than he had ever seen her, moving everywhere and never standing still as the Ataru form demanded while K'kruhk followed far more slowly using the Soresu form to guard her back. "Are you alright Master Lilit?"
"I am excellent master Windu," she replied, her voice joyful. "I am alive! I am alive when I thought my destiny was to die a few moments ago! Whatever that youth is, he saved my life and that of my padawan!"
K'kruhk nodded his head looking a little shamefaced. "I failed to keep in mind Master Giett's lesson masters; my lightsaber failed me against a cortosis shield. A Yinchorri had me dead to rights and my own master had just interposed herself between me and the killing blow when that youth's attack hit him, saving her."
"Begin to fall back," Master Windu ordered once again, his eyes narrowing as he looked at the youth.
That youth arrived here with Dooku, so it stands to reason that he and his strange Force abilities are the secret that Dooku wished to talk about in person with Grandmaster Yoda. Oddly secretive of him, but understandable given his concerns about the Hypercom. Yet now that I see him, I am uncertain what to make of him myself. He is not a Jedi and wields the Force, or at least the Living Force, in a way that I have never seen. It's obviously aiding his strength and speed, which admittedly is far beyond anything even a Force Warrior could do, but his other skills are beyond bizarre.
But all that was what any of the other masters could sense, Mace sensed more than that. Mace Windu was blessed, or perhaps cursed, with the Force ability called shatterpoint. This allowed him to sometimes see the weakness in a thing or person where it could be broken if pressure was applied through the Force. Most of the time when Windu saw it the shatterpoint was in a person's style of combat.
The young man dancing here and there through the attacking Yinchorri in an unarmed Aerial style that oddly reminded Windu of videos of Yoda in his younger years did not have that kind of shatterpoint. There was no weakness in his style. Instead he was part of something larger, something that was bigger than himself, bigger than Mace or any of them, too big for Mace to perceive on the fly. But the shatterpoint was there.
Shaking his head, Mace Put those thoughts aside for now. "Head back towards Master Gallia's ship, let's not let this sudden windfall go to waste."
OOOOOOO
After dropping Ranma off, Dooku had directed Michael to fly the ship deeper into the gorge towards the Consular-class cruiser that had landed there. After all, the Yinchorri hadn't just been coming down the gorge. Hundreds of them had attacked from the mountains as well.
Once there, Dooku dropped from the side of the Kaiseki while it rained down covering fire. That covering fire wasn't very accurate, none of the crewmen were trained gunners, but there was a lot of it.
Dooku smiled slightly as he descended, remembering a conversation he and Ranma had shared about why Ranma really preferred the Aerial style. He does have a point, feeling the wind like this is indeed amazing. As he fell Dooku continued to smile for a moment while he allowed his perceptions to expand through the Force, allowing his joy at the experience to color his emotions.
He frowned however seeing a Jedi below him, a green-scaled Anx whose name he did not know be cut off and surrounded while Master Tsui Choi tried desperately to get to his side. Reaching through the force Dooku grabbed the youth hurling him up towards his ship and away, using the youth's own weight as a counterbalance to hasten Dooku's descent.
As the youth ascended he let go of his lightsaber, which Dooku Force-grabbed and used in midair to block some of the bolts trying to track him from below. A second later Dooku landed his own lightsaber activating as he raced forward.
Giving himself to the Force entirely, the Jedi Master Dooku smiled grimly, his lightsaber flashing faster than the Yinchorri could track. With every strike it left a blazing trail, cutting here there and everywhere. He noted which Yinchorri had cortosis armor, avoiding those shields with ease, cutting them into pieces with an artistry and speed that would have astonished anyone but another Jedi. Indeed, it was well beyond even what Dooku could have done before training with Ranma these past few weeks.
Steeling himself for a moment Dooku let his lightsaber fall waving his hand,. In a massive swirl of Force power, hundreds of Yinchorri were hurled away from him and the other embattled Masters. Above him Kaiseki began to hammer the now disorganized Yinchorri with concentrated laser fire. This broke the Yinchorri's assault and they retreated for now retreating into the mountain crevasses or away down the gorge towards the main battle.
"Master Dooku," said Master Adi Gallia nodding her head wearily at him, gasping in exhaustion. "Your timing is impeccable but I must ask…"
"The Gran Protectorate is nearby, and I was one of the first to hear the news of the Yinchorri's militaristic expansion. I assumed that the Council would send someone Adi Gallia, and I decided to poke my nose in."
"Master Dooku," Master Choi came up, bowing his head formally. "I thank you for the life of my padawan. If not for you, he would be dead."
"No thanks are necessary, we are all Jedi here, and to defend others is our duty." Dooku said, waving his hand towards their ship. "I suggest you all get aboard, I can feel Master Windu and the others coming along. And none of you are in any condition to continue this battle."
Adi Gallia made to protest, but even as she did so her body sagged wearily. The battle had been going on for about 45 minutes of constant combat, and before that they had fought throughout the evening on their own missions, and none of them had gotten much rest since this expedition began. Even with her Force assisted endurance the constant combat was beginning to take a toll. "Thank you master, I think that's an excellent idea."
OOOOOOO
Elsewhere in the battle, Tiin and Ranma had finished destroying the last tanks, falling back quickly to the others while Ranma continued to toss or smash aside the Yinchorri between them as if they weighed nothing. But then Ranma grimaced as he took a few shots from behind. Turning quickly Ranma brought out his ki shield that he had made up on the spot during his first battle with Dooku, blocking the crew served weapon that had just opened up on him as the demon-looking Jedi master began to block some of the blaster bolts with his lightsaber.
Ranma did the same with his hands, smacking them aside and frowning as he noted that his shield had dropped slightly after the first few scattered bolts. Note to self, blasters come in all shapes and sizes, and some of them can be dangerous, can wear down my shield and probably get through my endurance training. Interesting, and I really don't want to know what most ship-based weapons would do. Ouch... And, come ta think of it, any sort of continual beam weapon would be bad too. If a lightsaber can wear down my ki shield as quickly as Dooku's can, that kind of weapon would do the same.
The youth's show of strength was incredible to the Tiin, who prided himself on his own physical strength. "Tell me," he said somewhat jokingly, "do you have a rancor in your ancestry somewhere?"
"Don't know what that is." Ranma said cheerfully, slamming his foot hard into one Yinchorri, pulping the Yinchorri's shoulder and hurling him back into several others as he grabbed a sword-spear thing that was aimed at his head. "'Scuse me!"
Flipping himself upwards, Ranma kicked out, catching that Yinchorri in the head and using that kick to throw himself in an entirely different direction landing among other Yinchorri who were trying to set up something that looked like a crew served blaster of some kind to attack the flank of the Jedi who were falling backwards through the gorge.
A few kicks and punches late the three Yinchorri that had tried to set it up were broken and unconscious. Ranma hefted the SAW himself, putting it to his shoulder and blasting away on what he thought of as full auto at the Yinchorri still trying to attack the Jedi Masters.
The Yinchorri, now without any tanks and having taking too many casualties to sustain the assault, finally began to pull back.
"They'll be back." Said Mace as Tiin and Ranma moved to join them. "I've never seen a species before that was so set on violence!"
Ranma scoffed, spitting to one side. "Have you looked in a mirror lately? Humans can be just as violent sometimes."
Windu frowned but nodded since that was occasionally true. "Who are you young man?"
"Ranma, I'm a friend of Dooku's but for now can we get going? This is fun and all, but I don't think it much fun for you lot."
"Violence should never be fun young man." Said Qui-Gon, while his padawan Obi-Wan stiffened at the disrespectful tone the younger man was using to the masters. "Even in the pursuit of justice."
Ranma shrugged. "If you don't like a good fight, why are you here?" He asked bluntly. "You're all Guardians at least right, that's the Class that deals with combat missions and such?"
Actually they weren't, though Windu should have insisted that only Guardians be sent on this mission, possibly with one or two Sentinels along to bring their particular skills to bear. But they weren't, indeed most of them aside from the padawans were Consulars save for Tiin and Giiett, a Guardian and Sentinel respectively. This of course was a problem throughout the order, since the numbers of Guardians and Sentinels had been dropping for decades. Still, Mace was chagrined to realize that he should've realized even at a Master's level specialties like that, the difference mattered.
High above them there was loud whistling sound, and Ranma stared upwards frowning before bringing his hands up and thrusting them forward. A bright cerulean sphere of pure force power shot from his hands up into the air. Seconds later it intercepted a mortar round that was coming down towards them, causing it to explode prematurely.
The Jedi had all looked up as well at the noise, and while none of them had reacted as fast as Ranma, many of them raised their hands, thrusting away the shrapnel from the explosion with the Force. "Mace is right." Said Plo Koon. "We have outstayed our welcome my friends, and the Yinchorri seem the type to demand repayment for their hospitality.."
"Was that a joke, that sounded like a joke, but it was actually somewhat funny!" Said another one of the Jedi, who Ranma was interested to note used two lightsabers. "Will wonders never cease!"
"Joke on the run please." Ranma said, but he smiled at as he said it.
Windu moved next to the youngster, looking at him thoughtfully, studying him intently with both his eyes and Force sense. "When this is over young man, I think we are going to have a long talk."
Ranma shrugged. "Dooku said something like that too, but we'll do it in person not over Hypercom."
So this is indeed the secret that master Yoda felt Dooku was keeping. It's interesting, as much as he has seemed to enjoy this battle, I haven't felt a single flicker of anger or fury or hate from him. If anything it's the exact opposite, he radiates the Light side of the Living Force so strongly it's like he's a beacon! His emotions are so powerful, it's worrying yet at the same time, it doesn't seem to affect him. Very odd. Even while he thought this however, Mace was already racing back down the gorge with his fellow Jedi.
Back at the downed ship Michael and his crew were still laying down some covering fire into the size of the gorge where many of the Yinchorri had gone to ground, trying to sleep at the Jedi and the ship. Its shields were flickering badly by this point, but its guns were still firing down into the slopes around the gorge, killing several Yinchorri while the Jedi retreated into the ship.
Dooku was the only one remaining outside by this point, with master Gallia guarding the entrance to the ship. He nodded cordially to the Masters and Ranma as they came up. "Master Windu" he said addressing the only one among them who he felt was truly his equal in rank and skill. "I suggest you get a move on."
With that he raised his hand, lifting a giant boulder from the ground. He held it as a shield in midair to block several blaster rounds from one side of the gorge before hurling it in that direction causing some of the snipers to scatter.
"Jedi never run," said Master Giiett, "Unless we really, really have to."
Ranma laughed, reaching down to grab up a few of the blasters and exchanging fire with the snipers smashing several of them back with pinpoint shots to shoulders, arms or weapons. "A sense of humor from a Jedi, didn't think that was possible given your oaths about emotions."
"We try not to advertise it young man, and unfortunately it is alas a rare trait among us. Master Dooku," said the long-haired man, bowing from the waist with both of his hands together, a faint but warm smile on his face as he turned to face the regal looking Jedi Master. "It has been some time."
"It has indeed, I am happy to see you well Qui-Gon." Dooku smiled, nodding at the man then looking over at the youngster who stood beside him, his padawan braid prominent alongside one side of his face. "And who is this?"
"This is my padawan Obi-Wan Kenobi, master. I believe he will be ready for the trials in another few years." Qui-Gon favored his padawan with a smile, while Obi-Wan bowed his head deeply to one of the most famed duelists in the Jedi Order, flushing slightly at his master's praise.
"Excellent, though you brought a padawan on a mission like this?" Dooku asked cocking one wintry eyebrow, causing Qui-Gon to twitch in response. Dooku had always looked like that right before imparting some painfully obvious lesson.
Dooku however turned to address Mace. "Three padawans I note. Now, this is not a mark against you three or your teachers but I would have thought after recent events, most particularly the Mandalore Debacle and the mission which cost my own most recent padawan her life, that taking padawans into missions which held the certainty of high levels of violence would have been… contra-indicated. Or are we so cavalier with our own lives we do not flinch in sending those young and less prepared than we into battle?"
His voice was mild, but his eyes were flashing dangerously, something more than one of the masters there noticed. Still many winced at the reminder of what happened to Dooku's padawan a bare two months ago.
"Haste was of the essence, so I took only those among the Jedi who volunteered which I thought could handle the mission." Mace said shaking his head, taking it upon himself as leader of this expedition to answer his fellow Blade-masters not-quite accusation. "In hindsight, that was an error, though my choice for pilots at least was well-founded. Still, it is one I will make certain does not occur in the future."
"That's nice and all," Ranma said. "But could we get on the ship now? Not want to compound that error, yeah?"
"You are impertinent, young man." said Obi-wan, shaking his head admonishingly. "You should not speak to Jedi Masters so."
"I speak as I find." Ranma said smirking at the young man, who he thought was somewhere in his twenties or so, though he spoke either like an old man or a lawyer, Ranma wasn't certain which. "Respect is earned, not given freely."
"Ouch." Giiett shook his head. "Remind me never to let this young man near any of the Senate. That would be very, very bad."
"Definitely." Ranma said with a laugh, before he grunted as a blaster bolt got through into his shoulder making him wince a little but that was all, causing many of the master's eyes to widen in surprise. "Think politicians a waste of space back home, here it's even worse."
A few moments later the last of the Jedi were aboard their ship, and the ship lifted off, putting its own shields between its savior and the attackers down below.
"Captain Michael, follow us up out of the atmosphere, try to keep us between you and the ground, your shields seem to be failing badly." said Master Tiin, while Plo Koon slid into the co-pilot's chair.
"Aye-aye master." Said Michael over the comm. "Everyone aboard?"
"Everyone is aboard," said Lilit via the intercom. Even now she had a small, wondering smile on her face from her rescue from certain death. "Thanks to your arrival and that of Master Dooku, everyone is aboard."
OOOOOOO
At the same time the two Consular-class frigates were making for space, on Coruscant Sidious was snarling, his lips a rictus of rage. His ability to read the future was perhaps the area where his ability in analyzing the Force was better than his teacher's. He had known, known that Jedi would die on this mission. He had felt it, seen it in the eddies of the Force, but now that was gone, and with it the ripples Dooku was causing were spreading.
No… not Dooku. In that brief moment, when the future changed abruptly to include the lives of the Jedi who should have died, there had been a brief moment. A very brief moment before the ripples had begun again where Sidious had been able to use his senses almost without anything obscuring his sight. In that moment he had seen that it wasn't Dooku who was the center of the, the maelstrom of chaos that was spreading from around his actions.
Instead it was someone else, a young human man, who literally blazed in the Living Force do his senses. It is him, him the one who causes such change, such disorder. I need to know more, much more about him, about who he is, where he came from, everything! He has already affected the Grand Plan tremendously, luring Dooku away from where he could have become my apprentice, and thus my public face. While I will be able to turn his actions to my advantage, Dooku's loss still hurts badly. If this young man cannot be turned to our advantage in such a way as to make up for that, he must be disposed of quickly!
OOOOOOO
Back in the seating area, Ranma was staring around at all the alien Jedi masters, trying and failing to place them in his limited knowledge of the species to be found in this dimension. Their prisoner's a Devaronian like a few of the spacers I saw on Malastare, and that one is a Zabrak, like that chick at the bar with the boyfriend who hit on me. But other than that... damn this really forces ya to realize how many species there are in this universe! Cannot… wait… to… explore it! So many styles, so much time!
On the other hand, why the heck is it so damp in here? I gotta wonder how that's gonna impact the computers and other stuff? I guess I should be glad whatever it is didn't impact this ship's ability ta fly.
Yet even among the humans there were differences. There was the odd headdress the darker-skinned woman wore, which made her look rather silly in his opinion. Then there was the younger human male who seemed to have a problem with Ranma judging by his glances in Ranma's direction. The other two humans, the black man and the older looking man with long hair, reminded Ranma of the first time Dooku and he met, calm and serene, radiating a certain tried strength, though in his opinion not as much as Dooku did.
Yet that was not the most important thing he noticed looking at them all. The blonde-haired woman Ranma had saved initially was actually shorter than his female form! Holy shit, I thought it was just because she was standing next to the big guy, but she really is that short! I won't be the shortest girl in the room anymore, awesome!
As he looked around Ranma was almost ignored in turn as Master Choi explained that he had come upon their prisoner trying to send out a message. That message had subsequently been traced to a small hidden planetoid deeper into the star system well out of the life bearing zone of the system.
"We think he was on Yitheeth to provide some technical assistance to the Yinchorri, but there might be something more going on. He has not talked yet, but he will. He is a mercenary, and such will always sell their employers out to save their skins given the alternatives."
Mace nodded, and was about to turn his attention back to the youth with the strange Force powers when Koon spoke up from where he was manning the sensors up in the cockpit. "My friends, I think you should all come and see this."
From where he Dooku smiled faintly, knowing they had just left the atmosphere. A second later the central hologram in the sitting area lit up, showing a tactical screen of the system.
When the Jedi had jumped into the system, there had been around forty-four enemy signals showing capital ships and fighter platforms, with seven defensive installations scattered around the three planets, two, two, three respectively. Now those installations were gone. And the remaining mobile units of the Yinchorri were in full retreat towards the area of space where Choi had already estimated the signal was going towards. They also only numbered fifteen red blips of various sizes.
Pursuing them were two fleets of green icons. Many of those blips were harrying the Yinchorri back towards their previously hitting command center. Others were above the planet's, slowly pulling away from them to join their fellows. Above Yinchorr, the four ships apparently assigned to that planet were even now moving out of their orbit towards the Jedi's cruisers.
"Those ships are reading as Battle Tide and Proud Explorer of the Dac Defense Fleet, and Quickstrike and Pointed Argument of the Sluis Sector Defense Fleet. In fact all of the friendly ships are reading as Sluisi or Mon Calamari ships." Plo Koon reported from where he was seated next to Obi-Wan.
"What exactly is going on here Master Dooku?" asked master Tiin looking at the other man. "This is not the Republic fleet; these are portions of the defense fleets of those two sectors."
"I was reminded recently that we Jedi alone cannot shoulder the burden of defending the peace of the Republic. The various species that make it up need to do the same, and I was able to convince the Governor of Dac and the Khedive of the Congregate to aid us here." Dooku replied, smiling faintly.
Adi Gallia frowned. "What did you promise them?" She was a Consular, and was very aware of the factions in the Senate, so she understood these two races were not normally allied. They were alike in many ways, but their systems were not in direct trade or competition so their interests rarely dovetailed, save on a very few issues.
"My personal backing along with the Chancellor's in the Senate to give their trade fleets the same rights that the Trade Federation recently won a few months ago: the ability to arm their merchant ships against pirate attacks. Before anyone objects I'll note that neither of them has evidenced any desire to build up the massive droid army that the Federation has since begun building, nor are they known for, or indeed have any need to be, expansionistic. They simply wish to defend their own ships as they go about their business."
"Interesting…" said Windu, now looking at Ranma, who was talking quietly to K'kruhk. Unlike Gallia, who now looked aghast, he didn't particularly care about the politics of the matter. The Padawan was bowing his head slightly to the shorter human, possibly thanking him for saving his master's life. "But not what I was asking about, at least not the entirety."
Ranma turned, nodding his head at the larger alien, glad he'd agreed to answer Ranma's questions about his species later. He stared at the bald black man who strangely enough reminded him of some American actor. Can't remember his name but definitely some kind of likeness there. Parallel evolution or something? "You talking about me?"
"I am indeed young man." said Mace, nodding his head, while nearby Obi-wan frowned again at Ranma's tone. "You said your name is Ranma, but I have heard nothing about where you came from, or where you learned that strange technique you used, or how you somehow took the Force Warrior training well beyond what should be physically possible. I've never heard the like that before, and your combat skills and physical strength are astonishing."
"Ranma's tale is one that I would wish to tell to master Yoda and the Council in person and only once, when we are certain it cannot be overheard." Dooku said firmly. "For now, he is an ally of ours, correct Ranma?"
"You Jedi are a force for good, your Code is in one I can respect. Too narrow minded, stupid and arrogant for me, but at least you try to do good." Ranma nodded.
"What's stupid about the oaths?" said Adi Gallia, trying hard not to be offended by the almost dismissive tone Ranma used, while Mater Koth and Obi-wan did the same. The Oath of the Jedi was one of the main pillars of the Order. To have it so easily dismissed was like dismissing the entire Order.
"Any more discussion on this will not be occurring in the presence of a prisoner, no matter the fact his ears are covered." Said Master Giiett firmly. He was a Sentinel, one of the Jedi who were trained far more than the norm in espionage tactics and making do without the Force, and knew precisely why Dooku wanted to keep Ranma's abilities secret. "Indeed, let us leave this discussion for now and concentrate on the main issue. Or do you really think that we should simply be standing around here and letting others do our work for us?"
"Not your work, though that's a nice sentiment, its everyone's work." Ranma replied with a smile. "Told it to Dooku, tell it to you. For evil to win, good people must do nothing. Those ships out there, they doing something."
"A remarkably simplistic yet imminently suitable way to look at the universe." Said Plo Koon, nodding his head towards Ranma. "For my part young man, I will thank you and Master Dooku both for your intervention on our behalf. You saved many lives today, at least three of our own and I noticed you also saved many of the Yinchorri as well."
There were some raised eyebrows at that as Ranma looked a little sheepish pulling at his pigtail. Plo Koon looked around, his body language showing his amusement to those who knew him. "None of you noticed? Young Ranma might've been throwing the Yinchorri around like they were small children, but I think he only killed about one out of every five he struck. With our insistence on using lightsabers we would've been forced to kill far more."
The reactions to that bit of news were mixed but Ranma tried to wave it off. "If you injure someone, you tie up him and at least two others to take care of him."
"Possibly if the Yinchorri were a normal military that would be true." Giiett stared at him thoughtfully then over at Dooku who was simply smiling benignly as he moved over to a refresher station to pick up a bottle of tea. "But not the Yinchorri. They care nothing for losses so long as they win. Why did you not kill them? It was in your power to do so."
"That's a trick question." Ranma said narrowing his eyes at the short, somewhat overweight-seeming man.
"I am sorry I have been remiss." Dooku said smiling blandly. "Ranma, be known to Mace Windu, Swordmaster of the Jedi Order. These are Masters Choi, Master Giiett and Adi Gallia of the council, and Master Koon who is not part of the council. Master Tiin is up in the cockpit, the rather short…haired… woman is Lilit Twoseas whose padawan you have already met. Master Choi, his padawan whose name I am sorry I don't know, Master Qui-Gon Jinn and his young Padawan Obi-Wan round out this gathering."
Ranma nodded at them all, smirking a little as Lillit huffed at the allusion to her size but Mace continued to stare at him commandingly. "I would like an answer to Master Giiett's question please."
Ranma rolled his eyes, not intimidated by the older man. "Killing is never a good thing, never something to be embraced without reservation. If you can get by without killing, should do that instead. I am a martial artist. My Code is that the strong, that martial artists, should defend the weak. If we face an enemy, if that enemy is prepared take lives, he is prepared to lose his own. But even that should not be embraced if there is an alternative. In a fight like that, taking them out of the action was just as easy as killing them. It cost me nothing, but let me retain my honor."
"Are you sure you're not a Jedi?" said master Giiett, smiling over at K'kruhk and the other padawans, who were looking very thoughtful now, thoughtful and guilty along with Lilit and Gallia, neither of whom had been on combat missions for some time. It was all too easy to forget that taking life should never be easy, even to Jedi. "That was a remarkably Jedi-like moment there."
Ranma smiled at him, but shook his head. "Sorry, I'm not a eunuch, and I want to own things. At least my own ship eventually, maybe some other stuff."
More than one of his listeners frowned or chuckled at what he said. Obi Wan and Mace in particular looked affronted by the 'eunuch' comment, while Qui-Gon looked strangely wistful, and Gallia and Lilit looked nonplussed. Koon and Choi smiled however, knowing the allure of owning your own ship was a powerful one. K'kruhk and his fellow non-human padawan both looked confused, not understanding the reference.
Ranma went on, his voice becoming grimmer. "And I refuse to be tied into serving a corrupt government."
Koth, Gallia and Choi all looked like they were going to take umbrage for that, but Tiin came in from the cockpit just then. "My fellow masters, there is a call coming in over the Hypercom from the Temple. I've routed it back to the hologram desk here."
Ranma moved out of the way of the pickup, and Mace and Dooku looked at one another before nodding. Yes, the strange Force powers the youth showed was something they needed to keep secret for now. His ethics seemed to be in line with that of the Jedi, at least so far. But he was also too anti-authoritarian for Mace's taste and maybe even the rest of the Council would be unwilling to look the other way around him.
His embracing his emotions and the desire to form attachments were also worrisome, as well as his general attitude toward the Jedi. But Mace was willing to withhold judgment for now, until this current crisis ended. Or until I discern what the youth represents a shatterpoint for.
A second after Plo Koon entered, the council room back on Coruscant popped into view. Yoda and the other master relayed what had occurred, causing many of the masters to close their eyes in sorrow at the loss of life, and for Ranma, unseen by the pickup to start to punch the wall of the sitting room so hard he left a dent. After that master Yaddle came on, informing them of the discovery of a fourth planet, a small one that was so near the sun it was almost invisible to most scanners unless you knew it was there to look for in the first place. Inside of which would be the perfect place to put a hidden command center
A moment later the call cut off, and more than one master was rubbing their foreheads irritably. "If we had waited before heading in, we could've found where it was simply by going through the records?" Giiett said, shaking his head. "This should teach us all, my fellow masters, to look before jumping into something. We could be mourning deaths among our brethren now rather than feeling simply foolish if not for Master Dooku and young Ranma's aid."
"Hindsight is 20-20." Ranma said, rallying them once more and nodding his head at the hologram, which had reverted to showing the system again. "We have two fleets ready to finish this, what are you going to do now?"
Dooku looked over at Mace and nodded his head. "This was your mission before I poked my nose in, would you like to address to the admirals?"
OOOOOOO
While Mace talked to the two admirals and the prisoner was taken to the maintenance room, Ranma quickly became bored. He sighed, stood up from the circular sofa, moving to an area right behind it before going into a kata. He closed his eyes, smiling slightly as he moved into a Saotome-Ryu special kata which was built for speed and body control. He ducked, weaved, punched kicked, each move going faster until he was a blur even to a Jedi's enhanced senses.
Yet there was an amazing level of control in the kata, almost a beauty in it to those watching. Slowly the conversation among the masters sitting around faded as they turned to look at Ranma. But with his eyes closed Ranma didn't even notice.
Dooku smirked a little, looking up from a game of holochess he had begun with his former apprentice to watch as the padawans and other masters stopped speaking to one another about the adventures they'd run into in this system to stare at Ranma.
Adi frowned faintly, looking over at Master Koon. "Are my senses deceiving me, or is he slipping into some kind of meditation trance?"
"The answer is of a sort yes, Master Gallia." Dooku supplied, leaning back. "I suppose you could say so, but he is not, as we would do, sending out his senses into the Force. Rather Ranma concentrates inward, and brings out his inner energy, what we call the Living Force."
"He's… he's sending out little flashes of the Living Force into the Unifying Force. I've never heard the like." Qui-Gon murmured, now looking at Ranma with far more interest. Could he be the Chosen One?
Qui-Gon was one of many Jedi who had felt the Unifying Force of the universe slowly turning away from the Light for several years now, and he felt that this tendency would be turned around only by finding the Chosen one, a Jedi who would be able to restore balance to the Force. Although, Qui-Gon thought Ranma was rather old for such and certainly was no Jedi. But he's so alive with the Living Force, how was he not found when he was younger?
"Young Ranma is a man of many mysteries, many of which he and I have not even discussed yet." Dooku replied.
"He's a rather opinionated young man, I know that much." Gallia said, trying to keep her voice even, and failing. Ranma's denigration of the Jedi Order's code and his disrespectful way of addressing the Jedi rankled despite his aid in the battle and her own self-control.
"Perhaps, but does that mean he is wrong?" Dooku smiled, watching as the other masters turned to him in shock. "I am simply saying that perhaps it is time we Jedi rethink things. The universe is changing, and we must change in some fashion to meet it."
"Master Dooku, that sounds almost disloyal! The Order has survived for thousands of years because of the Oath!" Master Choi said, shaking his lizard-like head.
"And those Oaths, the aloof nature they demand of us, mean we are out of touch with the rest of the universe. We are seen as outsiders, as meddlers, regardless of what we do. If we were more open, more connected to the common man perhaps we would have more support from them rather than scorn and distrust." Dooku countered, noticing that Plo Koon and Giiett were not taking part of the debate but watching Ranma. Perhaps this wasn't the moment to start his assault on the status quo, but Gallia had given him an opening.
"We do not need to be part of the universal community or populace to do our duty." Replied Master Koth, shaking his head. "Indeed, our duty to the Republic is best served by not having attachments."
"Is it? Because as far as I can tell we have an attachment to the Senate." Dooku replied calmly, his voice a scalpel taken to Koth's response. "It is the Senate and the Council who decide where we go. And far too often we Jedi have simply decided in favor of the Senate without looking at all the facts or worse. I can remember several dozen times off the top of my head just from this past year and a half where Jedi Knights and Masters were sent to aid diplomatic talks only to back the Senate in what turned out to be an unjust or unlawful decision."
"And before you say that we could perform our duties better if we spent more time on practicing law, let me remind you that all Jedi already have to master at least a rudimentary understanding of the Republic laws, regardless of their specific School. Because we are doing the Senate's dirty work for it, we are becoming seen as their hatchet men."
"We are the stewards of the Republic, we are not outside its laws and can best aid in keeping order by making certain others keep its laws, however distasteful that action may be at times to others. Our Oaths have allowed us to keep the peace for a thousand years, have allowed us to survive and to keep the dark side in check not only within the Order but within the universe." Gallia replied firmly. "Attachment to the universe can lead to love, greed or jealousy and a lust for power, which inevitably leads to the Dark Side."
"You make it sound so simple, so automatic." Dooku said wonderingly. "As if the moment we become attached to someone we are destined to become angry or frightened if that something or someone is injured in some fashion, and if by the barest blip of anger we are doomed to fall to the Dark Side. And yet we are attached to one another, are we not? The Order has never stopped Jedi from making friends within the order, and those are not seen as dangerous."
"There is a difference between friendship and love. Love is far less controllable than friendship. There are limits to how far someone will go for friendship, not so with love." said Koth. He frowned, glancing over at the other two masters who were not taking part of the discussion.
Instead both of them were watching Ranma still, their faces thoughtful. Why are they not taking part? They are part of the Council as master Gallia and I are. Shouldn't they be working with us against this assault on the Jedi code?
In actuality, the two masters were not taking part because they chose not to. Both of them had their own questions about the Jedi and their Oaths, though they came at it from different directions.
Master Koon felt that the Jedi should be more independent of the Senate, and should concentrate more on doing good deeds for those who needed their aid, like in the Outer Rim. He also was concerned about the fact that the Order sequestered and forbid knowledge, and had done so too quickly at times in the past, with those decisions not rescinded later on.
Giiett came at it from the other direction. He had served with those Jedi Knights and Masters whose task it was to bring in new youngling's to the Temple at times, and had seen the faces of the parents as their children were taken away. Sometimes they were proud, happy to have a Jedi in the family, or simply happy that someone else understood how to address their children's strange powers.
But other times, other times it did not go as smoothly. It sometimes took all of a Jedi Master's diplomacy to talk parents into letting their child go without violence. Worse, there were rumors that violence had been occasionally used, and that did nothing for the Order's reputation. Surely therefore, if parents and children wanted to remain in contact, those attachments were positive ones, and should be encouraged?
He was also a student of human psychology, and knew that for humans and similar species the Oath forced a mindset on them that came too close to being untenable, and frankly damaging for his state of mind. It was why he went out of his way to foster a sense of humor, to show his emotions at times and insist others do the same including his own former padawans.
Across from Dooku Obi-Wan leaned close to whisper into his master's ear. "Master, why are you not taking part of this debate?"
"Why are you not my young padawan?"
"I am a padawan." said Obi-Wan, bowing his head slightly. "It would be disrespectful of me to join a debate in which masters are taking part."
"You need to get over that humility of yours." Qui-Gon replied sternly. "At times it serves a Jedi well but at others humility can be its own kind of arrogance." He watched Obi-Wan's eyes widen, and he shook his head. "We'll speak more of that later, some time in the Temple will do us both good I think. As to why I am not taking part in the debate, it is because I am uncertain were my own opinion would fall."
That admission caused all three of the padawans to look at him in surprise, while master Choi cocked his head thoughtfully.
"I will hear no more of this." said Koth, bringing everyone's attention back to the debate. "Master Dooku, you are very close to a dangerous line."
"Since when is debate and questioning a bad thing?" Dooku asked smoothly, though his eyes flashed dangerously at the other master's almost dismissive tone. "The moment you decide to shut down all discussion, you have already lost the debate. The Jedi way is one of thoughtful debate, not a mental dictatorship!"
"Your order is built on sophistry." said Ranma suddenly, coming out of his semi-meditation and stopping his exercise. He ran his hands through his hair for a moment as he looked around at the Jedi Masters.
"Explain that young man." said Koth, turning to him sharply.
"I have looked at your history, what Dooku could share with me, what I could see on the Holonet." Ranma said slowly, making certain that each word came out correctly. Speaking in Basic was still not automatic for him, but he was getting there. "There is a pattern there. Every time your opponents, the Sith, come back, you grow to match them in some fashion, then restrict yourselves, cutting off bits and pieces of knowledge. You say fear, anger, hate is the way to the Dark Side, but your entire order reacts fearfully in times like that."
"There were good reasons for every moment you describe." Said Koth shaking his head and smiling slightly at what he saw as ignorance or perhaps Master Dooku trying to put his own slant on things. "Nor are the Sith alone the sole enemy we Jedi have faced. Far too often the threat has come from within our own ranks, brothers fallen into darkness, led astray by false teachings. At other times it was the public perception of things that forced us to change, such as after the Last Sith War. With the Sith banished for all time, we had to give up military and political strength into the hands of the Senate, which whatever Dooku has told you is a duly elected body that is trusted to lead the Republic."
"But we are not weaker for that. And at others, it was a threat rising from within the order, such as Revan or other Jedi falling into the Dark Side due to the lenient nature of the oath at the time. The Ruusan Reformation changed both those things, cutting us off from attachments to wealth and power, and to families which would inevitably lead to divided loyalties and favoritism."
"So instead of thinking of ways to teach better self-control, you started to teach abstinence instead. Hate to tell you, but humans, we cannot simply shut off our emotions. There's a word for people who don't have emotions like that, who can't see other people's opinions might matter, who are not empathic or understanding that emotions are important, it's called sociopath. Generally speaking it's not a good thing."
To one side Giiett raised a hand to cover his slight smile, as he heard Ranma use some of the arguments he had already brought to Master Yoda's attention several times. Admittedly, he was more respectful and had never actually openly challenged the Oaths of the order, but Yoda at least was aware of his concerns there. Dismissive of those concerns yes, but aware of them.
"The Jedi Order is made of far more species than just humanity, or even those who are mentally and emotionally similar to humanity. We have to think of what is good for all, the greater good is more important than trying to make all sentients happy."
Ranma shook his head. "One size cannot fit all. Worse, because you think it can, you're not growing! What can't grow stagnates! I am living proof that there is more to ki, the Living Force as you call it, then you think." Ranma held up a hand, and it glowed with blue gold fire for a moment, the Living Force given form in a way that none of the Masters there had ever seen or even heard of before Ranma showed up on the battlefield today.
"This is nothing compared to some of the tricks I can do. Where I come from, there are masters who understand and know that there is no stopping point when you are learning about ki. But you Jedi have stopped learning! You've been around for thousands upon thousands of years, far longer than humanity on my world has ever existed, but we know how to do things that you would find impossible."
Ranma sighed angrily, shaking his head. "Worse, you Jedi are too caught up in Light and Dark rather than right and wrong. Dooku is right about that, too often you think you know what is right, when you really don't, when you cannot understand the consequences of your own actions. And you willingly turn a blind eye to evil at the same time. Why, if you are an order devoted to order and law, is there still a slave trade? You Jedi do good, but you could do so much more!"
Koth stared at the boy shaking his head. "You speak in ignorance." He said kindly. "When we return to the Temple, I am certain that Master Yoda will be able to talk you around to the real answer. The Order is always right, that is why we have survived as long we have, and our knowledge is far deeper than the parlor tricks you have exhibited so far. Just because we cannot use all our powers in combat as you can, do not think us weak or uninformed."
Dooku winced at that, shaking his head at Koth's own ignorance. But he hadn't seen Ranma in action from up close like Tiin or Koon had, and that colored his interaction with him.
"If by real answer, you mean indoctrinated, he's welcome to try." Ranma growled angrily. "I've already been indoctrinated once by my father, and that didn't take for long! Problem with indoctrination is, once you're out in the real world it always starts to fail!"
"Master Koth is correct about one thing at least, the time for this debate has not yet come. I think Ranma that you need to cool off for now." said Dooku, sensing Mace was nearly finished with his discussion with the admirals, and deciding to end things here for now." He smirked, and with the Force turned on one of the little training balls in a nearby alcove, which Tune and the Verpine had redesigned. Instead of a small burst of low powered blaster fire it was equipped with water gun.
Ranma turned quickly, but not quickly enough to dodge the glass of water, which caught him/her right in the face. She growled, wiping at her wet face as the Jedi, both masters and padawans, gaped in astonishment. They had felt the surge of joyful humor as the change occurred through the Force and had wondered about it, until they saw the change in Ranma's body.
"How?" said Qui-Gon, speaking for them all. "How did that just happen!? Actually, what just happened?"
"Magic." Ranma said, shaking her head again. "Though Dooku says that it's something to do with the Force, don't know about that really. I don't use the Unifying Force or whatever you call chi. And Dooku," she growled looking over at the man as she pulled off her shirt for a moment wringing it out. "You know that I can't change my shirt! The washers got no power remember?"
Ranma's sheets and clothing had been in the wash (again…) when the news about the Yinchorri had come in. After that, the ship's washer and dryer had been disconnected from the ship's energy grid as one of the many alterations the crew had made to save enough energy so they could power the weapons systems.
She glared angrily at the male masters all of whom were gaping at her, in particular Obi-Wan who was blushing brightly. Holding her hand over her chest she pointed at them angrily. "Close your eyes or lose them!"
"But," said Qui-Gon, said shaking his head again. "How in the…" Then he was forced to hold up a hand quickly using the Force to block several small toothpicks that had been aimed at his eyes, wondering idly where they had come from in the first place. Giiett, who had turned away, reached out a hand as well, redirecting two more that had been going for Obi-Wan's eyes.
They instead smacked into his forehead with punishing force and he howled in pain for a moment. "OWW! Why!?"
"That was a perfectly appropriate response for being ogled." Said Lilit, and Gallia nodded in agreement. "Though simply saying 'magic' doesn't really explain how …er…" she floundered to a halt.
"That another problem with your Order." Ranma grumbled, before repeating herself more slowly as she pulled her shirt back on, still growling angrily at Dooku, who was ignoring her, smiling faintly at the responses the curse had gotten.
She turned away, starting up a small hot water dispenser in the corner. "You Jedi have no ability to roll with the punches. I told you, it's magic. I was cursed a few years ago. I was knocked into a pool of drowned girl, came out like this. I was born a guy, no my mind doesn't change, yes it is a massive irritant! And yes…" she said staring at Lilith and Gallia master. "It is a full body change."
Both of them seemed to get it at once, exchanging a glance of wide-eyed surprise. "Does that mean you get a… monthly visit?" asked Lilit.
"Yes, though it's only when my time in this form accumulates rather than every normal month. I could also be raped in this form. Something, something which I've had some nightmares about."
Ranma was looking for understanding there since he'd had those nightmares several times since undoing the damage Genma had done to his mind and body. He had hoped to talk to a woman about them, assuming that they would understand such fears better than any man. But he didn't get any sympathy or understanding. Both female Masters blanched, frowning and looking away, but that was all.
"Fear leads to the Dark Side." said master Koth, who had never even heard the word rape before, insulated within the Order as he had been his entire life, something that made the more worldly masters shaking their heads. "You should face your fears."
Ranma snarled, her hands clenching and unclenching. She was about to go for the Zabrak but the beeping of the heater told her the water had finished heating and she turned back counting to 10 for a moment. She poured the hot water over her head, changing back to a male and grimacing a little. "We'll have to agree to disagree on that one, you insensitive fuck."
The master stiffened at her response, and more than one of the other Masters also frowned, though the two female Masters did not. Nor did the long-haired one, who was busy remonstrating with his padawan at the moment for his inappropriate staring.
While Obi-wan had been desensitized somewhat to the female form during certain missions with his master, that didn't mean he was entirely dead to the attraction of such. And the redhead was a very attractive example of a female form.
"I apologize in advance." Lilit said, moving over to Ranma and taking a cup of water that Choi had been drinking from. "But I'm not certain I believe what I just saw."
Ranma sighed then nodded. "Get it out of your system now." He said in a sort of singsong voice, plopping herself down next to the extremely short blonde woman.
With a smile on her face Gallia moved behind Ranma towards the water heater, heating up some more water while the blonde haired master poured cold water over Ranma, staring at him as the change began, all of her senses open to the Force at the same time.
The Force is laughing! She thought to herself. It's the only explanation for the feeling I'm getting, a sort of snickering. The Force has a sense of humor, that is the most utterly bizarre yet profound statement I have ever heard of.
She was not the only one coming to the conclusion though more than one master was frowning at it. They saw it as a very strange and unusual distortion of the Force rather than something to be amused by.
The two female Masters continued to change Ranma back and forth, and Ranma sighed as he remembered the first time Ukyo had seen his curse in action. He smiled faintly at the memory shaking his head at how easy, yet how limited his life had been then.
Obi-wan looked away blushing brightly for a moment, shaking his head slightly while Qui-Gon smirked at him. "Obi-Wan you and I have been on missions where we've gone into dens of iniquity, were the most amazing bodies were on display. Why exactly is this young redhead affecting you so?"
"I don't know master…" He said slightly, still looking away and rubbing at of his forehead where the toothpicks had impacted. He did not want to lose an eyeball, as he probably would have if not for master Giiett's intervention. "I think it's because she isn't trying to display herself, it's just an accidental thing? Does that even make sense?"
"Somewhat I suppose…" Said the older man, frowning heavily. "It's not exactly an area that I've ever delved into of course."
Dooku smiled, seeing that his attempt to derail the serious conversation had gone appropriately. He turned back to his chest game, motioning with his hand to his former student who nodded, and turned back as well. Around the conversations continued on, with the two female Masters simply stared again at Ranma's change.
Around twelve minutes later Mace came in from the cockpit. "The fleets are ready to move in." He said, looking around, an eyebrow rising in surprise at how wet Ranma seemed to be. "Did I miss something?"
"Oh yes." said Gallia, getting to her feet. "But I'm afraid I'm not even going to try to explain it. You really do have to see it for yourself."
Mace's other eyebrow rose to join the first, but he shrugged. "The fleet is ready to move in, but we have our own part to play. I suggest we all prepare ourselves."
About fifteen minutes later the fleets regrouped directly outside the defensive cordon of the hidden asteroid base, taking the time to both regroup and get a reading on the defenses. The Jedi also had hoped that the Council of Elders would sue for peace now that they had lost control of their planet's orbitals. That did not happen, and so Admiral Sitoris led the combined Sluisi/Mon Calamari fleet in.
They drove forward in a wedge, with the Mon Cal ships in front. Since they had better shielding and armor, they took the defensive fire on their shields while opening up a hole in the defense. With that done, and with some of their frigates and cruisers trailing atmosphere they fell back to either side, letting the Sluisi into the breach. The Sluisi spread behind the orbital stations taking out several more while the starfighters of both fleets zoomed on engaging the few remaining Yinchorri capital ships with their own hoarded concussion missiles and proton torpedoes.
Behind the fighters the Kaiseki surged into hyperspace. While the two fleets continued to hammer their opposing numbers, the Jedi with Tiin at the controls did a micro jump, jumping forwards towards the base, deep into its defensive envelope.
Yet even so, the defenders were quick to respond to the ship suddenly appearing in their firing arcs. Turbolasers blasted out, and more than one missile lanced out, only to be spoofed away from the ship by its electronic defenses, handled by Tune and Master Choi.
"Shields failing!" Tiin growled, looking over at Plo Koon who was trying to divert energy from the top shields to the bottom ones, and then from there to the front, trying to stay ahead of where the heaviest fire hit them. "Find us a target quickly, or we won't be able to find one at all!"
"I found one," said Choi. "It's an entrance to an inner hangar bay! Large enough for this ship and several dozen more! Left and down, then forward!"
As the fleets of the combined fleet broke through the defensive cordon around the planetoid the Jedi's ship flew into the hangar. "Nice of them to leave the door unlocked, if not unguarded!" Tiin shouted, moving the craft this way and that dodging laser fire from below and above from weapons emplaced on the ceiling of the massive hangar.
"Man, I have got to learn how to do this." Ranma grumbled from the entrance to the cockpit, having come up to watch the action, though this had more to feeling somewhat helpless in the space battle than anything else. "Being a passenger isn't for me."
Dooku didn't reply, having remained behind in the sitting area with most of the others. The pilots however smiled slightly while searching the ground beneath them for someplace to put down.
"We'll be an easy target if we hover out here. I can only see one alternative. Master Windu?" Asked Tiin, smiling thinly.
"Take it!"
Ranma grinned, grabbing the frame of the bulkhead. "Incoming!"
Moving forward at speed the ship slammed into what looked like an observation deck at the far back of the massive hangar bay. Its front armor crumbling, it burst through the glass and the rock around it.
Ranma shook his head from the impact a little having smashed his head. Turning he raced away, moving quickly through the ship towards the hatch. There he found a few of the masters and K'kruhk trying to open it. "The machine's still working, but there's some rubble in the way, we'll have to cut our way out somewhere else."
By the time they got back to the sitting area, Master Windu and Dooku had already done so out of the top of the ship. For a brief second they stood there surveying the area before leaping out and attacking the guards who'd rushed to try and defend their Masters.
Ranma was the first of the others out of the ship, bounding over the two Masters grabbing a small metal pipe that was sticking out from one of the damaged walls. He pushed himself back down, slamming into a crowd of guards that had just barreled out of a tunnel.
Several of them flew backwards from the impact, and he grabbed two of them, slamming their heads together and slinging them aside before selecting taking another with such force that he was propelled back down the tunnel with no way out of the pen.
"Stop! Stop don't kill us, we surrender!" Said a voice from behind him.
Ranma turned incredulously. "What? But, huh?" These guys are the leaders of these assholes right, so, wouldn't that make them the strongest? What the hell, man, talk about anti-climactic!
Mace shook his head, motioning Ranma to join them as he stared at the leaders of the Yinchorri, who were huddling together at the beck of the observation area. "What was it that master Ranisicis said about the philosophy of might makes right?"
"That it is often recanted upon meeting a more powerful adversary." Master Gallia replied, smiling thinly.
"Master Dooku," said Windu, turning away. "If you could please get on the communications device and tell Admirals Sitoris and Arikkakon that the battle seems to be over. As for you," he said turning back to the leaders of the Yinchorri. "You will be sending out a broadcast to your people to surrender, then we will be talking about the Devaronians, and what they gave you, and how they required it..."
End chapter
So, yeah this chapter was meant to show the timeline, start the ball rolling in the changes to come, get Ranma a droid for his own use (everyone needs an astromech, and trust me, Tune isn't going to be defenseless by a long shot) though he might get another droid later on, we'll see. The crewmen are OC's obviously, and won't be used again in this story.
To my mind, Palpatine is at his most dangerous right now, when he can't act openly, and when he can move without anyone really knowing it's him. I think he became power-hungry once he actually declared himself emperor. But right now he is the worst sort of enemy for the Jedi and Ranma. He'll be able to roll with the punches and make events go his way regardless.
I… I honestly am not pleased with the Jedi discussions in this chapter. I found myself unable to really debate from the Council's position about the Oaths, my own opinion colored my thinking too much, and unfortunately, while my reviewers all had some good ideas, they didn't quite fit the scenes as they came out.
Let me state right now, Ranma will not be reforming the order or anything like that. He will show them they don't know anything, kick them in the ass a few times, and generally rub their noses into the fact that the Force is far bigger than they think. It will be up to the order to change itself after that.
Next chapter Ranma meets the rest of the Jedi council, gets freaked out by Coruscant, argues with Yoda and meets Shaak Ti! Hopefully when I put it out you'll all like what I do with her. Frankly looking forward to it myself. Will not be posting another chapter of this story however until WW is done, the next chapter of which should be out in a few days. I will try to get out an ATP chapter by the Superbowl.
Oh, and if anyone knows any good M! character centric Dragon Age fics, which aren't wedded to canon for preference, I'd like to read them. I am frankly disturbed by how few good fics exists in this fandom.