The cockpit of the TIE Avenger pulsed with light: glowing monitors and flashing screens continuously signaled, warning of the constantly shifting news of battle.
But Asajj Ventress wasn't even looking at the screens.
Her perception of events extended far beyond the cockpit of the starfighter, far beyond the information provided by electronic instruments and her helmet's visor.
The Force was her ally and let her sense much more than even the most sensitive scanners and best instruments in the galaxy could give a pilot.
She knew the position of every ship in this battle, foresaw their maneuvers before they began to unfold, predicted the salvos of cannons and the pursuit of her fighter by enemy small craft.
Her expanded sphere of consciousness allowed her to anticipate every laser cannon volley from the pursuers on her tail, every subtle turn and roll, any movement and counter-movement made by the ship chasing her.
She was being pursued by an ace pilot, who had latched on not far from the small hangar she'd spotted for landing her craft.
The pilot was clearly more skilled than most of his comrades, but matching Ventress was clearly beyond him.
So, when she tired of playing with her pursuer, the Dathomirian witch spun her starfighter on its maneuvering thrusters alone and blasted the V-19 Torrent with a salvo from all her cannons.
Ignoring the explosion, she resumed her original course.
Several enemy fighters were already vectoring toward her, but cumulative missiles solved their existence problem, and her deflector shields, though they dipped, did so only slightly.
The battle was beginning to wear her down.
She frowned in tense concentration; her breathing became uneven and ragged.
Beads of sweat rolled down her forehead, making her eyes sting.
Still, it was time to stop piloting — she'd attracted enough attention from the Force-sensitive being on the bridge of the Lucrehulk\-class.
Lucrehulk\-class Battleship
(Modified LH-3210 Container Ship)
Now he would definitely come to meet her.
Asajj could feel the Dark Side radiating from her opponent almost through her skin.
His hunger for killing, his abnormal cheerfulness, his thirst for triumph and for inflicting suffering.
True madness born of an uncontrolled fall to the Dark Side.
You stoke emotions within yourself that strengthen your connection to the Dark Side.
The deeper that connection, the stronger the emotions.
And this cycle becomes an end in itself, a way of existence that is almost impossible to break.
You usually only notice it when it's already far too late.
Nurturing the Dark Side of the Force becomes your daily routine, your reason for living.
Otherwise you simply can't imagine how to exist.
The longer you exist in such a cycle of emotions and the Dark Side, the faster your body decays.
The strain she'd experienced in this fighter battle wasn't extreme — from an objective point of view.
Some thirty years ago, she could have flown and killed for hours and hours on end, taking pleasure in every death.
But now...
Subjectively, the strain she was experiencing was immense; and yet, despite her progressive mental exhaustion, her physical state remained at a level that allowed her to maintain mental focus and draw on the Dark Side of the Force to influence the course of her clashes with the enemy pilots who dared challenge the Dathomirian witch.
She could now clearly sense the presence of a Force-user aboard the Zann Consortium's battleship (and never mind that the barely faded emblems of the Confederacy of Independent Systems were overlaid with Corporate Sector identification marks).
She could say with certainty that at the start of the battle, that point of rage and hatred had been on the Lucrehulk's bridge, and was now shifting from the center of the core ship toward the periphery.
Directly toward the hangar she'd picked for her landing inside the vessel.
Well, everything had definitely gone sideways now, but it still fit within the framework of her plan — to make the capture of the enemy commander more realistic.
What was throwing her off was that after leaving the area affected by the ysalamiri aboard the Crimson Dawn, she felt the Dark Side coming from her opponent far more strongly.
Now it seemed only a pale shadow.
But nevertheless — powerful enough to understand that a clash with him wouldn't end in seconds or minutes, the way lightsaber duels usually do.
Time to stop playing with the pilots.
She could already sense that the starship carrying the fleet special forces assault team had arrived and docked on the opposite side of the core ship.
Time to break through.
She spiraled and tumbled through the flashes of anti-fighter turret barrage fire, shedding pursuers and other enemies, carving her way forward.
Reacting with the speed born of instinct, honed by training, and sustained by her Dark Side intuition, she pulled back the engine control lever and leaned hard on the control sticks.
The starfighter dropped into a steep dive, neatly ducking under three consecutive laser cannon shots from the Lucrehulk\-class.
Pulling out of the dive, she made a wide turn and headed back along the enemy ship's hull.
The Dark Side adept she was tracking, as it turned out, had already left the core ship and was now moving through the massive hangar occupying most of the vessel's open ring.
Obviously, all the enemy pilots' attacks on Ventress were attempts to buy him time to escape.
That was all well and good and matched Shohashi's plan, but she had questions too.
Ventress understood and accepted battles for ideology, wars for spheres of influence, and those aimed at total annihilation of enemies.
But being on the side of criminals...
Whoever this Force-user was, he clearly wasn't the only one serving the Zann Consortium.
In a one-on-one duel, she intended to extract more information from the enemy about the organization.
Vague doubts were also beginning to gnaw at her — that there might be several Dark Side adepts hostile to the Dominion aboard this starship.
That would explain the difference in the aura she'd sensed initially and what she was registering now.
Her Avenger ripped through the defensive perimeter around the battleship too fast and too nimbly to be caught in the sights of an enemy escort fighter or turret.
Breaking through the "corporates'" defenses, she headed straight into the heart of the main hangar, blasting V-19s taking off from the hangar deck with her cannons.
The crew guessed her intentions, but the blast doors dropped only a fraction of a second after her starfighter was inside.
The ship spun, skidding across the landing pad deck, and she opened fire, destroying nearly every soldier unfortunate enough to be inside the bay and in her path.
The moment the starfighter stopped, Ventress — who had already removed her helmet — immediately threw open the hatch and leaped from the cockpit onto the deck.
The next instant, several rockets slammed into her Avenger behind her, blowing the ship apart.
But she was no longer concerned with that.
She'd always find a way to get off a dying enemy starship — if there was one thing she knew, it was how to survive better than anyone else.
Landing nimbly on her feet a dozen meters from the blast site, shielding herself with the Force from the debris flying her way, Ventress drew and ignited her lightsabers in one smooth motion.
The first wide arc of her crimson blades caught the blaster fire from two soldiers in brown armor who had survived the initial assault, deflecting it safely away without harming the witch.
In a single leap, Ventress covered the six meters to her opponents; another synchronized motion of both lightsabers ended their worthless lives.
But more were already rushing to replace them.
Asajj smiled predatorily and launched into the attack.
A couple of minutes later, she stopped, assessing the situation.
Bodies lacerated by her lightsabers and machinery smashed to pieces were all that remained of the soldiers, technicians, and equipment that had serviced the Corporate Sector fighters on this starship.
Smiling, she stepped through the airlock threshold into the ship's interior.
Quickly and confidently, she moved through the corridors, guided by the Force emanating from the Dark Side adept — like a rancor catching the scent of prey and following its trail.
In one corridor, a security team intercepted her.
From the disintegrators on their uniforms, she understood that she was now facing not ordinary soldiers, but elites.
The best of the best at the disposal of the Corporate Sector armed forces.
They posed a greater threat — especially with disintegrators in their eager hands.
Ventress knew the training of these soldiers perfectly.
And the characteristics of this deadly weapon.
One soldier even managed to fire, punching a hole in the bulkhead behind her, before the entire squad fell to her blades.
By the time she reached the large chamber beyond whose bulkhead she clearly felt the Dark Side's radiation — something that could never, under any circumstances, be mistaken once you've walked that path — she had destroyed over a hundred enemy soldiers.
Their severed limbs, bisected bodies, shattered weapons, and crushed torsos littered the deck in a bloody shroud — testament to her fury and unstoppable power.
Two more elite enemy soldiers blocked her path.
They were ready to fight, but clearly terrified, seeing what had become of their predecessors.
And yet — they clearly had no intention of retreating, fleeing, or saving their worthless lives.
Too bad for them.
She felt the Dark Side adept beyond the bulkhead experience a moment of confusion.
But it lasted only an instant — after which he began withdrawing toward the opposite wall.
That alone told her — he wasn't strong enough, and therefore fled from any danger.
Strange that he hadn't abandoned his fleet at the first signs of defeat at the hands of Shohashi's ships.
Ventress didn't intend to waste time or dirty her hands on these fanatics; she also considered engaging them beneath her dignity.
Instead, she simply thrust her right fist forward and channeled a surge of the Force through it.
Both opponents were splattered against the buckled bulkhead, their own armor crushing their insides.
Without stopping, she blasted open the locked hatch door with another push.
Explosions sounded inside — the traps laid specifically for her had been triggered.
At the far wall, she saw her opponent — a lean human male who looked at her with panic in his eyes, igniting his lightsaber.
"And where do you think you're running, little fool?" Ventress sneered, spinning her crimson blades and taking cautious steps toward her prey. "I'm here — which means your worst nightmare has already come true."
* * *
The battle against the enemy fleet was reaching its peak.
The destruction, one after another, of three Recusant\-class light destroyers had thrown the enemy ranks into chaos.
Eric noted that the "corporates'" actions had ceased to be bold and coordinated.
In tactical language, this is called "loss of initiative."
And it walks hand in hand with ruinous panic.
The Lucrehulk\-class battleship wasn't going anywhere — like a large bird of prey, the Crimson Dawn hovered above it in the upper echelon, holding it in its invisible talons of tractor beams.
The ship was desperately fighting back with its remaining artillery, but all attempts to escape were futile.
The forward assault team of fleet special forces was already inside the sphere-ship and advancing successfully.
The space infantry stormtroopers had taken control of both main hangar bay doors, and shuttles were now continuously flying in, landing wave after wave of troops on the Lucrehulk's flight deck.
Battle droids and droidekas moved from corridors to compartments and back, clearing everything in their path.
No mercy for those who didn't lay down their arms.
Eric had a rough idea of how an attack that knows no mercy affected the enemy.
And how, when one droid fell, new ones took its place.
Such an attack would never bog down.
And the enemy soldiers understood this.
The deaths of their comrades and the unstoppable will of the assault droids fed their fear of death, from which despair was born, crushing hearts and souls with cold, sticky numbness.
It seemed that any action you took was already meaningless.
Ideologically motivated soldiers never panicked — if they knew their cause was just.
The Corporate Sector soldiers were such only nominally.
Before, they considered themselves the strongest and most invincible.
Until now, they had never encountered such relentless and merciless opponents as the Dominion's stormtroopers, with battle droids advancing ahead of them.
Panic had already begun — and the enemy was starting to flee toward escape pods, thinking it would help them.
A fatal mistake.
Every wrong move by an opponent multiplies when the mind can't process the information flow.
Every hesitation turned into an avalanche of errors and mistakes that overtook even the most disciplined troopers.
Every death sowed fear and a sense of hopelessness.
The battle, barely begun, was already nearly over.
The Corporate Sector fleet was in complete disarray.
Three Recusant\-class ships destroyed.
The Lucrehulk\-class battleship was under boarding attack, and all its small craft were either destroyed or driven away from the starship by the Crimson Dawn's air wing.
Its cargo-hauler counterpart had lost its primary shields during the first swift assault by the "Scimitars."
Now the Dominion's Star Destroyers were bearing down on it, training their devastating guns on the suddenly vulnerable container ship.
Turbolasers burned through firing points, ion cannons silenced entire sections of the massive hull.
The swift Dymells strained with all their might to disrupt the methodical attack on all fronts, or at least escape the trap they had fallen into due to their own belief in safety.
The turbolaser barrage from cruisers, destroyers, and escort corvettes emerging from their bays only proved once again the uselessness of enemy strike craft against an opponent built for war, not for intimidating rivals.
The remaining enemy fighter groups were split into individual elements and pairs, after which they were utterly destroyed by the Dominion ships' air wings.
Dymell-class strike ship.
Two Dymells, coordinating their attack, rushed toward the Red Dragon, intending to break past it while the destroyer's gunners were finishing off two of their counterparts.
The collapse of the enemy's plans was already as clear as a Tatooine noon.
Redirecting their heavy guns, the cumbersome corporate Lucrehulks relied on support ships—the Dymells—to establish defensive lines to contain the Dominion.
Without those lines, they were virtually defenseless against the Dominion warships' superior number of guns.
Eric tracked the enemy's escape attempt.
Both Dymells set a vector that minimized the number of guns the Red Dragon's gunners could aim at them.
The corporates wanted to circle around them, raining fire from all cannons onto the Star Destroyer's superstructure.
A logical tactic.
If the Red Dragon's crew tried to maneuver to bring more guns to bear, the Dymells would turn and come from another vector, dealing even more damage.
Or they'd simply swing behind its stern and either blast the engines or break out of the trap.
The plan allowed only one being to escape—the commander of this corporate formation.
But not a single starship would leave here.
The Red Dragon, despite several critical hits to its hull, did not alter its position in the formation.
And the Dymells broke out of encirclement.
Only to fall victim to the Scimitars that had moved into close proximity.
Coming onto a reciprocal course with the enemy ships, two fast bombers launched proton torpedoes.
A second later, it was over.
Explosions that started in the bows of the Corporate Sector starships continued with a chain of internal detonations that tore the vessels apart.
"Sir, the Imperative reports that all Supertransport-class cargo starships have been immobilized with ion cannons," the watch officer reported.
"Send the nearest cruisers and fighters to secure the ships," Shohashi ordered. "Do not board until we're done with the Lucrehulks. All destroyers, target the remaining Dymells. Then move to perimeter guard."
"Will be done, Vice Admiral!"
The cargo Lucrehulk was no longer a combatant.
Its hull was already charred from numerous hits by Dominion turbolasers and missiles.
Its firing points suppressed, assault squads were boarding, sending droids ahead.
Four strike ships—that was all that remained of the Corporate Sector formation at this point.
The first two tried to break through the line formed by the Red Dragon and the Eviscerator.
They evidently hadn't seen or hadn't accounted for what happened to their predecessors.
But now they were met by crossfire from both destroyers, reinforced by salvos from heavy cruisers.
The other two ships, swarmed by interceptors and raked by the flagship's broadside, couldn't hold out longer than the previous group.
One of them veered toward the Imperative but exploded, caught in the combined fire of the Tyrant and the Killer.
Precise short salvos—and the Corporate Sector starship ceased to exist.
Say what you will, but credit must be given to the crews of the former Ubiqtorate fleet ships—those personnel deemed loyal to the Dominion and continuing to serve in the regular fleet were truly masters of their craft.
At first Eric regretted that Star Destroyers from the Ubiqtorate fleet, captured the previous year, had been placed under his command, but now he acknowledged the correctness of that decision.
It would be a mistake to send these ships out into the galaxy—as long as the perception held that the Ubiqtorate had been destroyed and cleansed by the New Republic, it would be quite imprudent to dispatch them on Dominion missions where they could be recognized and reported to the Imperials.
Moreover, anyone with information about the designations of ships captured by the Dominion at Sluis Van would surely understand that no Ubiqtorate vessels had been present there.
Explaining their appearance in the Dominion would be very, very difficult, unless the Grand Admiral figured out how to do so without raising concerns from the Empire.
In any case, let command worry about that.
Eric continued his battle.
Another Dymell simply vanished, shattered by an explosion that tore the strike ship apart.
It all happened so fast that Shohashi had to request confirmation.
Yes, this enemy had been caught by anti-ship missiles from the flagship Crimson Dawn.
Now little remained but to watch as the Red Dragon and the Eviscerator baked the crews of the last two enemy strike ships inside their own vessels.
One of them opened fire with its bow guns to strip the Eviscerator's shields, while the other unleashed a volley of laser and turbolaser fire at the same spot, causing a massive detonation on the Star Destroyer's bow, accompanied by a minor internal explosion that exposed several interior compartments to the merciless vacuum.
It was a brilliant maneuver: under relentless attack, the two ships superbly coordinated their efforts to destroy a common enemy superior in class and armament.
Such a thing seemed simply impossible.
But one must also acknowledge that successes in battle do not always belong to the attackers.
Especially since this was only a minor victory before the final rout of the enemy formation.
The Eviscerator didn't even flinch—the oxygen in its breached compartments burned off, and the damage wasn't even worth noting.
In retaliation for the hull breach and the loss of several crew members, the Star Destroyer concentrated fire on the bow of the nearest Corporate Sector strike ship.
Given that the distance between the starships was practically point-blank, every turbolaser shot hit its mark.
If he had Triples under his command, everything could be resolved much faster, but Eric understood that no matter how much the Dominion wished, it couldn't refit all its Star Destroyers to the latest modifications in a short time.
No need to be upset that he was denied the latest models—Crimson Dawn was building a whole fleet of Star Destroyers.
And if he had the desire to annihilate every enemy starship in the formation with just the Warrior, he would have done it quickly, without even making himself wait long.
The Eviscerator simply sawed its opponent in half with turbolaser fire from bow to midsection—then the reactors and fuel tanks exploded, scattering the starship, which didn't even reach a hundred meters from bow to the edge of its main engine nozzles.
The second one, whose shields the Crimson Dawn had knocked down, veered aside, breaking course to escape the shockwave and high-velocity debris from its comrade.
But only exposed its starboard side to a more convenient firing angle for the Red Dragon's gunners.
Daggers of coherent white-green light struck exactly the center of the side, vaporizing the thin armor, burning and breaching bulkheads, melting compartment after compartment...
A second later, the starship flared with a white-orange glow, ending its existence.
"All enemy Dymell-class starships destroyed, sir," the watch officer reported. "The Supertransports have been silenced and taken under guard. Attempts to restart equipment are being suppressed by ion cannon fire from cruisers and destroyers."
"Acknowledged," Eric replied. "Monitor them until the oxygen runs out on every freighter."
He had no intention of wasting his soldiers' lives, or even droids, to assault military units trapped in doomed starships.
They'd die on their own or surrender—they'd find a way.
"Order all ship commanders to launch rescue shuttles," Eric directed. "Recover all pilots and damaged fighters and interceptors—both ours and the enemy's. Pay special attention to escape pods from Corporate Sector starships."
"Will be done, sir."
"What about capturing the Lucrehulks?" the Alderaanian asked.
"Progress on the cargo one is slow—heavy enemy presence aboard. On the battle one, half the ship is already under our control. Fleet special forces report they've taken the bridge, and stormtroopers are moving to clear compartments of hiding corporates."
"Has General Ventress been located?" Eric inquired.
"It's believed she's in the right half of the cargo module, but enemy infantry are blocking the way."
Hutt witch. As long as she doesn't forget that the enemy commander needs to be let go, Eric thought.
"Anything else?" he asked.
"Yes, sir. From the fourth interceptor squadron: a message that one starship—a modified Headhunter—managed to escape. The pilots couldn't stop it—it proved too accurate and dangerous an opponent. Only two pilots from the squadron survived."
Too good an opponent for the ace pilots of the fourth interceptor squadron?
Something new.
And the starship was atypical for an ordinary ship.
Probably the enemy commander himself had escaped.
But, by the Hutt, what is Ventress doing then?!
* * *
The man suddenly transformed from a hunted animal into a smiling person.
"You felt it too?" he asked hoarsely.
The brief flare of the Dark Side, accompanying several deaths, vanished.
Not died, but in one moment had gone far beyond the witch's perception.
"Looks like you've been abandoned here," Ventress snorted, continuing to slowly close the distance.
To get on her opponent's nerves, she periodically sliced off the top layer of the room's plating with the tips of her blades, leaving melted trenches.
She had seen General Grievous do this in the past before he started killing Jedi.
Very effective.
Given her plans to make the scoundrel talk, it was better to stall and engage in conversation.
"That was intended," the enemy said importantly, demonstrating a Soresu ready stance.
Memories surfaced—Obi-Wan Kenobi had preferred this fencing style.
But the acolyte before her was not Kenobi.
"My master has withdrawn and now knows everything about you," the enemy declared smugly, tracking her approach with his gaze. "Now your entire Dominion will burn in fire. Now we know how you fight and what you can oppose us with—your conquest will be swift and bloody. All Imperials will be exterminated, and my death will decide nothing."
The distance between them shrank to ten meters, and the Dark Side adept retreated when Asajj took another, very small, step forward.
Despite his verbal bravado and knowledge of Soresu, he was frightened and tried to retreat.
There was no doubt that he was not the commander of this Corporate Sector fleet formation.
The Dathomirian witch already saw what her opponent was hoping for.
Behind him was the hatch control access, where he intended to duck to escape from her.
Too bad for him, it wouldn't work.
"Hate to disappoint you, but it won't work," she said with a smirk, throwing her lightsaber at the enemy.
The energy blade spinning around the hilt was perceived by the enemy as aimed at his head.
So it was no wonder he ducked.
And the crimson stream of energy bit into the wall behind him, severing the panel's power cable.
With a light gesture of the Force, Ventress returned the weapon to her hand, twirling it virtuously with her wrist.
"Nowhere left to run," she said with a smile. "If you want to survive, you'll have to defeat me."
The enemy changed stance, gripping his weapon with both hands.
His posture changed, showing that this style was more familiar to him than the Soresu he had displayed earlier.
Well, the little deception was exposed.
If with Soresu he could still offer some resistance, then Shii-Cho, the first and most basic of lightsaber forms taught to all Jedi at a young age, was for her nothing more than amusement.
Against Jar'Kai with elements of Makashi, which she mastered perfectly, this adept wasn't even a worthy opponent.
Now the enemy stood with his back to a rectangular viewport, outside which the last stages of the fading battle were visible.
Only now, when he held the lightsaber hilt, did the Dathomirian witch notice a sort of guard on the device, made of interwoven curving metal strips.
And she didn't even need to test it—this was made specially to negate the possibility of damaging the lightsaber's emitter and thus disabling it.
Hand protection from this construction was mediocre.
"I will destroy you," the enemy hissed.
"You can at least try," Asajj corrected him. "From my experience, I'll tell you: more than one Jedi has tried to do that. As it turned out, none succeeded. But they all served a good cause—no doubt their decomposed bodies fertilize the soil of dozens of worlds across the galaxy."
This admission clearly puzzled her opponent.
"You seem familiar to me," he muttered.
"Picture me without hair," Ventress suggested, pondering whether she should just blow out the transparisteel viewport and toss the would-be opponent into space instead of wasting her time.
On the other hand, capturing him or making him talk could help the Dominion learn where and how many Force-sensitive beings the Zann Consortium had in service.
Given that it was previously believed they had none at all, data from this being could prove far more useful than intelligence reports or even prisoners taken in this battle.
"So you are Asajj Ventress!" the enemy's eyes lit up with recognition. "Count Dooku's acolyte!"
"You guessed right," she smirked. "Only the old codger has been in his grave a long time, while I'm alive, well, and have found work again. For example—killing half-Jedi-half-Sith like you and your master."
Her opponent's face twisted with anger.
"You will answer for all the Jedi you've killed!" he shouted in her face, looking around with clear intent to attack.
"Oh, so you care about the Jedi I've killed?" she smirked, taking a step sideways, thereby positioning herself between the man and the hatch she had blasted. "And why is that? Oh, don't tell me! Let me guess—you were a Jedi, weren't you?"
"I am Danaan Kerr!" he declared with undisguised and foolish pride. "Jedi Knight!"
"Oh, my," Ventress laughed softly. "So that's where you've been hiding, you fool."
Danaan Kerr.
"You know me?" he asked.
"There's a bounty on your head," Ventress shared the information, diligently searching her memory for what she knew about this man. "A Jedi who fell to the Dark Side, called the 'mad dark mage.' Fifteen thousand credits from the New Republic for your head. Though it was offered by General Cracken, now deceased."
Kerr had terrorized an entire planet, subjugating its inhabitants, searching among them for those who could learn the ways of the Dark Side under his direct control.
But it all came down to him killing all his students, deeming them unworthy.
His rampages spread across several sectors of the galaxy when word of the bounty got out.
Many hunters and mercenaries died trying to at least kill him—fifteen thousand credits didn't grow on trees.
For some reason, the New Republic didn't send its favorite and publicized Jedi, Luke Skywalker, after him, but preferred to use small-time bounty hunters.
As a result, none succeeded, and the terror spawned by Kerr grew and multiplied.
It was precisely to hunt down mad Jedi that Ventress had sought her old lightsabers.
After a few jobs, she could amass a tidy sum and lie low.
Just think—how ironic that she had finally met the one for whose head she had emerged from the shadows.
And ended up in the whirlwind of Grand Admiral Thrawn's intrigues.
Unfortunately, by the time she gained any authority in the Dominion, Kerr's trail had gone cold.
It was assumed that someone had killed him eventually—like most of those on General Cracken's wanted list.
Turns out, no.
According to the information the Republicans had gathered on this man, he had indeed been a member of the Jedi Order, before that meant a target on your back with the Dark Lord of the Sith in a stylish black armored suit on your trail.
It was thought that Darth Vader had eventually tracked him down, but found that he had fallen to the Dark Side.
"I wonder why you don't serve the Empire, little traitor," Ventress continued to taunt. "Weren't you recruited into the Inquisitors, fallen Jedi?"
She already understood that this man wasn't worth her special attention—fighting him would be a waste of time.
It would be far more effective to provoke him, extract information, then bring him to a boil and kill him.
"I serve the Emperor!" he declared proudly. "I'm not some cleaner like those runts from the AgriCorps who became Inquisitors! I am above all those failures!"
Yes, but you're at the beck and call of the Zann Consortium, Ventress thought, noting the tense in which Kerr spoke of Palpatine.
"Until he was killed," she continued playing on his nerves. "Now you've got no one to answer to, you fool."
"You're wrong," the fallen Jedi snarled. "I sensed changes in the Dark Side several years ago. I know that my master has returned to life—and I am again the conduit of his will."
Ventress's smile slowly slid off her face.
Here we go.
Palpatine's former toy knows he's alive?
And now he claims to serve his will?
This unplanned conversation with the fallen Jedi was getting more and more interesting.
"And how can you serve a dead man, you fool?" she inquired. "Not even the Dark Side can save you from death."
"Stupid acolyte," Danaan Kerr snorted. "Palpatine is alive! I feel it because I am stronger than you! That's why I led you away from my master—so he could continue our great mission. And you, naive fool, chased after me to meet your death!"
He attacked, and not without success.
Asajj, expecting a straightforward attack, was unprepared for the hatch she had blasted to strike her legs, throwing her off balance.
Hitting the back of her head against the metal, the Dominion general barely managed to cross her blades to block Kerr's overhead strike.
The man, despite his frail build, proved quite strong and was now trying to overpower her with brute physical force.
"You thought you were playing with me," he reeked of decay, and madness swam in his eyes. "But I was playing with you. While you were wheedling information out of me, I was digging through your head."
"Don't flatter yourself..."
"Do you think Palpatine would have taken under his wing someone who couldn't easily extract all the most important secrets from his enemies' minds?" he laughed. "No, dearie. My telepathic abilities are an order of magnitude greater than those of most living Jedi..."
"And you talk too much!"
Ventress drew both legs to her chest and kicked the enemy, sending him flying several meters.
Executing a backflip, she met his counterattack with her blades, deflected his weapon aside, and with relish drove her second lightsaber into his chest.
But instead of dying, her opponent burst into laughter.
"Idiot!" he exulted with madness in his eyes. "I can absorb energy! I don't feel pain—I control it!"
"Control this!"
Asajj hit him with a Force Push, but the enemy didn't fly to the wall.
Instead, he slid a couple of meters on his feet, continuing to smile maniacally.
"I can also dissipate the Force," he admitted smugly. "Oh, how much I will tell my master when I destroy you..."
But instead of the expected attack, he retreated as Ventress slowly moved forward.
"The jokes are over, would-be Sith," Asajj warned, casting aside her desire to play with the victim.
"Unlike you, I haven't had my fun yet," he declared, continuing to retreat from her advance.
Ventress noticed his gaze starting to unfocus, which could only mean one thing.
He was preparing to use the Force in large amounts.
She had seen this before—when dark acolytes, Count Dooku's servants, contacted their master through the Force.
Or rather, tried.
Most of them were simply weaklings, and telepathic communication was clearly not their strong suit.
There weren't that many options for who this errand-boy Jedi could say a word to.
The first that came to mind was Palpatine.
And that Ventress could not allow.
Establishing mental contact requires a Force-sensitive being a little time.
Of course, if he is powerful in the Force.
For example, like Palpatine himself or Anakin Skywalker.
But Kerr was clearly weaker than most Jedi she had fought.
And even his natural telepathic abilities didn't allow him to perform physical and mental work simultaneously.
Using the Force requires concentration.
And that concentration Ventress now intended to break.
Quickly crossing the room, she focused her power.
She released it in a hurricane of electricity, bolts of blue-violet lightning enveloping the flesh of the unfortunate victim.
The acolyte's body thrashed in convulsions of agony until his smoking form finally crumpled to the floor.
"What, couldn't absorb my Force Lightning?" Ventress asked the man with mockery in her voice.
She knew from experience that a Dark Side adept was easy to provoke into an attack when his plans were interrupted.
And so it happened — Danaan Kerr lunged at her with his lightsaber held high.
But this was no longer the same opponent she had fought just seconds ago.
His concentration was broken, and it would take time for him to call on the Force as an ally.
Now he could only rely on his physical abilities as a fighter.
And those, after a thorough roasting by Force Lightning that he hadn't managed to either block with his lightsaber or dissipate with the Force, were, to put it mildly, not at their peak.
His movements were slow, but Asajj was in no hurry to end the duel with Kerr, even though she could have taken his life in the first few seconds.
Taking such an opponent prisoner was dangerous — at any moment he could re-establish contact with Palpatine or his unidentified master and reveal more than he should.
Neutralizing him and stuffing him in a room with ysalamiri was also unlikely to be accomplished without giving him a chance to pass on information.
He was dangerous simply by existing.
The very fact that his master could potentially serve Palpatine placed the Dominion in a situation where they had interfered with some plans of the Emperor who had so inconveniently returned from the dead.
It was unlikely that Kerr had been sent to the Corporate Sector merely to silently observe Tyber Zann subjugating one of the largest economically developed regions in the galaxy.
There had to be a plan.
There had to be.
And they needed to find out what it was.
"How does it feel to be on the brink of defeat?" Ventress inquired, leaving charred traces of deep wounds on her opponent's left forearm with a flick of her blades.
"You'll all die!" Danaan Kerr hissed, retreating a few steps from her. "Your turn will come. As soon as the criminals finish killing each other and clear the galaxy for my master!"
Oh, so that was it!
Exhausted, drained to the core, he began building up the Force within himself, making no attempt to conceal his intentions.
Asajj lunged forward, intending to finish him — if not with her blades, then by throwing the hatch that lay on the floor.
Kerr sliced the metal to pieces and batted them aside.
Asajj jumped, aiming to drive both swords down into her opponent's chest from above.
Kerr beat her to it.
The torrent of Force Lightning he unleashed on her was nothing compared to what she had experienced before.
This man was strong enough.
But no match for Dooku.
And he had known how to turn her life into pain.
Ventress caught the streams of electricity with her lightsaber — the one she had intended to drive through her opponent's chest — and felt herself being pushed backward.
Danaan was clearly just buying time.
His gaze was starting to go blank again.
With a Force push, Asajj hurled herself to the floor, escaping the fallen Jedi's Lightning attack.
She landed right next to her opponent.
Mere meters away.
Both blades swept upward...
Kerr, breaking his concentration, raised his weapon to block one of the swords, channeling the Force through himself to absorb the energy of her second blade...
Everything went exactly as he had planned.
Except that Asajj intended to make him expose his chest and face.
Where she delivered a headbutt with particular satisfaction.
A crack of breaking bone sounded — his nose — and the opponent was completely disoriented.
His weapon flew away instantly — along with the hand gripping the hilt of his extinguished lightsaber.
With her next strike, Asajj separated her opponent's head from his torso, using Force-enhanced blows to send them flying at tremendous speed.
With the deafening crunch of breaking bones and the squelch of bodily fluids, what remained of Danaan Kerr was smeared across the bulkhead of the ravaged Lucrehulk's compartment.
Exhausted, Ventress fell to her knees, clutching her deactivated lightsabers.
The woman reached out to the Force, spreading her awareness across the surrounding space.
If she hadn't been fast enough — if Kerr had contacted someone, established a mental link — she would be able to catch the residual traces...
Nothing.
The Force was calm. She detected no one's attention directed at this patch of galactic space — attention that would be easily perceptible even at a distance to those connected to the Force.
She had done it.
Danaan Kerr had died without being able to tell anyone anything of what he knew.
The woman sat there for several minutes, trying to quell the raging fire of the Dark Side within her.
A long-forgotten joy at killing an opponent with particular cruelty spread through her body with a pleasant warmth, stirring her hunting instincts and demanding the carnage continue.
Ventress crushed the feeling through sheer will.
Years had passed.
She was no longer a mad beast-killer on Dooku's or Palpatine's leash.
Her life, her emotions, her thirst for killing — they belonged only to her.
No one else.
She, not the Dark Side, would decide who died and when.
Only that.
Finding the strength to get to her feet, Ventress invigorated herself with the Force.
"Peace is a lie," she muttered under her breath as she made her way back through the corridors to the landing bay.
She stood by her battered starfighter, pondering whether anything at all was true — the Sith Code or the Jedi Code.
That was where a considerably depleted squad of naval special forces found her.
* * *
"The enemy in the Bosph sector is completely destroyed," reported the hologram of Rear Admiral Shohashi. "As ordered — the operation commander 'managed to slip away from us.' Counterintelligence is currently working with the captured prisoners. All obtained data will be forwarded to you and to Colonel Astarion's department."
"I take it you also have trophies?" I inquired.
"Five Venator-class Star Destroyers, an equal number of first-modification Acclamators, two Lucrehulks, and a dozen Dreadnaught-class heavy cruisers of Imperial modification," Shohashi continued. "Also six ships of that type in Rendili design."
In other words — slow, no hangars, and with enormous crew requirements.
Fine, they'll get in line for modernization, just like the other starships that are Dominion trophies.
"Acknowledged, Rear Admiral," I replied. "Excellent work. You know what to do next."
"Yes, sir," Shohashi saluted and faded out.
Leaving me alone with the hologram of Asajj Ventress, who had been waiting her turn.
"You wanted to speak with me privately, away from the Rear Admiral, General," I reminded her. "Is there something you wish to add?"
"Yes," Ventress said hoarsely.
It took her five minutes to recount her story — from the unplanned deviation from the plan to the destruction of the fallen Jedi Danaan Kerr.
"What you've told me — are those verbatim quotes?" I asked.
"Yes, Grand Admiral," Ventress nodded. "When he spoke, I could feel that he believed it. It's not an attempt at disinformation. It's the triumph of a madman confident in his victory. I did everything to destroy him and prevent any possibility of him contacting anyone through the Force."
"Commendable," I said. "And yet, you do understand that changing the original plan without coordinating with Shohashi is unacceptable? You are his subordinate. Not the other way around."
"My plan gave us the knowledge that Palpatine has his own people in the Corporate Sector," Ventress bared her teeth. "Possibly — even inside the Zann Consortium."
"That possibility was anticipated," I agreed, causing no small surprise to the Dathomirian witch. "We haven't heard anything about Palpatine's agents for a long time, whereas in the past they weren't exactly hiding. From your deceased opponent's words, certain conclusions can be drawn."
"That Palpatine is watching the development of crime in his own backyard?" the Dathomirian suggested.
"That Palpatine, while pushing the Imperial Remnants to weaken the New Republic, could not have failed to understand that his forces might have to confront organized crime. And that he wouldn't have lost sight of even neutral systems. I suspect his agents are continuing their work — but now in those galactic territories that used to supply the Empire with money. War is an expensive endeavor. And power and influence are things that must not be lost, otherwise they'll have to be re-conquered in the future. Your actions helped confirm my hypothesis. Therefore, no sanctions for insubordination will be applied to you. For the future, please remember — you won't always be able to benefit the common cause with actions that contradict the approved plan. Inform Shohashi of what you intend to do contrary to orders. Next time, I may not be as merciful as I am now. Is that clear?"
"Perfectly," Ventress said dryly. "Can I hope that when the time comes, I will be allowed to join the strike force for eliminating Palpatine?"
"That's what the Shadow Guard is for, which you declined to join," I reminded her. "Or has your decision changed?"
"No," Ventress answered quickly. "I was simply refreshing my memory, recalling that Dooku intended to kill me on Sidious's orders. I wouldn't want to leave that assassination attempt unanswered."
"I'll remember your wish," a crooked smile flickered across the Dathomirian witch's holographic face. "But I make no promises it will come true. On the other hand, you can speak with Rear Admiral Shohashi. He's practically a specialist in negotiating with me to get his wishes approved and carried out."
"'The Butcher'?" Ventress said, genuinely surprised. "He knows how to negotiate? Are we talking about the same person, Grand Admiral?"
"The same one," I confirmed. "I think you, more than anyone, should understand what a concept like 'a being's many facets' means. Rear Admiral Shohashi can still surprise you, if you stop thinking of him as an empty-headed military man obsessed with carrying out orders."
A snort came from Ventress's side.
"I hear you, Grand Admiral," she said seriously. "End transmission."
When that hologram also faded, I leaned back in my chair.
"It's hard being a matchmaker," escaped my lips involuntarily.
The moment of relaxation was over, and it was time to get back to work.
One duel had added quite a bit of food for thought.
An agent's infiltration into the Corporate Sector was entirely logical.
And unusual — because I had assumed Palpatine was mad and paid no attention to what was happening in the galaxy if it didn't align with his personal ambitions and goals.
It turns out it's different.
I need to think this through.
It's likely the infiltration wasn't one-sided.
A flaw in my thinking.
The plan will need adjustment.
Not drastically, but another total purge is being postponed.
Not canceled — that would be fundamentally wrong.
Just shifted to the right on the timeline.
Well, war plans are only good until the first battle.
I have the time and resources to ensure the changes are for the better.
Being dead has quite a few advantages, actually.