Grand Audience Chamber

"Indeed, I always find it encouraging." He replied to Alexis, although his attention remained focused elsewhere.

Kel'Al's face took on the pained look of one who realizes too late that he has not properly explained himself. "Oh, I do not intent to reveal the source of the data. I just want the last known coordinates and vector for Master Matango. My contact is what you might call a independent contractor. He must never know about the communications network itself. But if we Jedi are not able to find Adieumus, then he is probably the only one who can, given his last known location." The former UFFW chief of state still had a number of intelligence capabilities at his disposal, and not all of them were what the Senate or the Jedi Council would have considered kosher. But he knew who he could trust, and with what kind of data. "Even if he perished, we would be wise to recover his starfighter before someone else does." How exactly he would do that, without giving his contact a free look under the hood, wasn't immediately obvious to Kel. But he'd figure it out. He just wanted permission to take the data with him. Planning the search would take time, and he could handle that later. The Jedi Master was chuckling now. Kel'Al didn't give a hill of beans, either. After all, he was a Corellian.

"If you're sure it won't inconvenience you, then I'll take Ao-sei with me today." He nodded. "And I will keep you well-informed on its performance. I have a good bit of routine travel coming up, and this will be a good opportunity for some testing along familiar flight paths."

I chuckled at realization of what Kel was asking. what he was asking would truly provide a right brained challenge.

“now that you explain yourself, it does make more sense, I will have Pixar scrub the raw data of network traces, and provide you with a bio-print for your contractor to track Master Matango with. As for recovering the ship, I hate to degrade my own work, but the Prototype ship Master Matango flew is more of a case study than a viable prototype. the two most notable systems would be a power plant designed to give it the same levels of generated power as the TIE-D, and the Comms system utilizing starnet… of course. I suppose that the few days that it would take you to get back to Corellia would be enough for me to write a program to neutralize the systems in case your contractor gets greedy.”

I paused to consider what Kel was talking about… when I came to a conclusion I spoke again

“yes, Take Ao-sei now. do what you promised to, and when I am ready to produce main line ships from that ship, she will be a powerful ally for your Squadron, and worthy enough to maintain a place within rotation in your personal hangar. As for myself, I will simply have to design a new starfighter based on the lineage that I have begun for my own personal use….”

I did not get to maintain my train of thought, as my wrist comp alerted me to a problem in the academy. truthfully it was a timer that I set because I am not used to high honor ceremonies. But to anyone that was able to comprehend the double encryption that was both High Instramtan and Living flow, the message would check out as a request of a duty that I would need to preform with haste.

“And… being a headmaster without a deputy or advisor means that I must remain on the move. apologies” I turn to face Aleis and bow “ Congratulations again Sister Karidian… Kel, if you wouldn’t mind meeting me down in my workshop before you leave, I have certain items that I would rather have in hands that I trust than in the Order’s archive… especially after the transition to the Open forum Governance.”

I bowed one last time before exiting, as I exited I sent Master Jade a message.

::I would request an Audience with you before you leave. I am headed down to my personal workshop. you will be able to find your way if you follow the tracking function of Starnet.::

"Good," Alexis finally smiled, a beaming smile that sent warm light flickering through her dark brown eyes. "C'mon then," she invited, with a small gesture towards the door. It would be good to be off the ground again, back in her element. The newly minted Jedi Knight was walking with a bounce to her step as the two pilots headed off towards the hangar.

It had been a long time since the man they called the shepherd had set foot in this room.  The whole of the moon still bore the scars of the Mandalorian invasion, but it was here that the mauraders had thrown everything they could at the Jedi, and they - like their base - remained standing.  Damaged and broken, but standing.  It did the old man proud, knowing that some of the people he trained in their youngest years had stood fast against a horde of armored thugs with more firepower than brains.  Such courage and steadfastness was a bright light in the old man's mind, which only served to darken the shadow cast by the decadence and complacency that the Jedi Order had fallen to in recent years.  They licked their wounds on Felucia while the remnants of the Sith rebranded themselves as the First Order, free as ever to continue their wanton violence that marked their history.

This simply wound not do.

Fortunately, the Jedi he had once been had sent out a message to the galaxy, and it had been heard.  They came in trickles at first.  But by the end of the month, they had come in droves.  Victims of the Sith, eager for some payback.  Innocents that the Jedi had failed.  Mercenaries, discharged veterans, bored youths looking for something to believe in, it didn't matter.  Droves upon droves had answered the shepherd's call, like a flock of loyal bantha.  And now that they had their home - set up in the ruins of the great temple of the Jedi Praxeum - the time had come to turn the banthas that comprised the Jedi Order into the krayt dragons that they ought to be.

Fortunately, the shepherd knew just where to start.  The Praxeum didn't have much; most of what was valuable had been taken when the Jedi left this place.  But it still had plenty of rations for the comparatively small flock, and plenty of power to operate (provided, of course, they not overtax the generators too fiercely).  It now had a master that knew the ins and the outs of the temple.  It had plenty of followers willing to tend to its needs.  And it had a fully-stocked brig, capable of holding all of their prisoners.

"Send them in," the shepherd said, "and bring him to me."

Behind him, two armored soldiers offered curt salutes and went to relay the broken-horned Zabrak's orders.

The shepherd regarded the kath hound in his presence coolly, raising his head only slightly to turn his gaze at the guards holding him in place.  Without a word, the guards released their prisoner and left the room.  As they left, the doors that slid open for them slid closed once more, and the clang that echoed throughout the chamber was the only sound to be heard.  For a long moment, the shepherd continued to say nothing, breaking the silence only when he felt the Human ready himself to speak.

"Thank you."

His voice was rough, gravelly, and carried absolutely no pretense of pleasantry despite the politeness of his words.  Yavin IV was a humid moon - sweltering, in fact - and the shepherd's words could have sent a chill down the spine all the same.

"I've long thought of how to begin our reeducation of the Jedi.  I believe you've provided us with a way."

Though the black-haired abomination would have been unable to see it, the shepherd's face expressed a grim smile.  He had read the man's thoughts as easily as they'd flowed into his head, and he was making a poor attempt at hiding the fact that each of the proposed avenues was useless.  He smiled not at the vain attempt of the abomination to keep his cards close, but that the Human thought that those were the reasons he'd been summoned to the temple's grand chamber at all.  No, that reason was a much simpler one.

With solid footsteps that echoed deeply in the audience chamber, the hooded figure approached the kneeling man, hiding a grimace that worsened with each step.  Being in the same fleet as this monster was irritating.  Being on the same base as him was painful.  But being in the same room, getting closer to the beast step by step, was nothing short of agonizing.  That was part of the reason that the black-haired man had been brought before him.  Something in the way the Force flowed through him was wrong.  Not insane.  Not evil.  Wrong.  It was as if the Force itself was wounded by his existence; every step he took was an act of defiance, and every breath he drew was a sin against it.  The Force called out to the shepherd to heal its wound, and before their conversation was over he would do so.  There could be no question of that, and a flicker of fear in the Human told the shepherd that his enemy knew it as well.

The other part of their conversation concerned the very reeducation of the Jedi that the shepherd had spoken of earlier.  It wouldn't be as cacophonous or as harrowing as the oily monstrosity he had concocted.  It wouldn't be as insidious or treacherous as the machine he had built to slay the gray-eyed woman.  It would be simple.  Straightforward.  Violent, if necessary, but honest in its intent.  More honest than this cretin had ever been, anyway.

"There are many who agree with us, but find themselves..." the shepherd paused, curbing his instinct to find the most direct word, "...unwilling, shall we say, to join us.  They require a bit more motivation.  A Jedi, for instance.  I saw the light as we're supposed to see it, and hundreds - thousands - flocked to me.  How many more do you believe would answer the call if another were to be enlightened as I was?

"You're asking yourself now, what Jedi would follow me?  They're all cowards, hiding in jungles and contemplating their navels as the galaxy burns around them.  But we're in luck.  I know of one such Jedi that would jump to the call."

Ignoring the screaming in his nerves as he strode behind his prisoner, the shepherd turned sharply, looking down at his prize, hiding another grim smile in spite of his pain.

"I believe we both do, Formidonis."

"We'll see."

The shepherd reached out with the Force, running invisible fingers across his captive's body.  There was an irregularity in the chest; metal and machine where lung, blood, and vessel ought to be.  It was small and unobtrusive, but the scars on the man's body and the damage to his innards told the shepherd that this was not the first respirator fitted to him.  Fortunately for him, there was enough lung tissue for Formidonis to keep breathing should the device fail.  He wouldn't be able to do much more than breathe, of course, but it wouldn't prove fatal.

There was a flicker of the shepherd's mind.  There was a crackling of metal and a small shower of sparks shortly afterward.

The shepherd strode away from the man, leaving him in the audience chamber and locking the door behind him.  He wasn't especially worried.  Even if he somehow found the strength to move, the only way out of the audience chamber was out a wide window and down what might as well be a sheer cliff face.  Formidonis would lie there, fighting for each and every breath.  And the woman they spoke of would rush to his side, either to save him or to finish the job herself.  Regardless of her reasons, she would come.  Of that the shepherd was certain.  And at that point, it was simply a matter of convincing her of what she already knew.

As the shepherd walked towards the hangar bay where his shuttle had made residence, he threw the hood of his dark robe back, affording himself some relief from the stifling humidity that permeated even the deepest levels of the temple.  The members of his flock that saw him made certain to avoid staring at the broken horn atop the Zabrak's head.

Two soldiers entered the room and dragged the crippled man back. He would rot with the rest.