A creak of wood, the light touch of cool night air. Count Dooku opened his eyes and found the smile of the girl who’d imprisoned him. A bulky figure in black floated behind her, a lighthouse in the Force. Whatever the man was, his lifeforce was endless.
“Is it time for my end, or do I get to meet the Master of your order?” Dooku wiggled his shoulders, but stopped as his eyes took in the empty sky around him. “This tree of yours is larger than I expected…”
“Yeah… Padme is a bit upset about it,” May gave a short laugh as she rubbed the back of her neck. A flick of her hand drew the Count’s attention to the man at her side. “This is my Husband, Dan-EL. We’re not here to kill you, but we do have an offer for you!”
“I’ve opened a new kind of force collage, a place where the gifted can truly enhance their knowledge,” Dan floated forward and revealed a youthful face beneath his strange suit. “Our Master, and a few others have already joined, and I have a good line on many students across the galaxy.” Dan’s eyes flashed with a hidden light, some kind of energy Dooku didn’t understand. “In fact, I hope to recruit your former padawan, Qui-Gon Jinn… he’s still on our homeworld, in discussion with Vergere about joining the new order.”
“Qui-Gon and Vergere…” Dooku’s face turned thoughtful. He had intended to recruit his old apprentice himself, so the idea of pulling him into the fold brought a smile to his lips. “I’ll reserve judgement, until after I’ve met the young miss’ Master… but I’m willing to visit your homeworld and join Vergere in turning Qui-Gon from the Jedi’s cause.”
“My master is currently… occupied, but I’ll take you to Garnib and we can await his return together,” May smiled and pointed to the sky above, where Gladius’ two kilometre bulk drifted down from orbit. “Dan has other business, so we’ll take my ship!”
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“Get up here, Mnggal,” Dan drifted into the atmosphere of the great slime’s world. It was time to get answers. “I want to know everything you know about the storm that abducted me, or you and this world are destined for the sun!”
Mnggal’s comments, before Dan was teleported to a different universe, were enough to know the slime held information on his attacker. Without his system, he might have been trapped in that alternate reality forever. The silver ocean below twisted into a spire, a rise of a familiar giant.
“How have you returned…” Mnggal’s voice shook the skies, confusion and shock on his massive face. “The sisters and their master evicted you from reality… you’re too frail to have returned on your own…”
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“I’ve got my ways,” Dan laughed as he floated in front of the giant’s head, wrapped in a thick layer of deep-blue ki. He descended to the ground with a pulse of his biofield, a wave of force that divided the ocean of Mnggal’s silver toned cells. “Now get talking, time is running out for this planet…”
Feet planted into the corroded rock, Dan let his biofield wrap the world in a halo of blue flame. A slight push and the sun above doubled in size. The temperature skyrocketed, atmosphere transformed into a mediaeval forge. Mnggal’s waters trembled, his giant avatar reduced to half its size under the harsh light.
“You cannot kill me, even if you purify this world in the fires of a star,” Mnggal bubbled a laugh that shook the globe under Dan’s feet. The ocean’s of the world retreated, until a great sphere of the purest silver towered above the eroded mountains. “This body is less than the trimmings of my hair, its destruction changes nothing!”
“Fine by me,” Dan shrugged. Mnggal was a threat to all of life. Even if his words were true, the death of this body would still slow its actions in the galaxy. Another push of his feet and Dan detached his aura from the planet, headed into space. Mnggal and his world tumbled toward the sun, even as the slime reached toward the heavens.
“Not a chance…” A flash of blue - twin lines of superheated energy - carved Mnggal’s tentacle into chunks that rained back down to the ground. “I assume you’ve got some remnants hidden away in the dark corners of the galaxy, but every cell on that world is destined to burn.”
Dan waited, until the desolate planet sank into the star. A coronal ejection of fire that washed over his body like a gentle rain. It was impossible to interrogate the strange lifeform that was Mnggal-Mnggal. If it didn’t want to talk, then this was the best course of action.
“I need to figure out who targeted me…” The only information Dan had was Mnggal’s paltry statements. It was enough to know that the slime considered the being to be an enemy of both himself and Dan. “The only enemies of Mnggal that I know of are the Celestials, but I’m not sure what I’ve done to make them my enemies…”
He’d certainly muddled with the fate of the galaxy, that might be enough by itself. The Father was in charge of balance, and Dan’s existence was an element of chaos. If not the last of the Celestials, hidden away in Mortis, then Dan wasn’t sure who else it could be.
“Whoever it is, they have limits,” A flash took him through the phantom zone, into orbit around Garnib. He angled to the day side of the planet and spent a moment under the unfiltered sun. “They haven't killed me directly, and they didn’t teleport me away the second I returned.”
Dan shook his head. Even so, the power to open a path between realities was something only his system could match… at least for now. Face set, he angled toward the ground. Merlyn would be recovered soon, the miracles of Kryptonian technology and the Wizard’s unusual biology.
“I need to apologise to the old man for being so late…” Merlyn’s injuries only happened because Dan had underestimated Sidious. The Sith from the legend’s canon was difficult to scale, and he’d assumed the Yassilamari could shut down his powers altogether. “After that, it’s time to meet Qui-Gon Jinn and see if he’s been convinced to join the fold.”
WIth both Dooku and Qui-Gon on his side, the operation of the new school would be well in hand. Combined with Vergere, Merlyn, and Maul, students would have access to a wide range of skilled teachers.
“Hmmm?” Dan took out his com and thumbed a control. Jango Fett’s armoured face popped into view, newly forged beskar in the place of his old helm. “Greetings, Fett, I planned to contact you myself in a few days.”
“We need to talk,” the Mandalorian nodded in reply to Dan’s hello and moved straight to business. “Our contract will be up in less than a week…”
“I’m aware,” Dan smiled. “Meet me tomorrow, on Garnib. We’ll discuss the future of our peoples' relationship then!”