"Lord Vizsla, you seemed to know all along that we wouldn't find any useful leads on Batuu."
"Yes," Max Vizsla said with a nod. "I did know. But I also knew that once you'd uncovered records of 'Skywalker' activity on Batuu, there was no way you'd be satisfied without investigating it—especially this young Master Skywalker here."
At the height of the Republic, benevolent rule from the Galactic Senate helped bring prosperity to the Galactic Republic, while hyperspace explorers carried the Republic's frontiers outward to the farthest systems from the galactic core.
It was during that age that the edges of Known Space were charted in greater detail—Batuu among them. Beyond Batuu lay the Unknown Regions, a vast expanse crowded with high-velocity celestial bodies and immense electromagnetic currents.
The Republic of that era was vibrant, alive, and full of relentless momentum. The hyperspace explorers of that golden age were, almost without exception, fearless and driven. Rapid-moving celestial bodies and electromagnetic storms were not enough to frighten them off.
Once Batuu was discovered, hyperspace explorers came in waves. They were determined to break through the barriers of fast-moving stellar debris and electromagnetic turbulence, to press onward into the unknown, and to carry the Republic's light into those distant reaches.
Little by little, Batuu grew lively and prosperous, becoming a busy port world on the very edge of Known Space.
In that same era, cooperation between the Jedi Order and the Galactic Republic was exceptionally close. At the request of the Senate, the Jedi agreed to establish outposts throughout the Outer Rim to uphold order and justice on the frontier and to aid any who might need help.
And on a crossroads world like Batuu, the Jedi even built a temple there, so they could serve the people more effectively.
In the end, however, even the explorers' indomitable spirit could not overcome the hard limits of hyperspace travel. The high-velocity celestial bodies and electromagnetic currents remained an impassable divide between Known Space and the Unknown Regions.
As the Republic declined from its golden age, the explorers seemed to lose the drive that had once defined them. They stopped throwing themselves against those impossible barriers, and gradually withdrew from Batuu as a frontier base.
Batuu had risen with the Republic's age of greatness, and it declined just as swiftly when that age passed.
Today, Batuu had become a forgotten world on the edge of the known galaxy. The Batuu Jedi Temple had long since been abandoned by the Jedi Order, and the planet itself was left with only a handful of settlements—Black Spire Outpost, Galma, Peka, and a few others—with a total population of less than two hundred thousand.
With the aid of the Mandalorian assault team, Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker spent fewer than ten days visiting Batuu's main inhabited settlements. But after all that investigation, they came away with nothing.
"The 'Skywalkers' you were tracking and Master Skywalker's Skywalker are two completely different things. There's no need for you to look so downcast, Master Skywalker."
"Lord Vizsla," Obi-Wan said with a slight nod, "please don't call this young man 'Master.' He's a very long way from that."
"No matter, no matter." Max smiled and waved it off. "He may not be a Jedi Master now, but he will be one day. Anakin Skywalker is extraordinarily gifted—far more gifted than you were, Master Obi-Wan Kenobi."
"Lord Vizsla, you can just call me Anakin." Off to the side, Anakin Skywalker could no longer keep quiet. "Could you explain the difference between these two kinds of 'Skywalker'?"
Max had no intention of revealing the Chiss sky-walker secret to the two Jedi.
On an emotional level, Max felt a good deal of goodwill toward the Chiss Ascendancy. Whenever he thought of the Ascendancy, the traveler from another world was reminded of a distant homeland.
Far from the Galactic Republic, deep in the Unknown Regions, the Chiss had built a brilliant civilization entirely their own—one in no way inferior to the Republic. Their culture and institutions were profoundly different from those of the Galactic Republic. From the Republic's point of view, the Chiss Ascendancy felt like an entirely separate civilizational sphere: powerful, refined, and fundamentally unlike anything in Republic space.
What made it even more striking was that the Chiss Ascendancy also adhered strictly to a doctrine of never firing the first shot.
From the standpoint of practical interests, an isolationist great power like the Chiss Ascendancy—one that refused to strike first—was almost a perfect natural partner for Max's future interstellar non-aligned movement. If he could bring the foremost power of the Unknown Regions into such a bloc, it would greatly expand both the movement's influence and Max's own stature.
There was also the matter of technology. Unlike the Galactic Republic, which specialized in blaster-based weapons, the Chiss Ascendancy had advanced mass-driver technology to a remarkable level. They even fielded heavy capital ships armed with long-range superheavy megamaser magnetic mass guns, such as the Peltast-class Star Destroyer.
And both mass drivers and spinal-gun warships were technologies Max found deeply appealing.
For reasons of both sentiment and interest, Max decided he would keep the Chiss secret.
"Let's begin with the Skywalkers of Tatooine instead." Max smiled and turned to Obi-Wan. "Master Obi-Wan Kenobi, may I have a word with Anakin Skywalker alone?"
"This..."
After a brief hesitation, Obi-Wan finally nodded.
"Anakin, in searching so earnestly for 'Skywalkers,' are you really searching for Captain Burda—or for Shmi Skywalker?"
Max's question struck straight to the soul, and the young Jedi's face flushed red at once. Then, in all the stubbornness of adolescence, he lifted his chin and fired back, cheeks still burning, "What, am I not allowed to go looking for my mother?"
"Shh." Max pressed a finger theatrically to his lips. "Quietly. Master Obi-Wan Kenobi would be unhappy if he heard that. Of course you're allowed to look for your mother. But the right way would be to do it on your own leave, not to use an official mission for personal business. Don't you think?"
At that, the young Jedi lowered his head in shame and muttered dejectedly, "But the galaxy's so big. If I go looking on my own... how would I ever find her?"
"Give me your comm code. I'll look for her for you. If I find her, I'll let you know."
PS: In current canon, Batuu was a busy port world thousands of years before the rise of the Galactic Empire, back when hyperspace travel was still underdeveloped. Later, as hyperspace travel advanced, Batuu fell behind and was overtaken by worlds on more popular trade routes, eventually becoming a forgotten planet.
In this story, the author has adjusted that history, placing both Batuu's rise and its decline in the Republic's golden age.
PPS: The Batuu Jedi Temple was founded during the Republic's high era and abandoned toward the end of that same age. That is official lore, not an invention of this story.
PPPS: The Chiss Ascendancy's mass-driver technology and the Peltast-class Star Destroyer both come from Legends and have not yet been restored to current canon.
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STAR WARS: THE RISE OF MANDALORE
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