Abilities to travel through space and time rarely manifest the same way. Some rely on magic, others on artifacts—and the teleportation method itself will always differ entirely.
Phasing through solid objects is a form of magic closely related to teleportation. House Kallig used shadows and a lengthy preparation ritual to achieve it.
I couldn't grasp the exact mechanics, but Erra explained the fundamentals. The body was cloaked in concentrated dark Force, turning the user's silhouette pitch black.
I know of roughly twenty variations of such magic, and by no means do all of them require covering oneself in shadows.
This particular spell carries almost no side effects. It is vastly superior to using a more efficient technique that would simply leave your body a withered husk.
Perhaps it induces a paradox—a slight fracture in the laws of physics—creating a shell that allows the body to simultaneously exist in the material plane and somewhere else. These are merely theories. Who knows what knowledge the creator of this magic actually possessed? Perhaps he simply wondered how to walk through walls, and the will of the Force provided the answer.
The most important part is that the magic works.
The ritual allows you to pass through solid matter for half an hour, but the technique demands a massive toll in energy. The results, however, were more than acceptable. We literally stepped into the ship's metallic bulkheads and made our way straight toward the admiral's quarters.
Twenty minutes later, we finally arrived at the correct wall. I verified my senses, then we stepped out of the solid steel and materialized inside Nomi's room.
For an admiral's quarters, the furnishings were surprisingly modest. Erra dispelled the magic, revealing our true forms.
A headache and sudden nausea hit me instantly. The muscles in my arms and legs twitched from overexertion, while the dark side of the Force gnawed at my life essence, eager to claim its share.
The sensation vanished the moment I forced the dark Force into submission. Erra waited for the side effects to pass before casting a spell to soundproof the room.
We nodded to each other. I drew my sword, stepped up to the bed, and pressed my cold bracer against the sleeping princess's forehead.
She flinched violently at the touch of cold metal and snapped her eyes open, only to find a sword blade at her face and Erra smiling maliciously at her.
"Good evening."
To my genuine surprise, she didn't try to scream, call for help, or lash out. Nomi simply rubbed her eyes by reflex, blinking away the remnants of sleep as she assessed her midnight visitors.
"Kreso Nal and Erra Kallig. You broke into my room in the middle of the night, you're armed, and you're threatening me. I suppose this isn't a very good evening for me. Right now, I'm just curious why you didn't kill me in my sleep."
Nomi looked at my sword and delicately pinched the flat of the blade. She calmly pushed the weapon away from her throat and smoothed out the wrinkles in her nightgown.
The girl even crossed her legs and folded her arms, waiting patiently for us to explain ourselves.
"You're taking this rather well. Aren't you going to scream for the guards?"
I stopped threatening her, deliberately sheathing my sword and hooking it back onto my belt. The princess simply offered a nonchalant shrug.
"I just want to live. I couldn't care less if someone kills you after I'm dead. Screaming will only give you a reason to kill me right now. Since I'm still breathing, it means you need something from me. So why should I act like a hysterical maiden cornered by three Gamorreans?"
Her pragmatism was endearing. This conversation was going far better than I had anticipated.
"You can thank your older brother for this visit."
I dropped the intimidation act and took a seat on the edge of her desk.
She kept her face perfectly composed, but I could feel her emotions vividly—a sudden, boiling hatred and a scorching desire for revenge.
"I'm impressed you bypassed my security, but I doubt my brother paid you that many credits. Shall we negotiate the terms of my survival?"
Erra finally moved from the door, stepping into the center of the room with an arrogant smirk.
"And how exactly do you value your own life?"
Without a second of hesitation, Nomi pointed at the wall safe next to the desk.
"There are ten million credits in ingots in there. I'll give you another five if you bring me his head."
I pulled an active datapad from my pouch, stepped into her personal space, and literally shoved it into her hands.
"This is the blueprint for your assassination. Your brother is sending a full-fledged Sith Lord. A one-time payout won't cover the intel and the muscle you'll need."
Nomi read the document with intense focus, practically forgetting we were even in the room.
The longer she stared at Erra's calculations and the list of conspirators, the deeper her frown grew. She quickly grasped the sheer scale of her problem. She didn't have the manpower to kill a Sith Lord.
"I'm afraid I have to disappoint you. I only have fifteen million in physical assets. I'd offer more, but I simply don't have it. I assume you'll take the money and wash your hands of this. After all, going up against a Sith Lord..."
Erra cut her off rudely. It always annoyed the sorceress when people overestimated brute force. She decided it was time to establish the hierarchy in our new partnership.
"What makes you think a Sith Lord is immortal? The only question here is whether we help you or your brother. The Sith Lord dies either way."
I walked back to Nomi, snatched the datapad out of her hands, and opened a different classified report. It detailed exactly what the Alsakan command staff had been doing.
The princess had arrived and immediately choked off their illicit income streams with her reforms.
"Do you understand why you have no allies now?"
The princess glanced at Erra, then went back to reading about the sheer volume of the embezzlement.
"My attempt to prove my competence only bought me a death sentence. I apologize for my assumptions, Miss Erra. If you're confident I can survive this, I believe we can find a solution to your financial problem. This corruption ring has far too many middlemen. If you worked directly with me, we could theoretically multiply those profits tenfold."
Erra and I exchanged a brief, barely perceptible nod.
Only one question remained. Was Nomi going to frame us the second she felt safe?
"The Princess of Alsakan intends to rob her own kingdom. Don't you find that slightly ironic?"
I pulled a syringe of poison from my belt and offered it to her.
To my surprise, she took the syringe and visibly relaxed. Until this very second, she had still been calculating the odds of her imminent execution.
Now, she knew exactly where she stood.
"Those credits will allow me to buy the absolute loyalty of my personal subordinates, but we'll sell the surplus to the Tion military. They're Axis allies, and doing business with them will strengthen my ties with local forces. Now, if I may be so bold—what exactly is in this syringe?"
If she wasn't planning to stab us in the back, it made perfect tactical sense to help her consolidate power.
Erra was already looking at Nomi with ten times more approval, perfectly scaled to the princess's promises.
"A Sith poison. It will kill you if you don't take the antidote on a regular schedule. Once our business concludes, the poison will be purged from your system."
Nomi rolled up her sleeve and popped the cap off the needle.
"You don't trust me, and the feeling is entirely mutual. Are there any side effects? Veins? Muscle deterioration?"
There was no resentment in her emotions. If anything, she radiated a muted sense of approval.
"No, it's our Jedi magic. Stick to the veins."
The girl didn't hesitate for a fraction of a second. Wasting no time, she slid the needle into her vein and pushed the plunger down.
"It doesn't hurt. And I'm not dead yet, so that's a start. I think we need to discuss tomorrow's naval engagement. The intel shows my fleet is being deployed into a tactically compromised sector. If I get demoted, your shiny new dead Sith Lord won't yield any dividends."
Erra stared at Nomi with genuine interest. She had dealt with the girl's brother, and the man lacked even a fraction of this emotional discipline.
Who in their right mind immediately starts demanding favors from their own assassins? It was precisely this sheer, unadulterated audacity that convinced the sorceress to completely scrap the assassination plot.
"Are you trying to force us to work for you?"
Nomi dropped the calm facade. She had survived, and killing her was no longer a profitable venture.
"We're in the same boat now. You want to siphon funds from Alsakan? Fine by me. But my military standing needs to be unshakeable. Ideally, I want my dear brother's job. And to get it, I need to deliver undeniable results."
Nomi interlaced her fingers, suddenly radiating a strange, heavy confidence dripping with the Force.
Wait—the Force? Was that the instinctive reaction of a latent sensitive? I suddenly remembered the detail I'd forgotten to mention to Erra.
"She's Force-sensitive. I think the Imperial Fleet's doctrine applies here."
Erra rapidly muttered an incantation, then nodded, confirming my suspicion.
"That changes everything. We can set up a temporary ritual tether. It'll let me channel the effects of Battle Meditation directly through her."
Was Erra seriously planning to burn through the rest of my alchemical supplies? Whatever. If it kept us alive, it was an acceptable loss.
"You'll also need to feed her your precognitive visions of the battlefield."
Kallig paused, considering it, but didn't argue. It was only a temporary link; it wouldn't accelerate her flesh degradation.
"The real question is how long her brain can handle it. The tether requires immense focus, and processing visions is ten times more exhausting than a Battle Meditation network linking nine officers."
If I was already burning through my reagents, I might as well sacrifice the precursors too. I couldn't restock them here, but I could always try begging Lord SorSyn for more later.
"I'll brew a few potions to mitigate the strain."
Nomi clapped her hands sharply, demanding our attention.
"Right. Stop. The Alsakan naval manuals explicitly state that Battle Meditation should never be attempted by anyone below the rank of a Sith Lord or a Jedi Master. I want both of you to explain exactly what I should expect and what this magic actually does."
Nomi had only ever heard of Battle Meditation being used to coordinate ground infantry.
Erra let out a long, heavy sigh and began explaining it like she was talking to a toddler.
"If I were trying to coordinate hundreds of thousands of infantrymen, my raw power wouldn't be enough. It would require a full Sith Lord, a dedicated meditation chamber, and a massive convergence of Force nexuses. I'm scaling this down. I'll only be hijacking the minds of the nine captains directly under your command."
Nomi grasped the concept instantly, but she needed to verify her assumptions.
"Let me make sure I understand this temporary tether. It's a mind link? Will I be puppeteering the captains personally?"
This was entirely uncharted territory for her.
"Exactly. On top of that, you'll be able to see a few seconds into the future. That's all the warning you'll need to execute perfect evasive maneuvers."
Erra knew better than to feed the girl long-term precognition.
Peering just one second into the future generates thousands of cascading variables branching off your own decisions.
If Nomi tried to look ten seconds ahead, her brain would literally hemorrhage.
The princess wasn't a conditioned Force adept. Even with Erra doing the heavy lifting, a normal human mind simply couldn't endure the processing load.
"I've never heard of command-staff seers or meditation masters doing anything like this."
This time, I was the one who had to clarify.
"Because it's completely useless for anyone who isn't Force-sensitive. Tell me, how many Alsakan admirals fit that description?"
Nomi instantly realized why the tactic wasn't standard military doctrine.
Without the Force, you can't process the magic. And what sane officer would voluntarily surrender control of their mind to a Sith?
"Fine. Let's assume this solves our little naval crisis. What are you doing about the Sith Lord? As I understand it, Erra will be glued to me, maintaining this magic."
Kallig didn't even try to hide her pointed glare in my direction.
They had casually dumped the hardest part of the problem on my shoulders. Fortunately, I had already formulated an ambush.
"I'll handle him. But I need full access to the armory. Specifically: thermal detonators, disruptors, incendiaries, sonic emitters, scatterguns, and high-yield lasers."
It would all depend on the engagement parameters. I'd also need to drag the Twi'lek sisters into this.
"Unfortunately, we don't stock sonic or laser weaponry. Should I assign you a security detail?"
I shook my head immediately. Those idiots would only compromise the operation. Ordinary soldiers have no mental shielding; they broadcast their killing intent like a beacon.
A Sith Lord would sense them coming a mile away and slaughter them effortlessly.
"Only if you want a security blanket for your own nerves. I just need Lord SorSyn's acolytes, who are already stationed on this dreadnought."
I needed cannon fodder capable of tying up the Lord's personal retinue.
"Anything else?"
I shook my head. I could have mutated some prisoners or crewmen into Sith spawn, but I simply didn't have the time to synthesize the retrovirus.
"Very well. Then I'll have to ask you to leave. Sleep deprivation will compromise my cognitive performance, and I'd very much like us to survive tomorrow."
Erra and I shared a look. It was time to state the obvious.
"Would you mind calling off your guards? It's a waste of my alchemical reagents to sneak back to our quarters through the walls."
Nomi, who had spent the last ten minutes pretending our abilities didn't terrify her, lost the ability to speak for a brief second. She shook her head in sheer exasperation.
She had already injected an unknown poison and handed her life over to two Sith.