The girl knelt and bowed her head before the appearing hologram.
The connection went through many relays, causing the image to constantly ripple with interference.
But even this couldn’t hide the full power emanating from the Sith Lord.
It seemed to her that the darkness itself hid the man’s face.
Zola was almost certain—if the caller removed his hood, she still wouldn’t see anything except the tip of his chin and, perhaps, amber eyes.
“Master, your task is complete,” the girl tried to say as firmly as possible, but her voice failed her.
“Wonderful,” the altered voice rumbled through the crackling interference.
“I will review your detailed report later.
And now, please, briefly and in your own words.”
“Yes, master.
Jedi Knight Nemak is of no interest to you.
He is completely harmless.
A weakling.”
“What about his student?” the figure stirred.
“Young, naive, foolish.
Immensely loyal to his mentor.
In the future, he’ll likely become a decent swordsman.
He already demonstrates excellent potential.”
“Wonderful.
Anything else?”
“Yes, master.
It seems the Jedi fool fell head over heels for me.
Apparently, I was his first woman.
He tried so hard to win a sparring match against his padawan that he even gave in to rage.”
“Well, that could be interesting,” the figure wrapped in a robe paused, and the girl leaned forward against her own will.
“Let’s not rush,” the lord decreed.
“Let them travel, let them see with their own eyes what their beloved Republic is doing in the outer worlds.
When the time comes, I will inform you what to do.”
“I obey, master,” not a shadow of a thought to doubt the Lord’s right to give her any orders crossed her mind.
“You worked well.
I am pleased.
You will receive payment today.
Rest for a couple of weeks, after which you will receive a new assignment.”
“Your will is law, Lord,” Zola answered obsequiously into the void.
* * *
The body writhing in agony, enveloped in Force lightning, was unable not only to scream, but even to gasp.
Only a call signal, coming to the long-range comms terminal, saved the teenager from death.
The woman shrugged displeasedly and stopped tormenting the victim.
Spitting on the convulsively twitching body, she swung and with a kick turned lips already like flatcakes into bloody pancakes.
If the unfortunate still had teeth, he would surely have lost them.
“Worthless weakling, just like your master,” the sadist cursed, involuntarily touching the remains of his ear.
“Master,” the woman said, kneeling and bowing her head, activating the connection.
“I see I’ve interrupted your work,” the robed figure in the deeply pulled-down hood grunted contemptuously.
“What work, master?!
A worthless little padawan.
Just like his master.
Breaking him was child’s play.
Now he’s more of an animal than a sentient being.”
“His master isn’t that weak.”
“He just got lucky,” the woman said, pulling her hand away from the remains of the ear.
“It happens,” the Sith didn’t argue.
“Are you ready to carry out a new assignment?”
“Of course, master,” the sadist grinned in anticipation.
“Especially since I have a little doggy too,” she glanced towards the former padawan, curled up in a fetal position.
“A loyal dog can be useful, but rabid dogs are shot.”
“Don’t worry, master, mine is loyal.”
“You know best, you converted him, you worked with him.
The advance and the assignment file will arrive in half an hour.
When can you fly out?”
“As soon as I shove this piece of meat into the bacta tank.”
“Wonderful,” the Sith Lord nodded and disconnected.
“You got lucky, bastard,” the woman exhaled, and kicked the former padawan in the ribs a couple of times.
Then, grabbing the piece of meat, which wasn’t even capable of moaning, by the hair, she dragged him to the medbay and threw him into a tank of healing solution. Visit g.com for the full chapter.
“I rushed it,” she gritted her teeth, glancing at the victim’s groin.
* * *
Having finished communicating with his subordinate associates, Darth Sidious, better known to the public as Chancellor Palpatine, took off the ridiculous hood.
This tribute to tradition and peculiar fashion always irritated him, but he had to comply.
“Who I have to work with,” he sighed, massaging his temples.
“Yeah, the dark side has degenerated, no words needed,” Sidious muttered, closing his eyes tiredly.
It was impossible to find decent assistants.
One is a complete sadist and maniac, who could only be used very limitedly.
The second is a weakling whose only skill and virtue is cloaking in the Force.
“Some assassin she turned out to be,” the Sith snorted.
She found some third-rate holocron, and couldn’t even master it properly.
Yet she thinks she’s someone important.
The other assistants aren’t much better than these two.
He hoped Dooku would check all the information he’d been fed soon.
After all, there wasn’t a single lie in it!
Only the truth and minimal emphasis.
“It’s fine, I’ll wait,” Sidious encouraged himself.
Then he’d have someone to offload the routine work onto.
Of course, it would take some time to break in the new apprentice; after all, the holocrons the Jedi was currently consulting weren’t quite what was needed.
No, they could mess with his head effectively, but everything else, alas, wasn’t their forte.
However, no worthy Force ghost of past lords would cooperate with him.
Or rather, they would play their own game.
“No, I’ll manage without them,” Sidious massaged his temples again and put on his hood.
Followers of the dark side are good, of course, but Palpatine didn’t count on them particularly.
In fact, his plan was to get rid of not only his eternal ideological opponent in the form of the Jedi, but also to significantly reduce his ideological brethren.
Darth Sidious absolutely did not want to share power, and therefore preferred to strangle competitors in the bud.
Even if they could only become such by an incredible coincidence.
Dark lords never recognized half-measures.
It was against their very nature.
* * *
The stars, stretching into a tunnel of light, returned to their normal appearance, and a planet appeared in the viewport.
Green on a yellow background, under a haze of milky-white clouds.
“Just like pistachio ice cream with cream,” I purred to myself and licked my lips mentally.
They didn’t control the orbit here at all.
Nevertheless, we, adhering to regulations, acted strictly according to instructions.
Simply put—we summoned the planet ourselves.
“Unknown ship, state your designation and purpose of visit,” came the long-awaited response from the natives.
“Act, padawan,” the master nodded to me.
“Cargo-passenger vessel L-3353, self-named Pif-Paf.
Free trader…
Irm,” I blurted out the first thing that came to mind, having somehow missed the appropriate moment.
“Requesting permission to land and conduct commercial activities.”
“Wait,” was the reply.
“Understood.
Occupying parking orbit.”
“It seems we’re not very welcome here,” the master chuckled.
“They’re just afraid we might not be who we say we are,” I shrugged.
“Yes, I’ve heard about that more than once,” the mentor nodded.
So, while the locals were actively hiding their most valuable possessions, we indulged in idleness and swapped stories.
Or rather, the master shared information gleaned from drinking companions.
Amusing, and in places, even useful.
“Free trader Irm, you are cleared for landing, transmitting coordinates,” the natives finally managed to contact us.
“Received, initiating atmospheric entry.
Pif, let’s go,” I gave the ship a command that violated all rules and instructions, but was considerably shorter.
“Initiating maneuver,” the android reported, and the master just chuckled and began rereading the planet’s report.
We flashed through the atmosphere like a bolide.
We braked hard and landed on a pale imitation of a runway.
“It’s modest here,” the mentor stated the obvious, looking at the rather bleak landscape.
“I’d say poor,” I didn’t argue, but rather, expressed my opinion on the scene outside the viewport.
Instead of a proper runway, there were crudely fitted plates, and even those couldn’t boast of integrity.
It felt like they used ordinary concrete.
The spaceport itself was completely unfenced.
It was located on the outskirts, presumably of the capital, whose appearance was quite depressing. New chapters come out on g.com first.
I even experienced something like a wave of nostalgia from my past life.
A provincial town, steeped in melancholy and existing in a state of eternal depression.
There was even something resembling Khrushchev-era buildings.
The control tower, topped with a saucer-shaped antenna, seemed to have been unused for a long time.
In short, to complete the picture, all that was missing was some livestock grazing right on the runway.
“Master, are we still in our galaxy?” I couldn’t help but ask.
“Let’s hope so, padawan,” the mentor encouraged me absently, though there was little confidence in his voice.
Pif, reporting that something like a motorcade was rushing towards us, pulled us out of our contemplative detachment.
“Let’s go meet our guests,” the sensei waved his hand.
“Uh-huh,” I twitched my ear, thinking that buying a blaster would clearly be useful.
I didn’t like the approaching crowd of sentient beings.
It wasn’t about them themselves, but about the weapons resembling assault rifles.
The guest who emerged from the representative-class flyer, with a mix of a skullcap and a turban on his head, delivered a lengthy welcoming speech.
The general gist of which was that he was happy, delighted, and had always dreamed of meeting such wonderful people as us.
This was followed by an invitation to the local house of government, where, it turned out, we had long been awaited with impatience.
Naturally, we didn’t refuse.
The Force clearly indicated that behind all this wordplay was not a request, but an order.
However, no particular danger threatened us.
Or rather, it could be quite easily avoided, to mutual joy and our own benefit.
“We thank you for the honor, esteemed sir.
We, humble traders, are rarely granted such attention,” I bowed a little more than necessary, eliciting a pleased smile from Comrade Haruk.
“Unfortunately, traders are rare guests in our harsh world,” the government spokesman sighed.
“Should we present some gifts?” the master inquired, showing untimely initiative.
It was indeed at an inopportune moment that he remembered the brief diplomacy course taught to younglings.
“Certainly not!” Haruk exclaimed indignantly.
“Do we look like savages?!”
“Please forgive my assistant,” I intervened immediately.
“He is still too young and inexperienced.
The drawbacks of a metropolitan education,” I added, exerting a slight mental influence.
“One can feel it,” the guest snorted.
“Snobbery,” he added, grimacing.
“Youth passes quickly, and foolishness is perfectly cured by hard work.”
“Golden words,” Haruk nodded.
“If you don’t need to change, let’s hurry.
After all, it’s harvest season.
There’s a lot of work.”
“And time in a day is, unfortunately, limited.
I understand you perfectly.
We are ready to depart immediately.”
“I doubt you understand us,” the negotiator muttered, getting into the car.
“For you, time is just money, but for us—it’s life,” he explained, realizing he had been heard.
“We brought a food processing complex; I believe many will survive this year.”
“The universe has heard our prayers,” Haruk said with sincere joy.
“You can’t imagine how many times we’ve asked trading guests to bring us such equipment.”
“But they always found reasons not to, because then they couldn’t buy your lives cheaply.”
“Yes, you are absolutely right, Comrade Irm.”
The rest of the journey passed in silence.
Haruk was lost in his own thoughts — judging by the echoes coming through the Force, he was reminiscing.
Apparently, those memories weren’t pleasant.
The mentor fell silent too, and we watched the city glide past beyond the glass.
It made a rather eerie impression.
Like we’d ended up in an abandoned, nearly deserted village where only a couple of old people and a dozen crumbling houses remained.
And we’d somehow managed to do it in late autumn.
An incredible and depressing contrast to the worlds I’d seen before.
Despite the bright sunny day, it felt as though we were wrapped in a gray gloom.
I cocooned myself in the Force and squeezed it as tight as possible.
It got a little easier.
The sense of longing, hopelessness, and terror before the coming drought that the locals were feeling didn’t go away, but it receded, became more muffled.
I’d always thought harvesting was a celebration.
Pleasant work that’s followed by well-deserved rest.
Yes, that’s how it is in most worlds, but not in this one.
Definitely not in this one.
I even had to strain to suppress the growl instinctively trying to escape my throat.