The Force Wills - Chapter 142

My breathing was harsh and deep.

Hissing through my teeth as I resisted with all my might.

Resisting the plunge, to give in to the assault writhing its way from below, through every nerve and rushing into my brain.

I looked down from only seeing an endless night sky, partially obscured by nearby artificial lighting.

Beyond my breasts, which were rising, falling, shifting and rippling with each harsh breath and the expanse of my abdomen - my eyes met the intense gaze of the one who was torturing me. One mischievous natural eye, the other red, harsh and artificial.

Her lips were firmly locked on those between my legs, her tongue darting in, out, swirling.

“Frakking! Ahh-…” I gasped, cutting off the moan that threatened to spill out, my hips instinctively bucking, trying to lessen the pleasure.

She was having none of that. Her blue arms were locked around my thighs, unyielding as beskar and she increased her efforts, even creating a small vacuum with her lips, letting it pop.

The sensation hit me like a blaster bolt. It took all my strength just to remain partially sitting up on my elbows and a cry of pleasure tore itself from my throat.

Finally, some mercy, she let go, but it was only to reposition - both her thighs locking themselves around my left leg. Her own nether lips crashed into mine and she began twisting and twirling her hips, supporting her own weight on her palms.

The wet sound of it rang into my montrals, even as the pleasure built and built. Then my attention was forcibly wrenched away-

I suddenly comprehended my location - a familiar stage, spotlights were glaring down onto me and… Vryss?... as we continued to grind into each other.

“Everyone! Everyone! Welcome to Preigo’s Galaxy of Wonder! For your viewing pleasure, we have Ahsoka Tano and Vryss Korr!” declared the ringmaster.

I gasped, moaned, writhed - trapped and tormented with pleasure, even as the invisible crowd beyond the glaring lights cheered, whistled and clapped.

The sheer shock, excitement and not a small amount of embarrassment thundered through me, piling on top of the pleasure, even as my own hips began moving in concert with Vryss - seeking more pleasure, seeking the release of climax.

My perceptions suddenly shifted, my body twisting.

I surged awake, throwing my blanket off me, sitting up and gasping for air in my dark quarters aboard the Resolute.

“Computer, Dim Lights!” I growled with annoyance.

A few moments to calm down as the lights came on, I called on the Force, regaining equilibrium.

“Wet dreams, yay,” I sang flatly.

A quick look at the chrono told me I could’ve slept for another hour, had my subconscious and body not conspired to throw the utterly ridiculous scenario of me sleeping with Hondo’s very hot second in command, then throw the twist of it happening right on the circus stage with everyone watching…cheering…

No. Nope, not thinking about it further.

I jumped out of bed and quickly changed into a new set of underwear, whilst setting my personal caf machine to begin brewing a cup. I had splurged on getting the device after finally getting fed up with the walk from officer country to the mess hall.

With a steaming cup in hand I leaned against the wall nearby the other new addition to my quarters - the high definition holo projectors that were currently displaying an exterior view of Keitum from mid orbit - as if I actually had a direct transparisteel window. I wasn’t one to generally get claustrophobic, but I had also finally gotten sick of the enclosed nature of my quarters.

I took a sip and focused on what should’ve been a pristine view; the 42nd Fleet in orbit around a verdant world, but instead it was now visibly scarred with a thick line of black walking down one of the major continents. Fires visible from orbit were still raging down there.

Beyond the fleet, was a further mildly organized gathering of a few hundred ships; giant freighters, smaller cargo ships, armed frigates - all gathered from the worlds of the Malarian Alliance. A constant stream of shuttles and LAAT gunships were going up and down from the planet’s surface. Emergency relief supplies in one direction and critically wounded survivors being brought up.

The 501st and two other clone legions of the 42nd Fleet were down there doing rescue work as best they could. Using base construction tools and working with local engineers to dig through the rubble of the cities for survivors. Modern scans could generally detect the lifesigns of survivors even through debris - so it was not an unfocused effort.

That there were survivors was a minor miracle. As much damage as the orbital bombardment had done, it wasn’t the horror of a true Base Delta Zero. The droids and CIS officers behind them had simply fired single volleys and moved onto the next sectors, walking their fire down the continent in methodical fashion. There had been no saturation strikes or glassing down to bedrock.

I savored another sip as I also tried to come to terms with the memories of the last week.

Master Yoda had arrived in Ansion, taking command of the Crucible, ordering me to take a shuttle to Keitum and retake my post as fleet 2IC. However, it was mostly to shove me into Resolute’s sickbay to help the wounded survivors.

I’d already lost count of how many I’d healed and treated by the second day.

There had been no end to it since then and today I only had more of the same to look forward to. More crushed bones, burns, collapsed lungs, amputations of ruined limbs and more. Most of the Keitumite population were the natives who were small humanoids with smooth, mottled green-blue skin, elongated, expressive ears, large almond-shaped eyes for low-light vision, and subtle cranial ridges. I had to quickly learn their biology as I went and only early guidance from the Force prevented me from some tragic mistakes. Inevitably, I would also heal humans and twi’leks - having to do a number of very careful lekku repairs and unfortunately, even partial amputations.

The road to recovery for the latter was long, arduous and something that I would probably wish for Palpatine to experience.

The front door chime to my quarters resounded softly.

A flick of the Force triggered the lock and I took another long sip of caf as Anakin walked in.

“Sleep well, Snips?”

“As well as can be expected,” I grumbled.

He grabbed my pants from my desk chair and threw them at me, “Get dressed, we have an urgent briefing in Intel Division in ten minutes.”

I caught the garment and chugged the last dregs of caf.

“What’s happening?” I asked, threading my legs in.

He shook his head, “Can’t talk about it here.” 

I put on my Hapan top and boots. “That’s rather worrying.”

My lightsabers came flying to me as I secured my belt and hurried after Anakin as he walked out.

Intel Division was tucked away in the aft upper quadrant of the main superstructure of the ship. It was almost ninety square meters of space filled with computers, database secure storage and a number of holotanks. Sixteen intel analysts and spies were squeezed inside, they sat behind computer stations; doing cryptography, hyperspace signal analysis and Holonet trawling. And on board Resolute at least, none of them were clones. Each one was a vetted member of Republic Intelligence and not even Anakin or I were actually cleared to know most of their names. Naturally, that didn’t stop me and through Fulcrum I knew every single intel officer who came on board or left on rotation back to Coruscant. It was just part of the spy game that Fulcrum had to play now.

The current head of Intel on the ship was a Corellian woman by the name of Captain Ady Vaad.

She had a wiry, athletic build typical of Corellians who grew up navigating bustling shipyards and urban sprawls. Lightly tanned skin, weathered by coastal winds, with sharp green eyes that missed nothing. Her dark brown hair was cropped short for practicality, with a single streak of silver; Corellian tradition among some spacers to honor lost comrades. She wore a modified Republic Intelligence uniform; dark gray with green Corellian accents and the Corellian Bloodstripes on her trousers. Just what she did to get first class Bloodstripes, the highest military award that the Corellian Security Force could give, was still on the to-do list for Fulcrum.

She stood behind a holotank with folded hands behind her back, the glowing blue holo light, when combined with her fierce expression into it, gave a very ominous feeling to the whole room. I could feel her angry frustration seeping out into every nook and cranny. The analysts were also very wary of her at the moment, despite their usual professional composure.

Captain Vaad looked up at our approach, giving both Anakin and I respectful nods.

“General Skywalker, Commander Tano. Thank you for coming so quickly.”

“Captain,” Anakin nodded. “I suppose you have a very good reason for breaking protocol in this fashion.”

“Always,” she confirmed. “What we’re about to discuss can only be talked about within the highly secure confines of Intel Division. As much as I pride this department on keeping Resolute and the 42nd Fleet secure from the spying machinations of the enemy, we can never be hundred percent sure.”

“Understandable, now what’s the problem?”

She tapped a few keys on the holotank and the upper half of Mace Windu appeared inside. 

“Knight Skywalker, Padawan Tano,” the Jedi Master bowed his head slightly in greeting. “I’ll be quick as our encryption will only hold for so long. Captain Vaad is about to give you a briefing, carry out the mission she gives you. All will become clear once she does. Understood?”

I pushed my senses through the connection - it was actually Mace Windu, he was aboard another Venator - also within its Intel division. 

‘It’s really him, Snips?’

‘Yes.’

“Understood, Master.”

“Good, Windu out.”

“Now with that out of the way,” she said sardonically. “Republic Intelligence and the Grand Army as a whole is facing another crisis. Roughly around the same time as the Shadow Fleet was smashing Keitum, the Separatists switched encryption ciphers in their hyperspace communications. As you know, signals intelligence is a constant back and forth war of encryption and solving that with decryption. One side comes up with something new, the other solves it using a combination of specialist droids and computers - usually within a few days. However, as of today, Republic Intelligence is at day seven of not being able to crack the latest Separatist code and nothing is indicating that will change as it stands now.”

This was a catastrophe, something that would quickly begin to spill over into actual military disasters that would domino across multiple battlespaces across the galaxy.

If we truly couldn’t decode the enemy transmissions for intel on their movements, we went from proactive defense to reactive with all the delays associated with that. We wouldn’t know a frontline was getting reinforcements until scouts saw them coming and that would give only a day’s warning. It was especially a disaster in the north-east with the fluid combat and mazes of hyperlanes.

Anakin folded his arms, a severe frown on his face, “Can you tell me what specific problem your crypto-analysts are having?”

“Ordinarily that is classified, but our desperation has changed the situation. At this point, we’re throwing as many minds at the problem as we can find. Our working theory is that the Separatists have developed this encryption based on some form of the classic one-time model, but scaled up to an extremely high complexity. That means there is no forcing this encryption through standard Hirgo methods or models. Even the most powerful computers or droids would need millenia of computing time to solve it.”

Frakking bastard, Palpatine! The CIS was literally using what I had based Fulcrum’s communications on.   

Anakin nodded in understanding, “So the only solution is to actually find a Separatist encryption module that they would use to decode the cipher.”

“Correct, we need to infiltrate enemy space and steal one.”

Vaad tapped the holotank controls.

A galaxy map appeared before zooming into the northern Hydian Way, to a sector centered on Botajef and currently the most contested space of the war at the moment. It further zoomed into a system behind enemy lines called Hijado - a rather unremarkable system with only a single habitable planet with a decent sized human population that now firmly fell under the CIS aegis.

In orbit of that planet was a CIS dreadnought and its escort fleet.

“We’ve identified that this dreadnought was the origin point for the new form of Separatist encryption. It all began here, centered on the Indomitable. We’ve confirmed that it recently underwent a refit, and you can see its communication array is nearly four times the size of the standard Providence-class. It’s definitely acting as a com hub for the sector.”

“So we grab a scout vessel, sneak in under cloak, infiltrate, steal the encryption module, then get out,” Anakin shrugged.

“Were it that simple,” Vaad sighed. “The security inside the Indomitable was also significantly upgraded. It’s to the point that the chances for mission success are extremely low, especially because it’s not just about stealing the module - it’s also stealing it in such a way that the Separatists don’t know it’s gone. Otherwise they will simply change the module to a different standard and we’re right back to where we started.”

The holo changed to show a rather pretty red and gold R4 model astromech, “This is R4-K7 - we’ve rebuilt it to house an internal fabricator and molecular resolution scanning system. The ultimate goal is to get this droid into the high security com vault that houses the encryption module. It will scan and produce an exact molecular copy of the module, at which point you have to exfiltrate without raising the alarm. K7 has also been fitted with a disruptor-effect self-destruct system. We wouldn’t want the Separatists to get their hands on it, as the entire mission would be pointless the moment they analyse what its capabilities are. The current mission design with the best chance of success, is as follows.” She looked at me pointedly. “Commander Tano, your infiltration record is the best among the Jedi Order, so you will be leading it.”

I was entirely certain that the few Jedi Shadows that still existed would have much better results than me, but I doubted the Order would assign them to a mission like this or even expose their abilities to the GAR. 

“And I can’t come because there’s no way that I could entrust fleet command to General Skoll and Admiral Yularen is on his way to Coruscant,” Anakin scowled.

“Correct, General. Second in command of the mission will be Colonel Gascon, who is a few hours away from arrival along with the other members.”

The holo of a stilty eyed, green zilkin appeared, dressed in a field army uniform.

“Are we sure it’s wise to send one of the best strategists in Republic Strategic Command on a mission like this? If he’s captured-”

“The Colonel has agreed to be implanted with a suicide device in that event. His diminutive stature also makes him a natural infiltrator and he has a number of successful missions under his belt.”

I had to give Vaad credit for a superb poker face and her emotions were tightly leashed, but it was the rare sentient who could see a zilkin and not be bemused or outright laugh.

“Next we have a number of astromechs that have each been retooled to aid the mission. Firstly, we’d like your permission - as you’re its owner, General - to assign R2-D2 as the mission’s astrogator and general multitool. It’ll be given an upgrade to its jump jets to facilitate better mobility.”

Anakin gave me a stern look.

I held up my palms in a disarming fashion. “Yes, Skyguy, I’ll make sure he comes back in one piece.” 

“Good, then you have my permission, Captain.”

“Next we have QT-KT, who’ll be outfitted with a tractor field generator of considerable power,” Vaad changed the holo to show a red and white droid.

Anakin frowned, “Hey, isn’t that Knight Secura’s astromech?”

“Indeed, she was kind enough to also loan it for use in this mission. QT’s task will primarily be to neutralize the swarm mines present in the com vault, but there will undoubtedly be other uses it could be put to. Next we have U9-C4, who will have the strongest and deadliest laser cutter ever mounted on a droid platform. It will make short work of most armoring and materials you will encounter in the vault. More importantly, it will not register as a lightsaber on any of the security scanners inside.”

This astromech was one of the R5 models and colored in pale orange and white.

“Wait a moment, do you have any details on that?” Anakin asked with concern.

“As far as we can determine it’s simply a highly sensitive, specialized scanner that blankets the interior of the vault, specifically looking for the diatum energy cell that lightsabers are commonly known to feature.”

He closed his eyes and I just knew he was using that technical genius to come up with some sort of solution. “Snips, I should be able to fashion you a sensor-damped microfusion cell for both your blades before you leave.”

“But not for the Darksaber,” I concluded, mentally visualizing the assembly of my green blades.

“No, I doubt you’d want to open that hilt up anyway.”

The kyber entity of the Darksaber immediately gave me its equivalent of a glare.

“Even if this technical hurdle is overcome,” Vaad raised a hand of caution. “I’d suggest you avoid activating your lightsabers at all, Commander. No intel is perfect, after all.”

“Understood, Captain Vaad.”

“Good. The final droid of the mission is M5-BZ, which has been converted into a mobility aid and mobile C&C center for Colonel Gascon. As agile as he is as a zilkin, he can’t exactly cover distance quickly. He has used this droid in the past successfully on a number of missions.”

M5 was an R4 series droid in all green coloration, whose tall upper dome had been hollowed out to fit a seat surrounded by numerous holoscreens and controls. Allowing Gascon to take control and even fly the droid if he had to, with similar leg jets as R2.  

“You’ll be breaching Separatist space by using a cloak capable Omicron-class attack shuttle that will arrive with all the team members tomorrow. Make your way to Hijado and space walk onto the Idomitable’s hull, where you’ll use-”

The holo switched to show the 2 kilometer long dreadnought, zooming in to a mid point on the upper dorsal hull.

“- this maintenance airlock to make your initial breach. The com vault is on Cresh Deck, which we’ve calculated equates to at least roughly 234 meters of corridors and one turbolift you’ll have to traverse to reach it.” She handed me a datapad. “This contains the specifics of the security, it’s an extensive list; the highlights are life sign sensors, swarm mines, and a floor pressure detection system. We estimate Colonel Gascon will be especially useful in this regard.” Vaad’s mouth twitched somewhat. “Any further questions, commander?”

“No, it all seems pretty clear.”

“Good, then as you Jedi say, may the Force be with you.”

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I waited patiently in Docking Bay One, fully armored in my berskar’gam, with R2-D2 beside me.

“How are the new jets treating you, R2?”

‘Very well, thank you. I have 80% increased thrust performance. It is much more sensitive to control inputs, but well within my calculation tolerance,’ said the droid in astromech binary.

The Omicron-class shuttle, Shadow Talon, decloaked directly in the Resolute’s launch spine, folded up its wings and came in for a smooth touchdown. Showing one of the astromechs was at the controls.

The rear embarkation ramp opened up with a hiss of hydraulics, letting the four astromechs of the newly named D-Squad to roll out onto the deck.

In the lead was M5-BZ, which rolled forward on wheels with purposeful speed only to come to a halt directly in front of me.

The droid’s flattened head abruptly popped open and all 33 cm of Colonel Meebur Gascon jumped out. He deftly balanced himself on the open edge of his ride and stood to attention before saluting me.

Only in this galaxy could a species like the zilkin gain full sentience. The generally accepted notion that you need a certain brain size was thoroughly challenged by their existence. Not only did zilkin have an entirely different neural architecture that was distributed all throughout their body, the biochemistry was also radically different and featured near-unbelievable densities of memory storage. Jedi scientists had also managed to actually sense that zilkin biology was partially extruding into extra dimensions on a molecular basis and confirm it scientifically using modified hyperspace scanners.

I returned the salute, “Colonel Gascon, welcome to the Resolute.” 

“It’s a distinct honor to meet you, Commander Tano,” he said, with a tone of grand pomposity. His tiny voice was generally boosted to audible levels by the droid he used for mobility, letting him interact with normal sentients with general levels of hearing in the humanoid range. My montrals had no problem hearing and generally Jedi wouldn’t have issues either. “The Mandalorian Jedi, one of the foremost Fleet Commanders of the Republic, the other mind behind our primary naval doctrine, the Bane of Durge-”

I gently raised a palm to interrupt the zilkin, “My memory has not failed me, Colonel.”

“Hmmph, typical Jedi, never one to brag,” he folded his tiny hands behind his back, then smirked at me, his two eyestalks bobbing alternately up and down on his small head. His emotions indicated that it was the zilkin equivalent body language for approval. “Now I trust you’ve been briefed already on our mission? If not, I’ll be happy to walk you through it.”

“No need, colonel,” I reached down to pick up my war chest. “R2 and I will do a post-flight checklist of the Talon and refuel, it will just take an half an hour to be on the safe side and then we can leave. Every hour of delay is another hour that the Separatists have a signal’s intel advantage over us.”

“Oh, well,” the zilkin deflated somewhat. “I was hoping to get an actual tour of the Resolute while I was here, but I can see your point.” He deftly hopped back into M5, turning the droid around. “Let’s go D-Squad, back on board!”

The other astromechs chirped and squawked at each other in binary, generally expressing their annoyance, offering to help get the Talon back in shape.

I laughed, “Whoah, all right, all right, go ahead and help R2. I imagine the trip here was rather boring.” 

“Actually Commander, we just want to just have a break from the Colonel,” QT softly chirped after Gascon was back aboard and out of earshot. “He just doesn’t stop… giving his opinion on everything or telling his selection of war stories.”

I inwardly groaned, this was going to be a fun trip.

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A day of hyperspace along the Namadii Corridor south, then another two along the Celanon Spur heading east before we reached Ord Mantell, the current front line battlespace in this part of the galaxy.

“Are you sure, commander?” asked Colonel Gascon worriedly.

I nodded, “Using standard hyper navigation routes is too dangerous, the waypoints in front line systems are naturally clogged, with either side using blockade formations. In addition, a new tactic being used is to purposefully seed debris and mines in randomized patterns around the waypoints to potentially damage or even destroy ships trying to use non-standard emergence points. This also applies to us, since we have two seconds of vulnerability until our cloak engages after leaving hyperspace. Therefore I’m using Force navigation to get us safely into an emergence in the system’s Oort Cloud. From there it’ll be just a few hours for us to reach R2’s onward trajectory.”

“Oh, well, I’ve heard all about Jedi Navigators, of course,” he said archly. “I just didn’t know you were one.”

“Most Jedi can do this, we just prefer not to unless in dire circumstances.”

QT-KTs warning had been rather spot on and the good Colonel Gascon was a literal exercise in keeping one’s patience and cool. About the only reason I imagine someone hadn’t threatened to stomp on him yet, was that he was constantly surrounded by senior Jedi in Strategic Command. Any non-Jedi naval officer working there had probably excused themselves before they could lose their marbles, not wanting to cause a scene in front of so many Jedi Masters. Clone psycho-doctrination would also stop senior clones from losing their cool as well. Yet despite this flaw, Gascon’s actual strategic and tactical planning skill on a planetary battlefield was among the best the galaxy had to offer. 

It took another two days from there to reach the crossroad system of Agamar and turn onto the Braxant Run.

It was at this point where I had managed to master the skill of internal meditation, whilst giving every outward appearance that I was generally listening to the Colonel’s bombastic rants, stories and opinions. The stories weren’t nonsense or false, it’s just that he had a clear oratorical talent for stretching it out to a near unbelievable degree.

Despite that, I actually managed to learn quite a bit from him regarding his homeworld - what his species called the Great Zilk.

It featured dense, low lying ecosystems; lush jungles, swampy wetlands, and cavernous fungal forests, where their small size was advantageous for navigating tight spaces, avoiding predators and exploiting niche resources. It had a naturally high humidity, which explained why Gascon had set the Talon’s life support to match.

“This uniform is not just for regulation, it keeps me from drying out in the climates you big’uns prefer.”

Big’uns the Basic zilkin slang for practically every other race in the galaxy who had ‘large’ bodies.

Culturally, the zilkin developed a society emphasizing cooperation and ingenuity to extreme degree, which went some way to explaining Gascon’s skill in coordinating forces on a battlefield.

“To me it’s no different than when we zilkin go on a slythervox hunt - they’re a serpentine predator on Great Zilk - out here in the great big galaxy against the Separatists, to me it’s just a hunt with increased scale, capability and we’re dealing thousands of slythervoxes.”

Zilkin architecture and technology was naturally miniaturized, with intricate compact cities, tiny walkways, hover platforms or drone assisted transport for vertical navigation. They naturally worked on a smaller scale and quite a lot of the common technology around the galaxy was only as small as it was because of zilkin science showing the way. Their scientists were the go-to source for anyone looking to miniaturize. In this respect, they were the unsung heroes of Corusca galaxy technology - and they weren’t looking to change that.

Hard evolutionary experience had taught them not to draw attention to themselves, lest the giant species of their homeworld step on them or gobble them up. This tendency extended to the rest of the galaxy.

This also explained why Gascon was away from Great Zilk - he was just too rambunctious and loud for common zilkin sensibilities.

Those zilkin who did go out into the galaxy, were also those who also displayed the most cunning and resilience, and featured a general chip-on-the-shoulder attitude toward the larger species.

We were very deep in CIS space after a further two days, arriving at Botajef before turning onto the Hydian Way and reaching Hijado after another three hours.

The urgency of the mission was weighing down on both of us, especially when news reached us of fresh offensives from the CIS across nearly every front that had caught numerous Republic fleets and commands on the back foot.

And if that wasn’t bad enough…

‘Snips, a strategic conference has been called for all senior naval commands and Jedi Council members, to decide what our response will be to the orbital attacks and whether we should escalate in kind.’

‘Really? Now? Where?’

‘Carida.’

‘Frak. This is not the time to pull senior fleet officers away from the front! You know Skyguy, we have this amazing thing called the Holonet, which lets them send a holo of themselves-’

‘Which no one trusts to keep this highly classified conference secure at the moment, Snips,’ he reminded me.

‘Yes, I know, but they can use rapid rotational encryption-’

‘Which only the 42nd Fleet and Ventator-IIs are really capable of.’

I was sorely tempted to give myself a nice slap to the forehead for forgetting that little detail.

‘Skyguy, you know that this conference is just begging for a clandestine CIS attack. In fact it will happen.”

‘I know, Snips. But there is no other choice at the moment, we have to talk to each other and make this decision. It can only be done in person. The conference will have the highest security and military capacity gathered in the galaxy in one spot, Snips. No CIS black ops team could hope to achieve anything here.’

‘Do you truly believe that?’

He mentally sighed, ‘No, but I can’t tell the entire senior command that we shouldn’t meet without showing some evidence, your prescience won’t cut it and you know you can’t reveal it.’

‘Make sure they at least maintain a heightened alert state.’

‘I’ll try Snips, I’m just a conference attendee here, not the Carida system command.’

‘Then light a fire under the osik'gam* in charge over there.’ (shithead)

His amusement at my colorful Mando’a surged through the Bond. 

‘I will, Snips.’

When the Talon finally emerged from hyper and cloaked, I had managed to manually navigate us to within spitting distance of the mass shadow of Hijado IV, just under 20k kilometers from the Indomitable and its escort fleet.

“Well, I’ll be a Fluffel Skree’s uncle, you actually managed it,” Gascon commented from his perch on the backrest of the pilot’s chair.

“And a fluffel skree is?” Curse my curiosity.

“Small critter on my homeworld with an absurdly poofy, brightly colored coat of fur, makes it look comically oversized for its tiny frame. Swings clumsily between vines or fungal stalks, often tumbling, which we zilkins find hilarious. I tell you, my family once-”

I hurriedly raised my palms and headed for the cockpit door, “Sorry Colonel, mission first, story later. R2, take over the controls, get us to our target area over the Indomitable.”

“Ah, right. Of course. BZ, get your fat wheels over here!”

I quickly entered my temporary quarters on the Talon and stepped out of my beskar’gam and began changing into a CIS Navy uniform.

It was a rare thing for anyone in the Republic to actually see, especially because these days the organic officers were usually only stationed on Lucrehulks and Providence dreads. In the current warfare paradigm, Munificents and Recuscants had become cannon fodder.

The uniform was a deep blue outfit; practically a jumpsuit-spacesuit hybrid with pronounced and padded, pointy shoulders. It featured sleek lines and angles in the design meant to firmly distinguish the wearer from the mass of droids they worked alongside on a ship. Ranks were denoted on the shoulders only and this one was of a Senior Lieutenant. Completing the disguise was a complete re-do of my facial and lekku pattern to match the identity that had been provided to me by Republic Intelligence.

That there actually were togruta within the CIS Navy was something that shouldn’t have been too surprising. It was a big galaxy, with trillions in it and togruta were firmly part of the Outer Rim melting pot of races.

Now I was Senior Lieutenant Nande Birkonas, born on Tion, a world right next door to Raxus Prime - a firm believer of the Separatist cause of independence from the bloated uncaring Republic.   

I stared into the small mirror of my quarters, wincing at the checkerboard patterns on my lekku and rhombus shapes around my eyes, “Urgh, I look ridiculous.”

“It is an effective disguise, mistress, don’t forget the code cylinders though,” M8 closed herself up and handed me the pen sized ID cylinders that I tucked into the dedicated pockets for them.

I picked up the matching uniform belt with the holster for the organic model of the E5 blaster pistol and clipped it around my hips.

If this had been any other standard infiltration mission, then I would’ve gone in as usual, but the com vault and the need for absolute deception in switching out the decryption module changed things. Gascon and I had been brainstorming a lot in our journey here and come to the conclusion that this was the approach needed.

“All right M8, you have the Talon, station keep and be ready for anything… Oh, do look after my lightsabers.”

“Of course, Mistress.”

I met up with the other members of D-Squad in the Talon’s small ventral airlock.

I made a quick final check on the seals of my gloves, boots and the CIS-pattern vac helmet and life support pack that we had fabricated. “Everyone ready?”

A chorus of affirmative binary chirps replied and a tinny “Ready, Commander!” from Gascon inside M5-BZ.

I patted the dome of R4-K7 and smiled at him. “You are the lynchpin of this mission, R4. Without you we might as well go home.”

“I’ll do my utmost, commander!’ the droid trilled excitedly.   

I stepped over to the nearby control panel, “Depressurizing.”

The hiss of rushing air being pulled out by pumps resounded, which quickly disappeared as we were left in full vacuum.

The outer door below us opened and we were greeted by the armored hull of the Idomitable, just fifty meters below us.

A quick check of my lifesign scrambler confirmed it working before I stepped directly over the outer airlock, using the shuttle’s artificial gravity to give me a push before I left its field envelope.

My breath echoed loudly back at me inside the spherical helmet as I ‘fell’ towards the dreadnought at nine meters per second. 

Behind me, D-Squad followed, letting only momentum do the job of covering the distance. The astromechs couldn’t even risk using leg jets in this phase of the mission.

In the six seconds it took to reach the dreadnought, I took in the rather majestic sight of it as it stretched out for more than a kilometer to either side of me, with the blue, whites and green of Hijado dominating the view to my left.

Spacewalks, despite having done it so many times by now, always left me with a feeling of awe. It also now reminded me of a notion or idea from my previous life that, as much as the galaxy had become spacefaring, that we still clung to little pockets of gravity and air that we carried around with ourselves. That we were still married to big rocks with relatively thin films of air around them. We still fought for them, spilled our blood for them to control and mine them. Soon we would be in a galaxy where the power would exist to utterly destroy them in the snap of your fingers.

Civilization, technology and even our bodies, would need to move on and say goodbye to these cradles.

I bled momentum into the Force, slowing down to a mere one meter per second.

Touch down.

I bent my legs to absorb the mild impact and let my magboots clamp onto the armored hull.

D-Squad landed behind me.

R2’s had done his usual brilliant job and we barely needed to walk ten meters to reach the maintenance airlock.

He took point to interface and slice local systems, also sending in a localized virus that would implant my cover ID into the ship’s personnel roster and authorization systems. It was a cover that would hold for most general scrutiny, even a database query back to Raxus Prime would have Nande Birkonas listed as an officer in the CIS Navy, Republic Intelligence had made sure of it.

Within less than a minute, we had our access and put ourselves through the airlock.

Beyond the inner door, I pulled off my helmet and hung it via a strap from my belt. “R2, sync my location in three, two, one… now.”

A flick of a small switch, my lifesign scrambler was off.

‘Your location and code cylinders are in the system and everything is nominal,’ trilled R2.

“Good, all right droids, game faces. We have a lot of maintenance to do today and very little time. Follow me.”

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Providence dreadnought interiors were very bare bones, even more so than the rugged industrial design that Venators favored. Nothing was easy on the eyes, everything was gray durasteel with minimal paneling and harsh lighting. We passed the first test of our disguise when we passed by a B1 squad patrol immediately on reaching the next deck.

Through technometry I vaguely felt the scan from the B1 commander as it interfaced with code cylinders on my uniform.

I kept myself in a purposeful, all-business stride, ignoring the squad and passed them on the right.

No reaction.

We turned a corner in the corridor ahead and the patrol passed out of sight.

So far so good.

By the time we reached the turbolift we would use, we had passed three more patrols, including a number of B2 squads.

The lift door opened and inside were two male humans in CIS uniform who were in a rather intense discussion. One was a junior lieutenant and the other an ensign. They both snapped to attention with a salute at seeing me.

“Senior Lieutenant,” said the taller junior lieutenant in greeting.

I returned a crisp salute with a nod, “Lieutenant, need a bit of space here.”

D-Squad piled in orderly behind me and the two officers had to awkwardly shuffle to one side to make room for the five droids. I ended up having to turn my back to them and tapped the button for C Deck.

“Maintenance duty, ma’am?” asked the ensign nervously.

I only nodded, using the Force to pull a minor Mind Trick on them both.

They blinked and resumed their earlier conversation. 

“I’m telling you Vex, all these turbolaser drills are a waste of bloody time,” groused the junior LT.

“Sir, we have to stay in tip top shape.”

“All we’re doing is creating unnecessary wear and tear. This ship is not going anywhere near the frontlines any time soon. Face it, our careers are over before they’ve even started.”

“Sir, we can’t know that for sure.”

“Oh yes, we can. Command would be utterly moronic to send this ship into combat. They’ve turned this top of line dreadnought into a glorified com buoy!”

The ensign’s attention fell on me again and I inwardly groaned with annoyance as I felt his appreciative eyes settle on my butt - which the CIS uniform did nothing to hide the curves of.

Thankfully, I didn’t have to endure the attention for long as the turbolift stopped on C Deck.

I strode forward, resisting the urge to quicken my step.

From there it was another few minutes of walking until I paused in the main corridor leading to the com vault, exactly where a maintenance hatch which bordered the vault was located. 

“All right R2, get cracking.”

‘Yes, Lieutenant,’ he chirped, plugging in his logic probe. It was highly unlikely we were being directly watched, but we had roles to play nevertheless.

Seven seconds of slicing later and it opened, allowing the droids to proceed into a tube that wasn’t designed for humanoids to walk upright in.

It would look too suspicious for me to follow them in as well, so I simply waited with folded hands behind my back and tracked their progress with Farsight.

U9-C4 took his turn to lead the group and under Gascon’s direction they traversed a veritable maze of tubes until they reached a major power conduit that led directly into the com vault.

R2 also plugged into a nearby logic port to slice into localized sensors and loop their feeds.

‘Go ahead, U9,’ R2 chirped.

‘Here we go, powering the laser!’ U9 declared with a disturbing amount of glee.

The green emitter popped out of his main body, aimed at a junction box and fired.

It was like a small version of a collimated laser that instantly surged out and penetrated through the hardened battle durasteel that protected the conduit from general external damage.

U9 drew the green laser down slowly with a crackle of molten steel and sparks.

The effect this had locally was immediately apparent as the corridor lighting above me flickered.

“Commander, it worked. My scans indicate the com vault security power is now on internal source only and local mode,” reported Gascon from his perch inside M5. “R2 has also managed to isolate all local scanners. We could have a parade in this section of the ship and the bridge wouldn’t know. Of course, the vault is a different story.”

I pretended to get a signal from my comlink, “Good work, on your way back now you lot.”

I quickly turned around and headed straight for the main vault entrance, reaching out with the Force to trigger the bulkhead doors.

Beyond was a short passage that had a second bulkhead door and the ominous form of two B2-ACMs with their Repeater arms in standby mode.

They saw me and instantly aimed those dangerous arms. 

“Halt, you are identified as Lieutenant Nande Birkonas, Maintenance Division. Your presence is not authorized. Explain.”

My voice adopted a Tion drawl that reminded me of a light Texan accent, “Sorry fellas, I’m just here for security tests and maintenance, which I’m happy to say you’ve passed with flyin’ colors.”   

Both B2’s began twitching and electrical arcs erupted from their chassis as I used the mildest version of the Disable Droid technique I had mastered so far, whilst also reaching into them with Technometry to trigger their emergency shutdowns.

They abruptly froze into lifelessness and threatened to topple over noisily.

I caught both with TK and hovered them over into an adjoining room that housed emergency repair supplies for the com vault.

“Smoothly done, commander, we’ll take it from here,” said Gascon, as D-Squad rolled in.

I quickly took my place as a hidden lookout, extending all my senses outward to encompass the entire sector of the ship we were in.

R2 rolled forward and opened a panel on his body, extending a modulated taser arm. A brief surge of current disabled the booby trapped logic plug, allowing him to properly interface with the inner vault door.

The main interior of the vault was a fifteen meter diameter, five floor high circular room, which itself had another cylindrical room inside that stretched from floor to ceiling. High bandwidth computer conduits and numerous interface screens lined the walls, constantly scrolling data and readouts as CIS communications for an entire sector were encoded and decoded before our eyes.

The sterile air was filled with hundreds of fist sized glowing spheres that were silently hovering and scanning for anything that moved inside of their pre-programmed perimeter.

“All right, QT, your turn. Get those swarm mines out of our way,” ordered Gascon.

“Yes sir!” she chirped with enthusiasm.

From the top of the droid’s dome a small door opened and a saucer shaped remote flew out, with numerous emitters stippled alongside its surface.

Before the swarm mines could even react to the breach in their perimeter they were all helplessly pulled into orbit around the tractor drone. Their proximity detonation circuits were subverted by the careful programming of the tiny tractor beams, keeping them well away from each other.

After a single careful orbit of the room, the drone had every mine under control - whereupon it released a directed micro EMP that disabled all of them.

QT carefully guided the mass of swarm mines back and out of the vault, gathering them all up into a large sphere of mines that hovered above her.

“Well done, now it’s up to me,” Gascon popped the hatch of M5-BZ and took a deep breath.

On his back was a computer slicing spike specially designed to his size, but it still looked like he was carrying a lance.

He carefully climbed down M5’s body and slowly lowered himself to stand on the droid’s fore wheel, before again carefully taking the next step forward.

This was the edge of the pressure sensor zone and he held his breath as his flat amphibian feet touched it.

No alarm.

He breathed a sigh of relief and took another careful step. His weight was not enough to trigger the alarm, but he still had to moderate his footfalls.

For a zilkin of Gascon’s size to carefully walk seven meters to the interface point for the computer slice would take forty-seven seconds.

Of course, this was the moment I sensed an incoming droid patrol.

A quick gesture closed the main outer bulkhead access to the vault and shielded us from general view.

The only blessing was that it was merely a single squad of B1s.

They turned the corner and were now stomping along the exterior corridor.

I was torn between letting them pass our position or using my equivalent of a droid Mind Trick.

Gascon was halfway to his destination and the enemy droid squad was now a mere ten meters from the outer door.

My focus was juggling too much in the present to look far enough down the probability line-

The B1s passed our position without pause.

“Thank goodness,” I muttered with slight relief as Gascon also reached his destination.

He adeptly began climbing and jumping up the vault’s inner cylinder - without hesitation pulling the spike from his back and jamming it into the maintenance logic port near a control panel.

We gave it a further three seconds to work.

“The pressure sensors are down, go,” I ordered into the comlink.

D-Squad rolled forward, leaving QT behind to manage to swarm mines.

R2 hacked the next door and headed inside to finally reveal our target.

The encryption module itself was a flat, hand sized mass of plasteel and computer chips, held suspended between two repulsors keeping it perfectly suspended. Above and below it were high resolution molecular scanners that reported on the current atomic state of the module itself. 

This was how the code remained truly unbreakable, it didn’t just use a fancy new math scheme, it further used the atomic structure of the module as a reference to scramble the code. Only by referencing this particular module, could the CIS even read their own communications. 

“K7, help us get our own module, please,” Gascon ordered.

“At once, Colonel.” The red-gold astromech’s panels opened up and a complex dish scanner unfurled and locked itself into place. “Scanning.”

This was another point where we had to patiently wait for the process to complete. Simulations had shown it taking anywhere from two minutes to an hour, depending on the molecular complexity of the module. If I had been in the CIS’ shoes, I would have made a complex atomic structure to base my code on, which would in turn take much longer for anyone to make heads or tails of, if they got their hands on it.

“K7, how long?” Gascon asked grimly.

“220 seconds.”

I put out of my mind how bloody long this was going to feel. Each second seemingly stretching itself into ridiculous proportions.

My senses kept watch, spying a few organic CIS crew approaching C Deck, but their turbolift thankfully carried them away toward the aft bridge superstructure.

“Scan complete, beginning fabrication.”

It would’ve been nice if we could do this part on-the-go, but K7’s internal fabricator had to remain completely still to make an accurate facsimile of the module. We also had to confirm an exact match between the copy and the original before we could leave.

“32 minutes to completion.”

Frak.

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A/N: This is mission impossible, Ms Tano. Difficult should be a walk in the park for you :-) It was fun fleshing out the Zilkin and I've given Colonel Gascon a general rework whilst keeping the fun bits of his character.

Have a wonderful weekend and stay awesome folks.