XIII: Concordat
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In the realms of Ultramar, there were three scales. The mortal scale, that of humankind, that of the teeming masses, the grist of the Imperium and the precious treasure the Crusade safeguarded. This was the first scale and it was the scale of lifetimes. A man could be born, father children, see himself a grandsire, then pass, all in less than forty passages of ancient Terra around Sol. In short years of time an infant grew to a toddler, to a child, through pubescence and into adulthood. There was a reason the galaxy turned on a fulcrum of a flesh: few resources were as renewable as homo sapiens. Yet in thirty thousand and more years, humanity had endured. They had been waylaid, they had dawdled beside altars better left ignored, they had bargained Faustian and suffered, recovered and soared. This first scale, the smallest scale, the scale of lifetimes, was made stronger by its adornment. Recognition of mortality made mortar that welded parent to child, culture to generation, letting mankind march through long and sleepless corridors.
This was the first scale and sat in the smallest seat. Humble, but all things begin such ways.
The second scale was the transhuman. Homo astartes, one might jest, whose termination was indeterminate. Conflict was their marker, their creator and their winnower, which clipped wings that might spread eternal. Theirs was the scale of scope. If mankind marched through aeons, it was transhumans that pushed the boundaries of the world mankind filled. First in and last out, the answer to Old Night. They spread sideward, lateral, forged not by generation but by brotherhood. The scale of the transhuman was one precipitated and maintained by proliferation of the parallel. An Astartes fathered no children, raised no grandchildren, embraced no concept of hereditary lineage. They were all brothers, the infinite sons of childless fathers.
The scale of the transhuman was the middle scale and sat the moderate seat. An intermediate measure, a filler, that defines the upper and lower bound by its mere existence.
The last second, the final and third scale, was that of the demigod. An awkward word in an awkward age, but language did not have the nuance to describe a man beyond men in a satisfying way. So a throwback was needed, remembrance to older times, a term pulled from antiquity and unevenly set on as crown. The last scale was a scale of purpose. The demigod hauled on the lead, they raised the hand and they pointed the way. The ship of mankind was all about them, but without the demigod, without their vision, it was wayward and becalmed, adrift in doldrums where endless currents led to no destination at all.
The scale of the demigod was the largest scale and sat the greatest seat. Only the sturdiest of legs would not buckle under adamantium responsibility, under the yoke of rule and role that every one of their breed must bear.
This is the weft and warp and web of humanity, from the mortal whose threads were the longitudinal, the transhuman who were the transverse, and the demigod who were the knots. Together, only together, did the tapestry become whole, impervious and glorious, stitched with a million billion threads and woven across all time and space.
Thusly, did Roboute Guilliman sit in his great throne, brooding, silent, garbed in white toga and green laurel, resting chin on curled fist. Thusly, did Marius Gage and Aeonid Thiel, in their lesser thrones, in battleplate, reactors purring, make facets of the same cut stone. Thusly did Sorvenos Noskaur and Cornelius Regil and Keres Likentrix and Imbris Caraen and Orichi-Mu sit in the meanest thrones, multitudinous and varied, like-as-unalike.
‘For what it is worth, I believe no malice,’ Noskaur offered.
Lord Admiral Regil, always sanguine, nodded his white-maned head. ‘If for no other reason than the alternative is a misplay of tremendous proportions.’
‘It would be at that, Lord Admiral. My read of Shesh is that she is honest. She has her own agenda, as any would expect, but she has not seemed one to so easily lie.’
‘That agenda, Iterator, that would see the Thirteenth and good sons of Ultramar bleed for their xeno-impregnated culture.’ Thiel rebut, shaking his head. The Astartes had been vocal in his disagreement with opening dialogues with the New Republic, ever since he had learned more and more of them upon his appointment by the Primarch. It was a testament to the Primarch’s choice that Thiel remained willing to serve in this role at all, knowing what he knew. Most other Astartes would, at the threshold of mutiny, refuse. It was not their way to treat with aliens and abominable intelligences, even for the more cultured sons of Guilliman.
‘Accords cut both ways, Lieutenant, for our gain and loss. The Primarch knows this, else he would not have personally reigned in the fleet and the Princeps.’ Noskaur sighed and cared little to maintain his Iterator’s aspect here. He did not wear that role in this august company, just an old man who had seen much and done more. ‘I like this as little as you do. I remember the atrocities the Thirteenth permitted us to record on Forty-nine Eighty-four. I know what was done by the Sajun Coherency in the Hyaenid Stars. Shun the alien, hate the abominable intelligence. The Emperor has not been proven wrong by his Truth, even as we search to disprove it.’
He looked around, forcing each present to meet his gaze, all aside from the Primarch.
‘And that is what we do, isn’t it? We seek to disprove the Imperial Truth, for only by falsification can a hypothesis be made true. If we try and try and try again and never find a counterargument, we only make stronger our own position.’
‘Then, if you stand for the Imperial Truth so clearly, Sorvenos, then you name the Primarch’s decree incorrect. This New Republic should be treated as any other xeno-tainted culture and avoided or confronted.’ Marius Gage spoke mildly but firmly, ‘and we would have broken compact with the Emperor by simple means of welcoming them here under a flag of peace.’
‘No, Chapter Master, not at all. As I have said, we seek to find flaws in the Truth. The New Republic claims that for the entire history of this galaxy, man and xeno have been intertwined. They claim twenty thousand years of history in which integration has not led to pogrom and slaughter.’
‘And you believe it?’ Caraen, the perpetually overworked General, asked in disbelief.
‘Not in the slightest. They lie about themselves as much as we have not told them the full story of our own Crusade. But. But!’ Noskaur nodded toward the Navigatrix. ‘There is something that I feel must be investigated. Their confusion about the warp.’
Caraen slowly nodded, eyebrows raised. Similarly contemplative looks were shared amongst the rest and the blind, frail woman replied.
‘I believe them. I look out - eye open, the seas I see, I see heights and shallows, depths and squalls, I see and the sea is seen and I see so far.’ She trembled a little, Admiral Regil reaching out to steady her with a hand on her bony shoulder. ‘We all see. We all listen. The choirs sing out and we can hear them.’ Likentrix composed herself, taking long, deep breaths, and then her voice was stronger. ‘It is harder to separate myself. The warp here is alluring. It is so quiet. Navigator Ibelain led her destroyer ten lightyears in ten hours. Without charts, without the ancient knowledge of currents. She looked and saw the star and she led them there.’
‘This is most unusual, mamzel,’ Gage murmured.
‘Yes, Marius. I wonder, I dread, I hope - this galaxy has not touched the warp. Imagine.’ For Likentrix, it was a wonder and terror both. She was who she was, product of millenia, bred to perfection, to be the eye into the empyrean. To find a culture so ignorant of her birthright allured and horrified.
They could imagine, though. They could. All too well, they could. For Marius Gage, he felt the ghost of empyreal teeth worry at the stump of his arm, tearing at flesh now sealed to augmetic nerve-fibers. Others imagined the terrors that stalked ships, that came from/became men.
They remembered the Word Bearers.
‘I think, my Primarch, that alone is worth overlooking this insult.’ Noskaur concluded.
Guilliman said nothing.
‘But there will need to be some response, surely?’ Caraen attempted.
‘Of course, General,’ Noskaur assured, keeping an eye on the Primarch’s form, half in shadow. ‘It’s all politics. They have offered insult to us and made a mess of things. If anything, we should see this as a boon. Now we have greater leverage over them, where before they may have felt instead a superior bargaining place. They came to us, remember, and they desire our sons of Ultramar and our strength. Mistake or no,’ Noskaur spread his hands among agreeing nods. ‘The Senator will have to concede more.’
Regil tapped his fingers on the armrest of his throne, tap tap tap and tap again, in sequence.
‘My captains will be unhappy, but they’ll listen. You have no idea how much our wardogs wanted blood.’
Thiel, unhappy, shook his head.
‘If the New Republic gets their way, there will be blood aplenty,’ he warned.
‘There always would be, my son,’ Roboute murmured, all present sitting even straighter. ‘My heart and my duty despises any distraction, but we can do little here, ignorant in this corner of the Galaxy. Iterator, the Senator offered access to libraries and athenaeums to research the topic of the warp. Focus on this. Lieutenant, I will release, at your determination, no more than a demisquad of Astartes for action of your discretion. I daresay, this is precisely the task for which I set you to gather your cohort. Find accord. Put aside the insult. We will remember it, but our need is greater now. Magos, the Mechanicum must reach a verdict on the technologies you have been hoarding. Sooner, Magos, than later, or I will make the decision for you.’
‘Lord, these technologies bear no connection to the treasured STCs. It may be impossible to judge their provenance.’ Orichi-Mu’s mechadendrites squirmed and writhed beneath the rich red brocade of his robes, making the Magos Dominus appear to be hiding several wrestling ratlings.
‘Sooner rather than later, Magos. Do not make me repeat myself.’
Orichi-Mu’s mechadendrites writhed still, but he genuflected and held his bionic tongue.
When the Primarch spoke, there was no dispute. Agreements and affirmations flew and Roboute Guilliman led them all as he rose first from his throne to sandaled feet. Each from seats of different scales, suited best to each form of humanity.
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When the Griddek finally finished recounting the whole tale, for a second time, she grabbed for a bulb of water and sucked it down, wiping her snout with the back of a paw.
“So I’m not going to be in any trouble, right?”
Rhoki Sal Huin, independent Captain of a little freighter called Wicked Minnow, formerly registered to Pirve, smiled at a Senator, a Jedi Master and a bunch of Jedi Knights. A long way away from hauling farming equipment for a modest margin or slipping occasional thiksticks through customs.
“They really put a bounty on you?” Anakin Solo asked - the Anakin Solo, mind you, like, the son of Han Solo and Leia Organa, the nephew of Luke Skywalker. That one.
“Oh yeah. ‘Vagrancy, Breaking of Curfew, Endangerment, uh, Disorderly Conduct, Operation of an Impounded Starship, Unauthorized Emigration - and you’ll love this one - Capital Treason’. A lot of credits too, I think that’s what tipped Rhona off about me. See, she found me at Corsin when I was trying to find anyone who’d listen and-” she spun back into the tale, making sure to emphasize here and there just how dangerous it had been, you know, I mean - bounty hunters! Imagine that! The worst run in Rhoki ever had with the law was spending two nights in the tank because of a drunken brawl on Canberon.
“Yes, yes, you’ve said.” Senator Shesh cut her off with a flap of her hands. “Tell me more about the Imperials, Captain Sal Huin.”
Rhoki smiled wide, making sure her missing tooth was obvious.
“Thought I did ma’am, but if you want to know something more specific…”
“You said they destroyed the starport, right?”
“Leveled it from orbit without even a warning. At least two hundred dead, I think, once everyone finished picking over the wreckage.” It punctured her bluster for a moment. She’d known a lot of the workers there, most of them pretty well over the years. All good, honest folks. None of them deserved that.
“I was lucky, I had Wicked Minnow out getting loaded on location. I think it might have been the only ship spared.”
“Then you were able to get the patrol patterns of the Imperials?”
“That’s right. I knew some folks who knew some folks, and we got a plan going. Well, you know the Imps don’t have a lot of ships, right? So we figured, if we could track their orbits, we could find a time I could slip out and then go spread the word.” They’d used little handheld scanners, crunched numbers with datapads and even just jotted down notes on flimsy, but over the weeks, they’d done it. A whole history of where ships were, how often patrols overflew the settlements, when landers came down to that big fortress in the mountains, the works. All painstakingly assembled, digitized, and then finally passed off to Rhoki. It took Wicked Minnow only a few minutes to crunch it all and plot out a whole simulation for her, at which point the name of the game was terrain flying and then a mynock-out-of-hell sprint to clear the gravity well and hit hyperspace.
The bounty on her head that drew several sector’s worth of attention proved that she hadn’t been quite as unnoticed as she hoped.
“Wanna see my ‘alien badge’?” Rhoki smirked, holding up the laminate card between two fingers. The way the Jedi grimaced filled her with smug satisfaction, as she poked her tongue into the gap between teeth. They wanted her to tell them about Pirve? Oh, Rhoki had stories to tell. She had hours of stories to tell.
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Master Durron requested a private audience. So Viqi sent Victor to go call Bel-dar-Nolek, since they were all still pretending that there was a chance to reach some kind of accord with the Imperials. There had been complete silence since the catastrophe of yesterday evening, outside of a very formal and cold text-only message that Malaghi Shesh and all other ‘New Republic warships’ were to remain at anchor and any attempts to move without contacting the battleship Opolor’s Vow to file a flight plan, would be met with necessary action to protect the 4911th Expeditionary Fleet.
It was wild to think it had only been three days. Three days since she set eyes on the strange and enormous Imperial warships and wondered about the people who made them. Three days since the Imperium welcomed them with a dramatic martial display. Viqi snorted, pressing a button beneath her desk to signal the Jedi could enter.
Durron was wearing a jumpsuit, his robes put aside for the moment, and he crashed on one of the overstuffed chairs opposite Viqi’s hourl wood desk. Out of his robes, away from the formality of the conference, she could see the notorious rogue that Durron was purported to be. It slightly boggled the mind to consider the man across from her was possibly, by strict measures, the deadliest being in the galaxy, with the blood on his hands.
Oh, the Jedi claimed that Durron had been mentally compromised, but that didn’t exactly make Carida a star instead of a rapidly expanding cloud of plasma, did it?
“Alright, Durron, you’ve got five minutes of my time.”
“Five whole minutes?” he asked, brow raised.
“Four minutes and change, now,” she shot back.
“We should leave.”
“Well, that is concise.”
“I’m serious, Senator.”
“Aren’t Jedi always? No, Master Durron, we’re not leaving. Not until the Imperium kicks us out or Borsk recalls me. I’m a Shesh, I don’t just turn and run.” Acid crept into her tone and she let it. Maybe the Jedi hadn’t intended for their little rogue Knight to go off and do the monumentally stupid things she did, but she had still done it, and now Viqi had to deal with the fallout. It smarted all the more to find out that more Jedi were with that idiot Commodore from the Plooroid Self Defence Force than Viqi brought with her. Rhonabeq, Harlan Ysanna, Harlan’s apprentice, then yet another Jedi and his apprentice. The Ysanna claimed she had been trying to get Rhonabeq to back down and leave it be, telling the Mugaari pirate what she knew about the planned summit that Harlan herself had been going to attend.
But Rhonabeq got it in her head, no doubt heavily influenced by the sob stories of that freighter captain, that the best thing to do for Pirve, the New Republic, and the Ploo Sector, was to use the patrol route data and run a smash & grab. ‘Liberate’ as many people as they could and then flee, leaving the Imperium with vakiir egg on their face and giving the New Republic a casus belli to do, the naive little Jedi figured, whatever was necessary for Justice, Freedom and Peace.
Then it turned into an absolute clustersnark as the squabbling governments of the Greater Plooriod and Ploo Sectors got involved, neither able to get over the petty regionalism that had sprung up like weeds when the Empire had arbitrarily drawn the sector lines. Both sides point at each other for letting Pirve fall to - what was it that they had theorized? Radical Imperial hardliners, or even Red Knights of Life.
Rhoki’s tales of the Imperium rounding up droids had triggered speculation that these were Vong fifth columnists, maybe the Red Knights of Life. Having seen the Magos encrusted with bionics, Viqi had been hard pressed not to laugh aloud at the idea.
Then Rhonabeq had talked a local Commodore into backing her up, who decided to act on his own initiative not to mention under-the-table assurances from the Greater Plooriod. They sent a message up the chain at the same time that they were already underway. Viqi would personally see that that moron Fthiss was drummed out of the Sector Self Defense force in the most ignominious way possible. There was nothing to be done for the internecine antagonism between Ploo and Greater Plooriod, but this at least she could do.
At this point it wasn’t personal: a being that stupid staying in a command position was practically encouraging terrorism.
“You can call it running if you want.” Kyp snorted. “These people make the Hutts look like good neighbors.”
“The Hutts are good neighbors, remember. They keep their space in order and local trade lets everyone prosper.”
Durron looked affronted.
“That’s all that matters? Keeping the peace and lining pockets?”
“I’m a Senator. You know that means that when I’m not kissing babies, I’m taking their candy. Isn’t that how the Jedi see us? Chief Feyl’ya and Master Skywalker famously rarely get along. What these Imperials do on their own worlds is their business.”
“Even if it’s slavery? Xenophobia? Murder?”
Viqi steepled her fingers, tapping against her lower lip. He couldn’t be this naive, could he? It was only months ago the Imperial Remnant showed up to help defend Ithor. The Imperial Remnant! The Hutts still practiced slavery, and Durron had just mentioned them. The Hapans were a matriarchal monarchy. Her own Kuat, her personal feelings aside, enforced a caste system. The New Republic wasn’t in the business of telling people how to govern themselves.
“The New Republic isn’t in the business of telling people how to govern themselves. We’re here to keep the peace and keep the Galaxy stable.”
“Fine, if I accept that - which I don’t, otherwise Master Skywalker fought for nothing - can we discuss the Imperium?”
Viqi threw up her hands in frustration.
“What’s there to discuss? That they’re a bunch of authoritarian imperialists? That they rule through military power? That in just half a year they’ve transplanted their own culture onto Pirve? I know, Master Durron. I didn’t like what I heard from that Captain Sal Huin any more than you did. I believe in merit, Kyp. It doesn’t matter who or what you are, if you earn it. The Empire was stupid to exclude most of the Galaxy, on some ridiculous notion that ‘humans are better’. Do you really think I’d agree with the Imperium?”
“There’s disagreeing and there’s trying to make deals with them. We don’t need the Imperium. Even if their dreadnoughts are, I don’t know, as valuable as this ship, each, it’s not going to make that much of a difference. We don’t even know if they are. I saw that same recording you did, and they destroyed capital ship analogues that didn’t have their voids ready. A Mandator like Malaghi could do that too. What else do they have, a few thousand soldiers?” Kyp shook his head and unhooked his lightsaber, slapping it down on Viqi’s desk. She eyed it, realizing she’d never actually seen a lightsaber this close before.
“The lightsaber is the symbol of the Jedi, but it’s not because we kill people with it. It’s because it’s a symbol. A Jedi could use a blaster like anyone else, but a lightsaber means something. It means we put ourselves in greater danger to make sure that when we have to fight, it’s only against the people who deserve it. Jedi aren’t going to win the war because this isn’t like the Empire. There’s no Emperor for Master Skywalker to defeat to bring the house of pazaak cards tumbling down.”
He was in his element now and Viqi let him go. Durron had been more reserved and acting like an observer, but now she was seeing the firebrand people made him out to be. It was a fresh perspective and she shifted her mental model of the Jedi Master.
“Jedi are about inspiring others. About being a role model. My Dozen and Two wouldn’t ever take down every smuggler and pirate in the Galaxy, but we could encourage others to try. Master Skywalker didn’t need to kill every stormtrooper in the Empire, but all he had to show was that it could be done.” Durron exhaled, seemingly spent and picked his lightsaber back up, hooking it to his belt once more.
“Thank you for the philosophy lesson, but while it was very pretty, I don’t see the point.”
“The point is that I’m afraid of what symbol the Imperium could become, if we prop them up.”
She knew some concern like this would surface. It was only expected for the Jedi. Viqi reached out, activating a single holo. A full-color image of the galaxy shimmered to life over her desk, faded with orange and crimson in a blotchy swathe from the galactic north, spearing towards the core and spreading like a cancer.
“It’s been seven months, Master Durron,” she said softly. “Seven. They’re already almost to the Colonies. If there’s a New Republic after all this, then I’ll consider us blessed to be concerned about what means we used to get there. Now, we can just be glad that we were able to learn a lot more about the Imperium before we hopped into bed with them.”
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Now the fat was pared away. No more clerks, no more scribes, no more staff. Now the chamber was grim and empty, set with two tables faced opposing, echoing in its antagonism. On the one side: Viqi Shesh, immaculate in corseted dress, long gossamer sleeves flowing. Kyp Durron, dark eyes suspicious and black robes dour. Tresk Im’nel, impervious to glares and scowls, red-sashed tunic contrasting dark fur.
Opposing: Sorvenos Noskaur, white-haired, lips pursed, venous hands folded. Aeonid Thiel, battleplate humming, nakedly bearing a long blade across his back. Katryna Vaul, bedecked in gilt, picking at her nails, espousing aloofness.
Six men and women. Or rather: five men and women and one posthuman.
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You could hear a pin drop. Viqi made a show of leaning over, whispering pointlessly to Tresk, the Bothan nodding along. She scrolled through her datapad, leisurely flicking a manicured nail along the surface, raising one delicate eyebrow as if fascinated by the contents.
A message had been sent that morning, requesting only the three of them to come down and re-open negotiations. No apologies were made, no acknowledgements of the wild overreaction that nearly saw open conflict. Was it stupid to go down again into the nexu’s den? Maybe it was, but she’d gotten assurances. Malaghi Shesh and her escorts were shadowed by Samothrace only - all other Imperial vessels had withdrawn at least to lunar orbit, though their engines stayed lit and active. The motley assemblage of the Plooriod task force huddled beneath Malaghi, shamefaced and chastened. The old Mandator sat with her shields up, turbolasers unmasked. If the Imperium wanted to play aggressive, she would play right back.
And she’d win.
Besides, danger or no, returning to Coruscant on such an anticlimactic conclusion would be a professional embarrassment. That held a greater peril than death, of course.
She put her datapad aside and slid her hands into opposing, voluminous sleeves. Noskaur shifted in his chair, while Shipmistress Vaul continued inspecting her nails. Thiel, looming behind the two, had muscles bunching in his jaw; clench and relax. Durron said nothing. Im’nel said nothing. The chrono ticked over.
“Really?” Viqi said.
“I thought it best to allow you to answer for your…error,” Noskaur offered. Vaul scoffed.
Gloves off, teeth bared, no holds barred. Just the way a Kuati should like it.
“I’m afraid I don’t know what error you’re talking about, Iterator. Is it the error of threatening violence under diplomatic banner? Is it drawing weapons on your guests? I don’t remember doing anything quite like that. Master Durron? Do you know what he’s talking about?”
Bless the Jedi, but he could play along.
“I’m confused too, Senator,” he muttered.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“Because sitting here, the last thing I remember was the Lieutenant drawing on us without provocation.” She stared into the enormous man’s eyes, daring him.
“The provocation was your treachery,” Thiel growled, almost as subsonic as the thrum of his armor. “You are more intelligent than this, Senator. Dispense with the games.”
“I don’t see why I should. Do you, Ambassador?”
“I don’t either, Senator,” Tresk confirmed, stroking his chin. “The way I see it, the Imperium owes us an apology.”
Finally something more interesting than her own manicure had Vaul slamming a fist down, almost rising from her chair.
“An apology-”
Noskaur caught her arm, the woman starting, but deferring to the Iterator. She eased back down but now her disinterest was gone, glaring vibroblades at Viqi.
“Peace, Shipmistress. Senator, this goading gets us nowhere.”
“On the contrary, it gives me a great deal of satisfaction.”
“Is this why you accepted the invitation? To mock us to our faces?” Vaul seethed.
She’d had fun enough. Viqi let the smile slide from her face, cracking the mirthful facade and staring down her nose at the Imperials.
“To get your measure. Did you really think the New Republic would be in the dark forever? Did you really think we wouldn’t learn of the bounty you put on an innocent spacer? Did you really think we wouldn’t learn how you have treated the non-humans on this world?”
“Senator Shesh, we have not misled you in any way. The issue at hand is the unauthorized arrival of warships within our territory-”
“Iterator, stop. Your territory? According to who? Some piece of flimsy you forced the governor to sign? You are a pack of warlords scrabbling for a single world. There is one authority in this galaxy, and it’s the New Republic. Your territory exists if we decide it does. If the Senate decides you’re another recalcitrant supremacist group?” Viqi shrugged. “Don’t you dare think the hand we reached out was anything but altruistic.”
Noskaur had his hand permanently on Vaul’s wrist. “Senator, once again, you must recognize the threat posed-”
“I recognize that a single Star Destroyer and a few escorts is terrifying to you, sure. I also recognize that you need us more than we need you. In fact, Iterator, Shipmistress, Lieutenant - we don’t need you at all. Would the New Republic appreciate peaceful dialogue? It’s always our goal. But if your Imperium is going to be as unpredictable, trigger-happy and paranoid as you’ve shown, I daresay we have far more reliable friends. Even Hapes would cast you in their shadow. You acted like we would come to shoot your ships down, but all the New Republic needs to do is close its doors. What will you do, when your ships can’t leave this star system? What will you do when we cut off holonet connections? Sit out here and stew in your own bitterness?” Viqi humphed, feeling Durron’s shocked stare.
Noskaur took a long, deep breath, blew it out through his nose and repeated it. It gave her no small amount of pleasure to have clearly caused the eternally pleasant man irritation. Good, now he felt a micron of her own frustration. Vaul folded her arms over her medal-adorned chest, head turned to the side, lips pursed. Thiel glowered, though that was nothing new.
“Look, Iterator. Shipmistess. Lieutenant. I’ll apologize for the rashness of Commodore Fthiss and I’m sure Master Durron would apologize for the unilateral actions of Jedi Rhonabeq. But I won’t be blamed for them either. I won’t have you paint us the guilty party. You knew when you invited us the way the Galaxy is ordered.”
Noskaur, damn him, seemed amused.
“Chaotic, decentralized and disorderly?”
“Quite.”
The Iterator leaned back, smoothing palms along the table before him.
“Perhaps I can accept that explanation, Senator. Perhaps I can. I try to understand other cultures. I try to find bridges across the gulfs of difference. That was my job, before the Primarch appointed me here. I’m not a diplomat. I’m a teacher. An orator, if I’m feeling bold.”
“The way you say that indicates your friends don’t.”
“The Lieutenant is Astartes. He doesn’t need to understand. Madam Shipmistress is a commander of voidwar. Nor does she. I was a teacher. Let me be a teacher again. You are not treating with us at our best.”
Thiel started, his first real movement since Viqi and the others entered the chamber, the big man peering down at the old Iterator in clear shock.
“Iterator-”
“Hush, Lieutenant. I have this.” Conflicting emotions warred across the Astartes’ face, but he slowly eased back to merely looming over the proceedings.
“You’ve seen our warships, no doubt. Did you notice anything?”
Intrigued, Viqi slid her hands from her sleeves, taking up her datapad, flicking it on. It took only a moment to bring up holos of the Imperial warships above and she gestured at the shimmering images in the air. Unnecessary, as she remembered the cold, hard lines of the baroque vessels perfectly, but it was illustrative to have the holos before her.
“Damage,” she said succinctly.
“Damage,” Noskaur agreed. “Tremendous and terrible damage. It was inflicted on us in a moment of true infamy and betrayal.”
“Iterator!” Thiel barked. “That’s enough!”
“You may silence me if you wish, Lieutenant, but it will need to be done physically. The Primarch appointed us to reach accord here, and I intend to follow his command.” He ignored Vaul as well, how the woman looked at him almost the same way she did at Im’nel.
“Do you understand me, Senator? Master Jedi? Ambassador? We were betrayed. Many, many died. Beloved brothers and sisters, comrades in arms. They died right before us to a foe we never expected. A foe we met under the banner of diplomacy. When we translated to the warp, it was to escape-”
“Sorvenos…”
“-to escape the destruction of a star, Senator. A star,” he said firmly. “That held a world the Primarch loved. That we all loved. Do you see?”
His hands were trembling. Clear as day, Viqi could see the tremors that quaked his fingers. As if he noticed when she did, Noskaur balled up a fist and drummed the fingers of his other hand against the table instead. Vaul looked furious. Viqi knew the look. It was anger driven by fear. And the Lieutenant - he looked resigned. Like he’d hoped it wouldn’t come to this.
Things clicked together. How cautious the Imperium had acted. The way they shut down Pirve like a smuggler’s prized stim-stash. How they blasted an alert across METOSP to stay away. Even sending bounty hunters to catch Captain Sal Huin made a sort of sense. The Griddek was a threat to them. Other things, the way the Imperium had insisted on exacting minutia about this summit. What ships could come, when they could arrive, where. Who would be allowed to the planet, who could speak, who could set foot within the Redoubt.
Betrayed by an ally. Backstabbed in what they thought was their safest place. And if Noskaur wasn’t exaggerating, if it had led to the death of a star…
They still overreacted. But she could see why.
More than that, she could see the desperation. They were alone and paranoid and wouldn’t trust easily, but she could feel it. They wanted to trust. They wanted an ally. They wanted to wash away the betrayal with fidelity. Of course it had to hurt when they thought the New Republic and she, when they’d been gracious and understanding, appeared to be the same as the ilk they had fled from.
Viqi softened, giving Noskaur a sympathetic smile.
“I do understand. In light of that, I really do apologize for how the Plooriod Self Defense Force acted. Rest assured, there will be an inquiry into the Commodore and the Greater Plooriod Sector’s government as well. It was a misunderstanding, all of it. I certainly don’t condone it.”
“And our own reaction was overmuch. The Primarch was right to call off the ships, the Titans. We could all see your surprise with our own eyes. I apologize for the threat implicit, Senator, it does not reflect well upon us.”
“Accepted, Iterator. These negotiations can be so tense, can they not?”
“As you say. I must argue on one point, if you’ll allow. Nothing the Imperium has done, though you may place blame, is against the norms of your New Republic. It was a legal action to place a bounty on the rogue Captain. Our treatment of non-humans, though you may not agree, has not been excessive nor unreasonable. I would not have you condemn the Imperium for the very same that others do within the umbrella of your New Republic. Not all are created nor treated equally, isn’t that right, Viqi of the Shesh family?”
A well aimed point, though she wondered if Noskaur had the slightest inkling of her own personal feelings on the matter. The jab at Kuat was entirely correct, though not quite the jab he imagined it was to her.
“That may be so, but the fact remains that you hid all this from us. To me, at least, hiding one’s actions is a sign of some form of guilt. Does the Imperium regret the actions taken? Would you do things differently?”
Noskaur opened his mouth, but Thiel beat him to it.
“No. Iterator, if you would allow me.” The Astartes slowly drew his long blade from where it lay across his back, motion slow enough that though Durron, beside Viqi, tensed, he did not reach for his ‘saber. Thiel held the blade gently, leaving it inactive and laying across both palms, as if in offering.
“Iterator Noskaur was kind enough to speak of the infamy that preceded our arrival in your galaxy. Let me speak of the infamy that nearly killed our kind.”
Without realizing it, Viqi wet her lips with the tip of her tongue, leaning forward. The way the Astartes spoke, the distant look in his eyes. Oh, she had wanted to know more of this Imperium-in-Exile and now it appeared she would get her wish, with none of the simplistic allegory or carefully dressed propagandizing.
“In our space, mankind held the galaxy in our grip. A golden age for our people, which reached heights unimaginable to you or I. The relics of that lost time are often beyond the understanding of even the most learned and ancient of Magos. It was peaceful, Senator. Mankind built wonders and paradises and yes, it is said we lived side-by-side with the xeno.” Meaningfully, the Astartes looked over at Im’nel. The Bothan appeared entirely interested and entirely unconcerned about the undercurrent of hostility.
“Then came Old Night. Iterator Noskaur already hinted at it. He was polite and he was circumspect. I am Astartes. I will not be. Humanity was butchered. There is not a word for the number of men and women who died as the galaxy fell into silence and darkness. We have seen the history of your galaxy and the horrors that capture your minds. Old Night was ten thousand Alderaans. It was ten thousand Caridas. You mourn over the loss of one single planet and revere it to this day. Old Night drowned millions of worlds.”
The Astartes proved a remarkably good orator, she considered. For having spoken little enough in the previous few days, his voice was rich and varied and he injected emotion and feeling into his words. The choice of them, of course, was dramatized and florid. ‘Millions of worlds’ indeed. But she pieced together further parts of the puzzle of the Imperium, revealing more and more of the tapestry of their personality, of how they viewed themselves.
Victims, she considered.
“Those very xenos that were content to live alongside man, when life was easy, turned on us. You wish proof? I am the proof. My brothers are the proof. From the very cradle of mankind, the doorstep of the homeworld, the mutant and the alien infested what had been ours. The horrors uncovered within the light of the very same star as Terra would shock you to your core, Senator. Have you ever seen infants butchered as a delicacy? Have you ever seen men and women, minds devoured by parasites, shackled to engines that sap their vitality simply for the pleasure of their overlords? Have you ever seen whole worlds, entire cultures, swept away into dust by slavers and torturers, whose lives require torment?”
Thiel looked along the length of his blade, from quillons to tip.
“I have fought on a thousand worlds under a hundred suns, and I am young compared to many of my brothers. I have killed more beings than you have ever met in your life and I will kill many times more than that before I die. And I will die in battle, Senator. I will not retire. I will not hang up this blade and grow old and grey. I am Astartes. I am no longer human. I am a weapon that was made because the candle of mankind was guttering out.
So we would do the same. We will continue to do the same.
And I wish for you to understand this: we could do more. But you understand the logic of science as well as we. Your New Republic is not ignorant of the principles of empiricism. We tested the aliens that we found on this world that was called Pirve. We tested them, for we had a thousand years and more of evidence of butchery and cruelty. But the Emperor, beloved by all, teaches us to seek clarity and truth.” Thiel took the blade by the hilt, swinging to point tip-downward, and pointed with his free hand at Im’nel.
“We have found these aliens to be permissible. I will never, ever, trust one. Know that and accept it. Aliens are not human. There can never be understanding. But there can be allowance. This is the Primarch’s will, and by his will we serve.”
“Well said, Lieutenant,” Vaul exclaimed, applauding. “Well said indeed.”
Noskaur appeared pained.
“It would be pointless for me to observe that this galaxy is not yours, then?” Viqi noted mildly.
“It would. We are aware. That we sit in open discussion with you is proof enough.” Thiel slid his blade back into the sheathe at his back, inclining his head and she knew he had said his piece.
And what a piece it was. Noskaur had indeed been careful when speaking of ‘reuniting lost cousins’. Assuming she could take the Lieutenant at his word - and at this point, the Imperium had not proven itself entirely forthcoming - then these were a traumatized, hostile and likely combative people. There was no doubt grand exaggerations had been thrown about, as much like everything else they did, she was sure that in speech the Imperium was just as grandiose, but should a fraction still be true, then these humans had seen devastation and loss of a scale not imagined since the tales of the old Sith wars. Take an apocalyptic collapse of a galactic culture, add in betrayal by other non-human cultures (and she saw no reason to disbelieve this part, as any grand catastrophe that would sweep a galaxy would, of course, make every nation look inwards to the wellbeing of their own people first) in that time, and then whatever befell this fleet before arrival at Pirve and truthfully, she felt a great deal of sympathy for these Imperials.
Whatever their way of life was, it was stripped away, turned upside down, and now they were trying to convince themselves they were strong, so that they could distance themselves from that dark past. She’d seen it plenty of times in her own short career, watching other Families rationalize their fading grace after the collapse of the Empire, or even as a Senator, among the squabbling of sectors still uncertain of what the future held.
The grand benefit though, she considered, was the Imperium held a great mistrust for non-humans. Unpleasant though that may be for the plurality of the New Republic, it boded very well for the future. The Yuuzhan Vong had come to Prive/Eboracum once and she was sure they would do it again. The Imperium clearly took self-defense as a near-sacred obligation, ready to go to war with the entire New Republic over a silly misunderstanding. Aiming them at the invasion corridor and dropping their leash should be simplicity itself.
As long as she could get them to trust the New Republic.
They acted like a nek, beaten and starved, and snapping at a gently hand reaching out.
Viqi traced her lip with her fingertip, deep in thought. Noskaur and Vaul had their heads together, murmuring, while Im’nel beside her refilled his and her own glasses of water.
A measured hand. Play into their need to feel superior. Stroke their ego. If they wanted assurances about Eboracum, why not? Pirve had been a staid little backwater anyway. The Ploo and Greater Plooriod could deal with it. If the Imperium wanted a little bit of a buffer? Well, if they proved worth the hassle, they could have it too. The Yuuzhan Vong advance was so close that it might end up that no one wanted to stay around here anyway.
“Thank you, Lieutenant Thiel,” she purred. “I think I understand much better now. I wish we could have been open with each other from the start, but I don’t blame your caution. Our galaxy is still recovering from the memories of the Civil War, though I fear it must seem almost a trifle to you and your people. Let’s begin anew, with this better honesty we’ve found, shall we?”
Reluctantly, the Astartes nodded. Shipmistress Vaul exhaled a sigh.
“The Navy will listen.”
Noskaur smiled thinly, looking older than his age.
“We had not wished to burden you, Senator,” he said. “But the Imperium prides itself on always hewing to the truth. It did not sit well with me to smile and pretend all was aright. We begin again, I agree. Call in your compatriots and let this day be a better one than last we met face-to-face.”
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Seated again next to young Anakin and Master Durron, Mei hummed a tune from her homeworld. Again she was in her armor - far more comfortable than being in robes alone like the other Jedi - and this time she noticed the Astartes eying it from across the chamber while the boring routines of diplomacy ran on around them. She tried to catch his eye more than once, smirking a little, but he was insufferably hard to pin down. Maybe since everyone had stopped being loud and unfriendly she’d get a chance to talk with Thiel or one of those other Astartes and ask them a couple questions about that starship plate they always had on. Jensaarai prided themselves on their master-crafted suits, but she’d never shy away from picking up a couple notes here and there.
Young Anakin still looked antsy and Master Durron looked ready to go for his lightsaber at any minute and both of them really needed to pay more attention to being a Jedi.
Not that Mei was particularly a fantastic Jedi, that is. But that was their thing, wasn’t it? The proper Jedi path, mastering emotions, finding their center and riding the balance. She was Jensaarai, the beautiful blend as handed down by the Saarai-kaar from Tyris. The Jedi had a lot to admire and a lot she had no problem adopting in her time among them. It just tickled her that one of the things she’d found the most compelling was sanguine acceptance of the ways of the world.
So this Imperium was a bunch of warmongering alien chauvinists. Ah, well. That was life, wasn’t it? At least they were sitting right there across from Senator Shesh and Victor Pomt and Ambassador Im’nel and talking over iced water, rather than burning people alive on pyres. That was more of the Yuuzhan Vong way.
It’s not like she hadn’t been wrong before.
Not like the Jensaarai hadn’t been wrong, wrong, wrong.
Thinking about having their own past thrown in their faces by smug Master Horn and pleading Master Skywalker could still get her to feel a shadow of that indignant, righteous rage. A pale, pale shadow, like looking at an old holo and feeling nostalgia, but it was there. She wouldn’t forget. You don’t forget that. But do you just ignore it? When you’re beaten down and in the dust and the truth is kicking you in the face or has a saber to your throat, what do you do? Cry? Rage? Die?
No. You listen and you live and you do better. Now into her thirties, Mei thought of young Mei and laughed inside. The whole world makes so much sense at eighteen. It was so easy to be so sure of herself. Now, she knew she didn’t know anything at all.
Still didn’t really, actually, but it was knowing you didn’t really know anything that made the difference.
So she spoke with a strange accent around her peers, having learned Basic later, more comfortable in the creole of old Sith and Susevfite dialect she’d been born to. She wore armor instead of robes and she looked for fights, when a Jedi should sit quietly and listen to the Force. Well, the Force made all of them, so she figured that meant that the Jedi meant to sit quietly and listen to the Force were there so they could do that, and she was here so that she could do this.
And if she lost half her spars because she liked improvising novel and not always useful techniques, so be it. Variety kept life alive. Trying and failing made a blade sharper. Master Skywalker always said ‘Do or do not, there is no try’ and she took that to heart, among other teachings. She did fight the greatest blademaster in generations when she was barely a woman. She lost and almost died, but she did it. She did leave her homeworld and her people behind and learn among the Order that she had been taught from birth were the greatest enemy. It was awkward and her brother died for it - through no fault of the Jedi, of course, and by the hand of a Sith, so that was irony - but she did it. She did take up her brother’s saber and learn a whole new form so that she could honor him along with the Jensaarai and it was like learning to walk all over again, but she did it.
Do or do not, there is no try.
Words to live by.
And when the greatest meaning in your life had already been fought over by the time you were twenty, it made everything else seem simpler in comparison. Sometimes she wondered if Master Skywalker felt the same way, having defeated his father and Palpatine at so young an age, then she would laugh and feel a little silly at comparing herself to him.
Still. Anakin was tense and uncertain and following every single word said. She could still see and feel the guilt and emotions churning right under the surface, the kid wearing the death of Chewbacca like a badge. She’d had her life-changing conflict years ago. The Yuuzhan Vong were dangerous and a threat to the galaxy, but they were sort of just that: a dangerous foe. Master Skywalker and others worried about what it meant that they couldn’t be felt in the Force but for Mei, it was just another quirk in the grand, endless tapestry of life the Force wove.
Korriban hells, but maybe the Yuuzhan Vong could feel the Force in their own way, and were horrified that no one in the Galaxy had the Force! Maybe that explained their religious zeal and the atrocities they did.
Or maybe they just weren’t part of the Force at all. It didn’t seem to change much, not to her.
Not when you once sat in the dust with Master Skywalker’s blade at your throat and learned everything you held dear was a lie.
That sets perspective.
Finally managing to meet Thiel’s eyes, Mei smiled and waggled her eyebrows. The Astartes was as unreadable as ever, searching over her face for a moment before continuing his endless and steady surveillance of everyone and everything. But she did catch a whiff of locked-tight emotion from him and it smelled like momentary confusion.
Well. She’d take it. Wondered if that great big lightning sword of his could cross with a lightsaber, though, and feared she’d never get to find out.
She stole a glance at Master Durron again, seeing the older Jedi still on-edge and gently she sent directionless waves of her own calm amusement out, washing against the sharp-edged focus of the other Jedi in subtle lapping tides. Not overt, not obvious, but she hoped, maybe enough to calm them down a little.
Really, she sniggered. They should act more like Jedi.
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They got an agreement to recall the bounty on Captain Sal Huin. The Griddek woman would be allowed to stay in New Republic custody, which really meant, she was free to go. She’d be required to swear to keep under wraps everything going on at Eboracum, but now the NRI would have a vested interest in that too. Viqi Shesh insisted on New Republic observers being allowed to visit the civilian centers of Eboracum before agreeing to any refugee deals on behalf of SELCORE. That had some of the Imperials arguing about sovereignty and not being a part of the New Republic, and though everyone on the New Republic side knew that Viqi was lying through her teeth and that SELCORE routinely did far less vetting, it was a very useful excuse to get NRI eyes on the ground.
So Senator Shesh argued that SELCORE wouldn’t be comfortable releasing refugees to Eboracum without inspecting facilities and filling out a checklist to make sure the poor wretches would be safe and secure there. The Imperium’s hunger for warm bodies was obvious and Noskaur reluctantly agreed, stipulating that the ‘SELCORE’ observers would be escorted by Imperial officials, for their own safety and assistance, of course! Spies spying over the shoulders of spies, more like, but that was how deals went.
As for the non-human populace of Eboracum? The Imperium was open to allowing expatriation. Viqi smiled around gritted teeth as Noskaur noted that there was likely to be a great deal of interest, as of course there would be interest given the Imperium had gone out of their way to make it very clear none of them were welcome. But, if the SELCORE deal passed, the New Republic would be trading indefinite numbers of human refugees for a few hundred thousand non-humans, quite a few of whom were already part-time spacers. Many also had families or other contacts offworld, giving them somewhere to go to without needing to exacerbate the very problem of refugees they were trying to solve.
They would all need to be briefed to stay quiet about the particulars of the regime change out at ‘Pirve’, at least until the Imperium and New Republic were ready to act openly.
And so on and so forth. Now the tension was out in the open. The Imperials were less veiled with their insistences on independence and sovereignty, more overt about their biases. In a way, it was better. It made it a simpler environment to navigate in. And for Viqi? She could lean harder on certain points, now having a more complete image of the Imperium in her head. Now that she knew their faults and their flaws, their history, their fears, she knew she could wield them. How long ago did they say their ‘Old Night’ ended? Two hundred years?
The Republic had been playing its games for ten times that and Kuat itself for even longer. Compared to the newborn Imperium, the New Republic stood on ancient and inviolate roots.
The real sticking point was just what to…do.
Viqi wanted to point the Imperium at the Yuuzhan Vong and let them have at it. She was no tactician, of course, and knew it would be up to liaising with the New Republic Navy. The Imperium didn’t want to commit any forces beyond the absolute necessary, which even she understood why, was still frustrating. They were very much alone here and with no backup they could imagine, each and every soldier, tank and ship was nigh irreplaceable. When Vaul again made aspersions about it ‘not being their war’, Viqi finally had enough.
“Shipmistress, the vong already showed up on your doorstep. You won then on your own, but they weren’t here for you. What happens when the vong send a whole fleet here? Don’t think they’ll take your explanation of ‘we’re not around here’ and give heartfelt apologies and pass you by. They mean to claim this whole Galaxy and everyone in it. You may dislike droids as much as they do, but I daresay the vong won’t like the Magos over there.”
It was a point well delivered and Vaul had quieted, looking contemplative. Their mindset was dogged and it was entrenched and Viqi knew she had to break it. They kept thinking of themselves as ‘other’. From some ‘other’ galaxy. Some ‘other’ homeworld. Some ‘other’ humanity. Well, they were here and that wasn’t changing. If they wanted to barter to dig through dusty archives in search of their strange ‘Warp’ they could have their fun, but the Yuuzhan Vong wouldn’t care. They were part of this Galaxy and all its problems.
More than once, she thought about a few of the things Victor had whispered to her in the past weeks. Names, contacts, dates. The Yuuzhan Vong were spreading nets out, subtle ones, looking for intelligence and turncoats. It wouldn’t be the hardest thing for a set of coordinates and a certain recording to end up in the ‘wrong’ hands. Maybe a fleet like that one at Ithor showing up would wake the Imperium up.
Viqi put it from her mind. It was a little enticing, if for no other reason than to see them shaken out of their stupor, but having the surprise factor of the Imperium counted for more than that. No, when their star dreadnoughts showed themselves, it would be to the best benefit of the New Republic.
“It’s trust,” Master Durron announced. “We still don’t trust each other. You lied to us, and we…made mistakes. Before we can hope to work together, we need to forge trust between the New Republic and the Imperium Exsilius.”
Viqi clapped twice, but not mockingly. It was something Master Skywalker might have said and it dovetailed with hew brewing thoughts.
“Well spoken, Master Durron. Let’s consider the matter of SELCORE settled, provisionally, and before we count our gizka before they hatch, perhaps a…minor joint venture will help build that trust. Shipmistress Vaul, Magos Nalt, you both professed interest in finding records of the, ah-”
“Empyrean,” Im’nel supplied, glancing at his notes.
“Yes, empyrean, or warp. Immaterium too, I think you called it?”
The Imperials nodded.
“Well, luckily for us all, I spoke with Director Bel-dar-Nolek last night, after the unfortunate and fortunately behind us events of that afternoon. You may have heard of the Obroan Institute? No? Well, it’s merely one of the largest repositories of knowledge and history this side of the Galaxy, and it happens to be practically on your doorstep.”
Almost comically, the Imperials perked up, some leaning forward.
“Unfortunately,” Viqi sighed, closing her eyes a moment in sorrow, “the Yuuzhan Vong captured it only weeks ago.”
“You mean to reclaim it,” Thiel spoke.
“As much as the Director is petitioning us to, no. Obroa Skai is just not a priority target at the moment, despite its treasure troves of lore. No, I was thinking, well, Master Durron, perhaps you could offer some perspective as well. Do you think it might be possible to send, say, a small infiltration team to Obroa Skai, so that the Imperium might have a chance to recover some of the data before it’s lost? The Jedi always seem to have a knack for being just where the enemy doesn’t want them to be, don’t they?”
A muscle in Kyp Durron’s jaw bunched and she knew he was thinking of poor deceased Miko Reglia, his last apprentice.
“The Jedi go where we’re needed, Senator.”
“Like Obroa Skai?”
“I don’t speak for Master Skywalker.”
“Well, neither did Knight Rhonabeq, and see how much she accomplished!” Viqi smiled at how several people blanched, but making light of the misstep was, she considered, the best tactic.
“Maybe,” Durron allowed. “I would volunteer.”
Thiel, following the exchange, slowly nodded.
“This…this would be acceptable. I have Astartes under my command that my Primarch has bade me make use of, should the opportunity arise. This would be just that.”
“A joint mission, then? Well, I’m only a Senator, after all, so we’ll need to coordinate with New Republic Intelligence and probably the Fleet, but I can’t imagine anyone would argue against saving some of Obroa Skai’s precious history.”
Anakin Solo, long quiet, spoke up suddenly.
“I would volunteer too. I’ve fought the vong the most out of anyone. I mean, I’m not bragging, but it’s true and - I can give advice.”
“How old are you, Knight Solo?” Thiel rumbled.
“Sixteen?”
“You are uncertain.”
Anakin cleared his throat. “Sixteen.”
Thiel studied him for a long moment.
“Acceptable.”
Viqi clapped her hands together, beaming. “Director Bel-dar-Nolek will finally stop calling me every other day.” Im’nel snorted and a few amused chuckles resounded from her aides, though the Imperials looked nonplussed. “Then we have a path forward,” she continued. “One I hope will continue to bear fruit.”
Noskaur nodded. “I hope so, Senator. The Primarch wished us to make accord this day, and accord, I think, we have. It is unfortunate it took the events two days previous to help us along, but perhaps we both needed to have our eyes opened, to see another perspective.”
“Treat it for the best, Iterator, and our mistakes become strengths.”