Not original

715 FNM (23BBY)

Month 5

Breshig, Excavation Site

Korkie Kryze

Damn this planet is terrible. I didn't say it out loud, of course. I was around people who lived here their entire lives and I don't want to offend them. I was just not used to the amount of humidity this planet has.

Breshig had been, from what I understood, one of the most industrious worlds in the Mandalore Sector. Once it was practically covered in shipyards, with materials brought in from all across the sector to build ships even from Mandalore. According to rumors, they were building bigger and bigger shipyards as the war went on.

Right up until about 700 years ago, give or take. Back when Mandalore was trying to build its own little federation of planets to maintain "peace" along the Hydian way. Of course it was their version of peace, as in a large fleet of Mandalorian ships showed up over a planet saying 'Yeah you work for us now.'. Which tends to imply that there was a little bit more than just diplomacy going on at that time. Anyways, the Republic had come down hard on the Mandalore Sector for that. This planet had been one of the Republic targets marked for destruction or, well, its shipyard at least.

They hit the planets polar ice caps either with some sort of heat bomb, or just simply blasted it with Turbo Lasers, with the same end result of melting all of the ice down and causing the world to flood by 20 ft or so. There was still some land left at the end, but the landmass had shrunk quite a bit and even at some of the lowest points it could be about a foot deep of water. Plant life that was previously going extinct had basically taken what's left of the landmass, and bugs ruled this newly transformed world for the most part.

Another reason why I hate this planet, as I smacked another one of those mosquito-like creatures off my neck. I had to have several shots to even come to this world as it was very likely that I might pick something up here from the mosquitoes. I really should have brought my helmet just so that I'd have less skin that could get bitten but since the helmet isn't temperature controlled, it'll be very uncomfortable to say the least. Thankfully though, none of us have gotten sick so far.

Due to the generous funding that the Royal Museum was getting, I've been able to hire a rather large survey group. 20 Mandalorians of various technical skills from Mandalore itself, they unfortunately have no skills related to underwater-related excavation or navigation, due to being from a desert planet. Which is why we hired local guides that do have those skills, or similar enough, to compensate apart from helping with local related issues and navigation.

Those guides were helpful in teaching us how to deal with swimming and diving, something we naturally weren't very skilled at. I didn't expect we would have to go on any serious dives. We had brought along an old Teroch-type that we had found which supposedly has a hatch that could, theoretically, couple with the one into this Maritime Museum; we just had to find it.

Besides those individuals there was also Zoll Bresh, the de-facto leader of the expedition, since this is his homeworld and he knew where we were going. Me, being the actual leader of the expedition, the best I would do right now is to delegate.

As for my friend group of Amis, Soniee, and Lagos, since none of us have any water skills Which is becoming something of a problem we need to deal with. The locals are willing to teach us, what locals there were anyway, for a price. We arrived at what could be best described as a tiny fishing village that is made up of about 20 shacks on stilts called Atiniir'arpat or Enduring Seed, about 3 days ago.

We were greeted by an old man who might have actually seen the tidal wave of water flooding down from the polar ice caps, sitting on a rocking chair as he smoked a pipe and playing some kind of string instrument.

He was sitting in front of a wooden shack on stilts, part of a complex of about 20 wooden shacks, and he was the only person who seemed to actually live here. According to Zoll, most people in this world lived more of a nomadic lifestyle, living on boats and moving from area to area to do fishing and such. Sounds like this village simply exists to be a point on the map for people to know where they can stay during the stormy seasons

With that being said, the Atiniir'arpat, had become our base of operations since it was actually not too far away from the Maritime Museum that we were trying to gain access to in the first place. Not the greatest place, but we were making do with what we have. Oh, and I almost forgot we also have Royal Guard Commander Rau and a couple other Royal Guards around. More simply for my protection rather than the expedition itself, since we were so far off the beaten path of the sector. Perks of being a prince, I guess.

The actual operation to actually gain entrance into the place was not really going to be something my group were going to be involved in. It had been decided we would just supervise the entire thing. We would, of course, have to be granted entry as soon as possible as my position as both lead and financier, but the experts had decided that they should be the first ones in and I wasn't really against that. There were a few Royal Guards in their group anyway so I knew they weren't going to try and pull anything funny. So, it was really just a vacation for me and my friend at least. We had gotten ourselves a boat, a local one. A rather large vehicle, it could seat 20 people comfortably and we had set up with a couple fishing lines not too far from where they were diving. The boat has two large fan-like contraptions on the back as propulsion. Apparently this was done because this area has two particular problems that prevented them from using regular motors. One reason is that there is a lot of floating plant life that would and can jam up such motors, which would mean you would have to go overboard to fix it. Which left you with problem number two, local creatures in the water that didn't like getting hurt or disturbed by the loud rotors that also like munching on the occasional local Mandalorian within munchin distance .

Oh, this operation also have two other ships, a AIAT class which was serving as the main support vehicle where the divers were jumping in and out of the water and another was hovering just above the water's surface with the aforementioned Teroch-type which was being loaded with supplies to be lowered directly to the museum. Some of which included their own power supply so they could get all the data off the trapped museum servers. I personally had yet to see the facility, but going by what I'd seen around this area so far, it must be rather massive.

Anyway, back to our group sightseeing, everywhere we had been so far has been plant life growing. Sure there were a few, I guess we would call them, rivers but in between those rivers were hoards of untamed wilderness. Trees and reeds are just growing right out of the water and a few other small places. This kind of plant life had grown up right up to the edges of the town we were staying at.

Here, a large bowl of water was formed that had been some sort of lake before the melting of the polar ice caps. I knew that if the plants could find some nutrient they would grow, indicating that the water is deep enough for plants not to grow on them.

Or just as equally likely, they couldn't find purchase on the metal exterior of this doomsday bunker museum. Either way the water here was relatively clear for a good half mile in either direction from the center of the lake. Not a lot of plant life, oh there were a few islands of it, but nothing like what we've seen so far.

From where our boat is docked, we could watch the efforts to dive the Teroch-Type ship underwater. But for the most part we were just enjoying this impromptu vacation. Sure, I was not a big fan of the giant mosquitoes or the humidity, but all things considered it wasn't too bad of a place for some relaxation for our summer.

Amis and Lagos were over by the left side of the ship fishing off the side of the boat. We brought plenty of supplies but having a little something extra never hurts. According to our guide, Miss Tarri Crikey, the fish of this lake were particularly good so might as well see if we can catch a few to make our supplies last a bit longer. They have a UV bug zapper that fries several mosquitoes a minute right next to them so they don't have to deal with too many bugs.

I was at the back of the ship with Soniee. We were less exposed back here as the controls of the ship had a fine netting that people could see through hanging from a basic box frame. It wasn't a large area but it was enough for the two of us, plus we were right by the radios so Soniee got access to the holo-net to keep track of the goings on in the universe, while I got access to the radio information being passed between the the crew working on the museum.

On the deck in between our two groups is Guard Captain Rau who is talking to a couple of his Royal Guards. As well as Ms Crikey, who was grumbling rather loudly about how 'Tom was going to get himself killed poking around that vault'. Said grumbling was getting louder, causing me to look up from the radio to see her coming towards the back of the ship where the controls were.

"Hey Prince Mando, mind moving mind moving over a bit? I need to use the radio, those idiots are going to piss off the local wildlife with how loud they're working over there."

"What?" I asked, confused. Getting up from my seat to crack my back. Soniee joined me standing up and cracking her back and I tried not to take note of her rather large assets in front of me. The planet was so ungodly hot and humid that trying to wear normal clothing is kind of a bad idea. Most of the crew instead are wearing various elements of Mandalorian equipment.

The Royal Guard were wearing suits different from the fabric worn at home that would prevent them from overheating while the crew over on the under-water operation were wearing hard suits meant for space operations.

And then there was my group who were basically just wearing the Royal Academy Environmental armor. A nearly skin tight under suit that had some basic armor to save your life if you were ever shot at. For boys that was not much of an issue, for the girls, well, your eyes were drawn to places.

Not so much of an issue with Crikey, she is in native of this planet and had clothing more environmentally designed. Granted, that just meant her clothing was a lot lighter and not as covered as ours but she seemed perfectly fine with conditions. Wearing a pair of shorts and a crop top with a vest, the most notable feature was the belt around her waist covered in knives and a rather large slugthrower pistol. Along with the leather-like hat, that she probably skinned herself from the local wildlife, wore over her short hair.

"I said I need to use the radio. Those idiots are dropping junk all over the place and I can see the dust cloud from up 're going to piss off the local wildlife, and when the local wildlife is pissed off, things start sinking."

Reaching over, I picked up the radio and said, "Want me to call them? I'm the expedition lead by funding the expedition, maybe they'll listen to me if I tell them to be careful."

She grumbled something about me being an 'unintelligent foreigner' in the local dialect of Mando'a. Apparently she had assumed I wouldn't understand that so I pretended not to before she finally said, "Fine, but tell them right away because if one of those idiots wakes the local snap jaw population, we're all going to be dead."

Nodding in understanding, I picked up the radio and said "Hey, the local guide here is not happy with the amount of junk dropping over the side. I don't know what you got going on over there but she's saying that if you don't knock it off you could piss off the local wildlife and they might, you know, come out of wherever they're hiding to take a bite. So please be a little bit more careful."

There was a muffled voice then someone came back and said, "We know sir. Local tech has been yelling at us for the same thing for the last 5 minutes. We'll try to be a little more careful."

Looking up I saw Crikey giving a nod of approval before turning to leave. Seemingly less annoyed now. I stopped her by asking, "Before you go, what is a snap jaw? Never heard about that in the debrief on the way down here."

The sigh I heard come off of her could probably have caused a tidal wave with the power of annoyance. "Of course he didn't inform the people he got about the snap jaws. Spent all his time on this planet playing with gizmos of the past and not enough time to realize that he was going to get eaten for his stupidity. I tell you if I wasn't there for most of his misadventures he'd be dead by now."

"Tom?" I said, trying to confirm who she was talking about.

"Yeah, him." Laying out a deep breath she said, "Snap jaws are descendants of the Mando alligator. A creature that was brought here as part of a zoo thing during the Neo Crusades. I think it was long before Mandalore was turned into the dust bowl it is today from what I understand."

"They escaped 700 years ago and the environment did them good as there are now several different variants of snap jaws. Like the humongous ones that could snap this ship in two with a bite of its mouth. Thankfully, those are located in more open water than this. The smaller ones that can move through the reeds of the planet's foot deep ocean are much more common here, and their bite can crush through any environmental suit that isn't reinforced with beskar plating."

"The particular group here is known as the mini jaws."

"Why are they called that?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Because, they are only slightly bigger than a person, while the more common snap jaw is big enough to snap this boat in two. The bigger ones mostly live in the open ocean while mini jaws live in the coast. While they may not be smart, it's believed that they do hunt in packs occasionally. Personally I've never seen them do so per se, just grouping together because they happen to be in the same area. Either way, if they start attacking they usually call out some sort of signal that tells others that there's food in the area."

"Which starts a swarm event I guess." Soniee asked as she tilted her head and thought.

"Exactly, and a swarm event is what's going to kill us all. You do not want some 27 feet tall man-eating crocodiles to swarm the boat now, would ya? If one of those mini jaws ever shows up, kill 't give it the chance to send out any signals or we know we're all going to kick it."

"Well that's comforting." I said, "Anything else we should know about these mini jaws?"

Crikey shrugged before saying, "Not much else to say. They're just one of many dangers on this planet. Give it enough time it'll probably push all of what's left of us here out of this world, and once that happens this planet's pretty much going to eat itself to oblivion."

"How's it going to destroy itself?" I asked, not out of curiosity.

"If we aren't killing them, they probablystart preying on each other until there's nothing left. Maybe there'll be a few fish left but that's probably going to be too few to be sustainable and will just slowly die out over time. That's why most of the survivors of the Great Flood just … left. They realized that it was only a matter of time before it became too unliveable, and rather than just let their future descendent suffer, They just left, while they still had something to make a living elsewhere. The last estimate someone cared enough to keep track of is about a thousand years or so, and they estimate that about a thousand year ago.

She said taking a seat on the sideboard of the vessel. "I hoped those rumors I've heard about this terraforming business are real, cuz frankly, I think my generation might be the last to come off this world at the rate we're going."

"Oh yeah, that's happening." I said matter of factly getting her to look up from where she was sitting. "My sister's actually the one behind it all. Been working for over a year to get the Ithorians to agree to terraform several planets in the sector and they finally did. That's actually why we're here now, there's concern that the vault might get damaged during the terraforming so we're getting it now before then. Terraforming of Breshig should start in a few months from now."

"Huh, how about that. Maybe there's a chance for this planet after all." she said with a smile, seemingly happy at that prospect. "You pacifists are useful after all. Guess those Death Watch guys are full of shit, like every other group in this sector."

"Death Watch?" What a comedian. "Those guys are already gone, they killed themselves out over 20 years ago."

"Nope, we had one of them show up here a few years back. Had a whole bunch of pamphlets for their organization and everything. I think Old Kuad still has one in his shack." She said leaning back on the railing at the side of the ship, only to go tumbling into the water as a massive leathery hand came down on the railing next to her and tilted the ship to that direction.

"The fuck!" was the loudest voice of confusion which came from Amis at the other end of the ship who had looked over just in time to see what happened.

"What happened to Crikey?" I don't know, but what's going to happen to us is way more terrifying as a large reptilian creature crawled out of the water onto the vessel. Standing on two legs with an extended snout for a face it looks around with a look that said it was going to eat everything and everyone on board the vessel.

I was a bit stunned by this turn of events but thankfully I was not in danger. Well, technically I was in arms reach of the creature, so yes I was in danger; but the Royal Guard had my back.

Captain Rau and the other three Guards immediately rushed over and started attacking the creature with their force staves, trying to get it off the vessel.

The creature backhanded one of the men off the ship, seemingly not caring the zapping it was getting.

"Crikey said you need to kill thatthing." I shouted to Captain Fenn, "If you don't kill it, more will just come."

That was an assumption that this was the snap jaw she was talking about. I figured it was probably the better and safer option to make that assumption than to be wrong and dead.

The captain didn't even look in my direction, instead he switched his staff from stun mode to one that allowed him to fire shots into the creature while stabbing it. The rest of the Guards also did the same before doing what they were previously doing, killing it

But I did not get to see the conclusion of that fight as I heard Soniee scream from behind me.

Turning, I saw why immediately as another one of the beasts had crawled up the back of the ship and had wrapped its claw around her waist and was holding her, moving to bite down on her.

I just acted at that point, grabbing the radio off the desk I had been sitting at, I threw it just right so that it went into its mouth the moment the creature opened it. In reflex, it bit down on the metal box and got itself stuck, its teeth jammed into the metal box, preventing it from going after Soniee.

Now to get Soniee free from the thing. I quickly figured out how to do that as I tackled the creature, smacking it against the side beam that held the netting as the entire thing fell on top of us. It wasn't that heavy but it did enough to basically trap the creature in the netting as it struggled getting itself only more tightly stuck.

It's attempt to get free required both hands so it let go of Soniee. I grabbed her hand and did our best to pull ourselves out of the netting. Although one of its claws raked my back, the armor of the suit only sparing me from having some serious damage.

With a push, I shoved her out of the netting and I was about to get through myself when it grabbed my ankle and started pulling me back. The ankle was not well armored and I think I felt the creature's claws cut somewhat into my flesh as it pulled me. As I was being pulled, I saw that there was something underneath the desk that the radio had been sitting on. Desperate for anything to get me out of this, I reached for the weapon and pulled it free of the tape that held it there. It looks like a blaster rifle but something seemed off about the design and it had a large blade at one end. I didn't know what it was, all I knew was that it's a weapon and it's something I needed right now. Flipping myself out of my back I aimed it towards the creature that was pulling me towards it, aiming at its upper arm and unloaded the first shot.

There was a charging sound before it fired and when it did the creature's upper arms ceased to exist. The monster roared in pain as the metal box was still stuck in its teeth and took its free hand to hold its shoulder which was now bleeding profusely. I didn't bother sticking around to find out if it would pull us up together and attack me. Instead I aimed at its head next and just fired.

The creature now headless sat there for a moment on its knees before toppling backwards over the side of the vessel with a resounding splash. It took the netting that had protected us from the mosquitoes with it but at that moment I didn't care, I'm just glad we had survived.

I took a moment to get a breath, somewhat in shock from the whole ordeal before I felt a hand on my shoulder seeing Soniee was back.

"You okay?" she asked.

"Never better." I said instinctively, taking a few more breaths and feeling rather exhilarated I can feel my heart pumping at an accelerated rate.

"Ankle doesn't look fine." she said, looking down at where I was obviously bleeding from a cut.

"Yeah, that could've been better." I don't feel any pain as I think I'm in a little bit of a shock. "Mind helping me down to the main deck?"

"Yeah sure." she said, helping me up as I held tightly to the blaster in one hand.

Carefully, we navigated down to the main deck where I saw that one more of those creatures had attacked Amis and Lagos. Said creature was now lying on the deck dead, it appeared to have been strangled by Lagos who wrapped the rope of the anchor around its neck before pushing the anchor overboard, causing it to crush the creature's throat.

Although I guess it could be argued that there were two other possible ways it died from that I wasn't exactly going to walk over there and find out. Right now, all I did was move to the center of the ship where the wounded were being cared for.

Royal Guards were helping their own guy who had been tossed by the first of these creatures. He seemed fine for the most part, a little bit dazed though. Another Royal Guard was holding his shoulder where he wasn't bitten, but it looked like the creature had let go before it could do some serious damage.

Captain Fenn moved over to me and quickly got out a medical kit and started sealing the wound on my ankle. "Where's the first one?" I asked.

"Sunk back into the water after I shoved my staff in its mouth and shot a blast out the back of its head." Fenn said matter of factly. "I don't think it's coming back."

"It might have brought more friends." Soniee pointed out bringing a rather dark mood to the whole situation.

"Where's Crikey?" Amis asked as he and Lagos walked over.

"Fell overboard in the initial attack." I said looking to where she'd fallen.

"Damn, if she hasn't come up yet it means there must have been one in the water waiting for her." Captain Fenn said, shaking his head.

"The Monsters murdered her." Soniee said

And it was at this moment a head came tumbling through the air onto the deck. The snap jaw head rolled a bit before ending up so that it was facing us with a wide open smile then a second head landed next to the first.

A moment later a knife gripping hand stabbed into the floorboard providing a solid anchor point to climb onto the side of the vessel and then pulled the rest of the person on board.

Completely soaked covered in blood that I think was just in the water from the attack, Crikey had reappeared.

"Wooo, nothing like fighting a mini jaw in one breath to get your heart pumping." She said with a wide smile on her face likely from the adrenaline rush of surviving a near death experience. As she sucked in huge gulps of air seh said, "I see everyone is alive, good job. Now you know why making too much of a racket isn't good for you."

Crikey stretched and wrung her soaked clothes while surveying the ship.

"Let's see, four snap jaws in total right?"

"Right." A Royal Guard said.

"Good job. That's usually how much of a hunting party they will have. While I think we're safe for the time being, the blood is bound to attract more of them so best be on your guard. We should definitely radio the other team and Tom to be more careful. If there's one team sulking around, there's probably more."

She started towards the back of the ship before noticing the state of it.

"Let me guess the radio is destroyed in the fight? That's how these stories usually go, right?"

"Kind of." Soniee said,

"What do you mean kind of?"

"Korkie sort of used it to stop it from biting down on me."

"Oh.. well then that's not really a kind of isn't it. But the teeth aren't too bad on these things so maybe it survived. Where's the box?"

"I use this to shoot its head with the box in its mouth." I said holding up the strange blaster.

"Huh... but Old Man Kuad probably didn't even realize he had that on this vessel. Well that box is completely gone then. guess we'll just do it the old fashioned way and steer over there."

"Sounds reasonable." I said, very tired, possibly from blood loss but I tried to keep myself conscious.

She looked over the bodies again and then said, "Wait, so the first one was killed off by you four right?" The Royal Guards nodded. She then looked over to the body near the front which was pinned against the deck hole by the anchor rope. "And you two killed that one." Amis and Lagos nodded.

"So does that mean you killed that one all on your own?" she said, looking at me.

I shrugged and said, "I guess."

"Interesting," she said before walking over to the back of the ship pulling out one of our knives. A moment later she came back and tossed me what appeared to be a claw that I had blasted free from the creature.

"Congratulations, you're now a man and native of this world."

"Why?" I said looking at the bloody stump in my hands.

"Old tradition, if you managed to kill one of these creatures in single combat, you're considered an adult warrior of Breshig. I know you pacifists aren't the warrior types, but if you ever do decide to become a man, you have full permission from this planet's population to put one of those claws on your armor as a signature that you killed one of these beasts.

"Oh... Neat." I said trying to ignore the put down that she was giving pacifism. I was just glad to be alive at this point. Everyone had come through okay and yeah I was definitely planning to move the boat closer, probably safety numbers was something to keep in mind in the future.

Coruscant, Senatorial District

Tanya Kryze

The night sky of this city world was beautiful, sometimes though it was rather smoggy at the edges of my vision. I could not deny that from where I stood the bright city lights showed the progress of civilization.

To not only conquer a planet but bend it to your will till it becomes a megacity that spans its entire surface is an impressive feat. I just wished that it wasn't built on a bed of corruption and actually built on capitalism.

I am starting to see that more and more with every passing month. The Republic had stood for a thousand years and it looks like it would stay standing long after it has corrupted itself to uselessness. I was starting to see the point of the Separatists after the little exploit that had just happened.

3 months ago, a senator by the name of Jheramahd Greyshade had been working on a bill to try and end this issue before it spun out of control into a civil war. The way he had done it was rather miraculous in its simplicity. He had authored the Financial Reform Act, a bill meant to clean up the amount of waste and corruption in the government in order to try and bring the Separatists back to the Republic by showing it could change.

I had met him once or twice and was a big supporter of this whole thing. It would have been a real chance at ending the civil war after all and then someone had thrown him out his window. A 60 story drop had put an end to the Financial Reform Act that could have saved trillions of lives and an unimaginable amount of credits. You'd think that since someone had been murdered that the FRA would be pushed even harder. Apparently, Senators were so weak-willed that they actually withdrew their support for the bill when they realized he'd been murdered.

They would rather let the corruption continue than risk their own necks, I could understand somewhat. I wouldn't want to risk my life but on the other hand I would just hire more security and turn my tower into a defensible bunker if that was what was going on.

That situation was bad but it couldn't get any worse. At least, I had thought that in the initial hours, then days passed and it did get worse. All hands pointed to the Senate Guard having committed the act, or members of it at least. Which meant for all intents and purposes, the Senate Guard were no better than the Roman Praetorian Guard. Anything that was a threat to their financial stability would be assassinated. Oh sure they were claiming that it was a one-off, that this individual was insane, that he had been thrown out for corruption and all the other things an organization would say in this sort of situation. But no one believed them, everyone was a bit concerned obviously. Why else would the Financial Reform Act become dead in the water?

Worse, the moment it became clear that reform was dead in the water, more systems began declaring their interest in separation from the Republic. So one of the keys that was going to be used to hold this whole system together had simply been used to break it apart even more.

The Republic is probably doomed to this civil war and I just have to hope that we got a United States Civil War out of this and not a Roman Civil War. With the appearance of a possible Praetorian Guard, I guess the Roman version of a Civil War is more likely.

It was so obvious that security was now lacking that I had seen several Senators bringing their own Guards around, just to be safe. Thankfully, I already had the Mandalorian Royal Guard to protect myself. But Senator Merrik apparently doesn't have the same arrangement as myself, and instead hired a few guards himself. Mandalorians from Concordia from what I understood. I never actually have been able to talk to them and my guards said that they weren't the talking type. They seem to be one of the more religious orders from Concordia and rather standoffish with talking with anyone other than the person employing them. The only thing distinct about them, besides them always wearing helmets, was they wore a mix of green and blue markings on their armor in various styles and patterns; and I had no idea what they meant. Something to research later I suppose.

Factionalism is spreading in the Senate too; there are generally three groups at this point. Those who wanted to separate from the Republic, those who were against those 'Seperatist', and my own faction who just wanted to not get involved with this mess. Thankfully at the moment my faction was the biggest one. There are a lot of reasons people didn't want war, some felt that it was okay for the Separatists to leave, others felt that it was a waste of money, but regardless of the reason they didn't want a war; and at the moment that seems like that we might be able to pull it off, or at least stave it off for another couple of years. Problem, of course, being even amongst my own faction that didn't want war, there are subfactions that did want to spend money on a military in case war broke out. We're large enough that there were general debates right now and theorizing to go on for another year about the creation of an "Army of the Republic"

The debates centered around a complete reversal of the reforms that led to the Galactic Republic a thousand years ago. Specifically those that disbanded the Army of the Old Republic in favor of the current Judicial Forces of the Jedi, in the hopes that they would be able to handle the situation as they came. Well, it appeared that idea was coming to an end and things were progressing in a way that would require some kind of drastic event to change the course of history. I really hoped we would be able to prevent a war but that always seems like a long shot anyway.

This galaxy had been at relative peace for a thousand years. Sure there had been minor conflicts but from all the data I've been able to acquire over the years they had been one-sided affairs, with the Republic coming out on top just because it had so many more ships lying around from the pre-Ruusan era as well as the Judicial System. Or they had local garrisons that were able to support the efforts of the Republic ships. If this came down to a real war, the fact of the matter was, they had no real training on how to fight a war.

Many simple tactics were well known, of course ,but a lot of them seem to be awfully closed ranges. Which makes sense, when you have a Jedi at the front of your formation speed is of the essence, as the Jedi can tank and overpower any crisis and can easily put an end to the situation. This strategy does not make sense when you're actually fighting a war, there are far more objectives to accomplish in a galactic scale conflict than they are Jedi.. The numbers just don't fit. More likely, if the Jedi even took part in it, which I really hope they don't, the military would be made up of the common soldiers. Maybe waiting for months for a Jedi to show up, stalling to commence an attack while the enemy is advancing on them the entire time. Maybe their local general or commander, thinking they understand combat when they've not seen war in a thousand years, waste their resources and human resources in obsolete tactics, like human wave attacks.

That being said, I will note that if the Republic hired Mandalorian mercenaries as trainers, it would probably give the Mandalorian sector quite a bit additional funding. If I was a bit more enterprising I might even push for that, but as far as my Silver Codex work was concerned, I left that up to the individual to rely on the True Mandalorian Supercommando Codex.

Supercommando Codex was a way of waging war while being honorable, the Silver Codex was about rebuilding the Mandalore Sector. They are not incompatible, just that one of them would serve you more outside of the Mandalorian Sector a lot better than inside it.

That is also one of my general concerns, both sides in this coming conflict would probably have no idea how to fight a war and the only people who would consistently been fighting a war for, say the last thousand years, are the Mandalorians, on and off civil wars, conflicts against the Republic, conflicts against neighbors, conflicts against other clans, conflicts against pirates, and 1,000 years of constant conflicts. I have the distinct feeling that our sector would probably be a recruitment ground for soldiers even if they did not manage to draw us into the war directly.

I would not be surprised to hear stories from Mandalorians about how they'd run into each other during the war on either side of it when I was over. How that event would go would probably depend on clan relations though. If they have good relations, they would probably take a break to drink together before having a play fight where neither one of them really died but they did as much as they could to show which is the better Mando. Otherwise, well, I could see a few more clan conflicts being brewed from the conflict easily enough, "Your uncle killed my uncle during the war. Now prepare to die." or some other inane illogical bullshit.

This whole conflict was going to make the whole galaxy a complicated mess, and I could just feel the inevitable reality of that statement growing with every month. I hoped that if we got lucky, a lot of the companies produced battle droids and could draft some sort of Munich Agreement or Geneva Convention, some sort of rules for war and limit the damage to just droids.

If I had more power than I did right now I'd probably be pushing for that, but I am just a simple representative. My job was to work out deals with other governments to improve the Mandalore Sector, not to worry about the greater issues of the Republic. That's a senator's job.

And so far he has done okay. After all, he must have shot down Count Dooku's offer when he tried to get us to join this whole conflict on the Separatists side. Maybe I should drop a note on his desk about the idea of creating some sort of war rules on his desk when I get the chance, let him run with that. Or I could run this to Senator Amidala or Organa, as they are much more inclined to minimize suffering. Additionally, I knew they aren't corrupt or engage in vices like Senator Merrik.

Worst thing that could have come of it was nothing after all. For my part I would simply worry about my attempts to improve the standing of Mandalore in the minds of various planets. And maybe continuing the burgeoning friendship with Chancellor Palpatine.

Though friendship might be a bit of a stretch, it was kind of obvious to me he was using the position I had to try and get planets to stay within the Republic, even if they had trade relations with the Separatist planets. And since that served my own goals of trying to create a middle-neutral ground between the two sides, it might be possible to try and find some sort of peaceful resolution to it all..

He is a shrewd politician, I'd give him that. He played the grandfatherly card well but there was no mistaking a politician who knew what they were doing for anything other than a politician. After all, you don't see the downfall of the last sitting Chancellor and get elected in the first round of voting without being somewhat competent at your job.

But that's besides the point, the future was moving even closer to a war. Maybe Palpatine would be able to ring out the corruption before then, but my bet was that the powers of the Republic were too decentralized to allow that. Mostly for good reasons but I imagine, but this coming conflict would only encourage the Republic to be more centralized..

Taking a breath, I quelled my mind of these thoughts. Worrying about the coming conflict would do me no good other than giving me age marks on my face. Which I kind of need for diplomatic matters.

Instead, I just focused on the here and now. The here being in an airspeeder heading to a local movie theater, or its equivalent here anyway. Now, I had been convinced by Vai to go with her to see the new Silver Rider movie. This was technically the third cinematic adventure of the Silver Rider, though he was up to seven seasons I think? Nearly seven at least so the film television franchise was well and truly a hit.

In a darker mood, I would have joked how most likely once the war begins the Silver Rider would probably be punching droids. Cinema was often a funhouse reflection of real events. In times of widespread war, the enemies in the conflict inevitably feature as consistent antagonists in culture and films; in this case, likely droids would be the convenient punching bags.

But I kept that off to the side. This was meant to be a fun night so I could get my mind off the insanity of the universe and focus on simpler things, things that brought me a little bit of joy. Watching an action star beat the crap out of some bad guys while performing some stunts on a hover cycle is fun, watching him get the girl is fun, and the beef and cheesecake that I would probably be served during this film would be confusing but fun. I mean I'm well aware that I've probably lived 30 years as a male and close to 70 years as a female before this life. And having experienced the chemical reactions that my body put me through on both times, I was someone who leaned in both directions at this point, but I attempted to not think about that.

Sometimes it's better to just not poke at a confusing matter and just stay as far away as possible until it would resolve itself in time. Either way this was a good way to get out of the Mando Tower and simply have some brain dead fun to take my mind off the impending galactic tsunami that is the coming Galactic Civil War. I've been doing that more often as of late since I had basically achieved most of my goals the first year and was just trying to relax for the rest of the year. With the potential possibility of a war coming up I wanted to have some good memories of peace. I wanted my guards and my handmaiden to have those memories as well so I've been going to more and more of these public outings. Either in an official capacity as a representative or as an unofficial civilian capacity at times when we went to the clubs for some recreational dancing.

Thankfully, there had not been any more incidents where my activities were exposed to the public at large. If that was because I had done a better job of keeping my Mandalorian Royal Guards informed and they were keeping the lid on these sorts of things better, or because I simply had just not done anything too outlandish, it was hard to say. I'm hoping it was just the latter.

I need to keep an image as the peaceful princess after all. Maybe I even need to do some to restore that image. Either way, hard work and not causing trouble was the general process to slowly build up my reputation. My thoughts were interrupted as the car came to a stop. The door opened revealing the theater.

"Finally, we're here." Vai said as she stepped out of the car stretching her back. The theater was on the other side of the Senatorial District from where we reside, which is understandable since it took nearly half an hour to get there.

"You can say that again." Tabi said, stepping out after her. The shorter human cracked his back as he stood up.

We wore nothing too outlandish, just ordinary clothing by the standards of today. We could pass for regular civilians and conceal our cosmopolitan status as elites with cushy government jobs and royal privilege. Vai was wearing several shades of blue on top of each other and a lot of leather in her clothing that she preferred. Leather pants, another corset like thing that had a strap that ran up around her neck and a simple wrist length sleeve shirt underneath the corset, and good boots.

Tabi thankfully was not as outlandish and tight as his garb is the same as other trips to the clubs, wearing simple fabric clothing. Main color being blue though. I noticed he had added a white and pink to some of his garments, and a pair of good boots.

Ordo stepped out after Tabi. He didn't comment about the conditions in the car, simply turned and offered a hand to me. Ordo was wearing simple Mandalorian style pants and shirt with blue being the main color. Although I noticed there was a light hint of dark green on some of the shoulder pads with some of the areas that had stiffer fabric for protection, and a pair of stiff boots.

Smiling, I said, "Thank you." as I took the hand as he pulled me out. I myself was not wearing anything too complicated, at least I felt it wasn't too complicated at this point. A pair of high boots over light green stockings with a below the knee skirt that ran up to my long sleeve shirt both having a general green coloration and with little frills around the wrists and ends of the skirts with a dark green vest on my shoulders.

We didn't advertise we were Mandalorian besides some obvious hints like the occasional iron heart designs and other ancient symbols. The vambraces though, had started to become a bit of a fad amongst the teens of the planet. I noticed several people here wearing vambraces already, using them for their easy to keep track of phone capability. We could pass for any other teenagers I believed.

Running my hand through my recently applied golden hair to force it back behind my shoulders, I said, "So what is this movie about anyways? The Silver Rider coming across another criminal organization funding their own army?"

That had been the general plot of the last two films. The television show had more variety, I'd noticed. From criminal organizations to corrupt governments he was always seeking 'Justice for the Oppressed'. That was actually a tagline for season 3.

Ordo shrugged before saying, "I don't know, I haven't actually kept up with the goings on of the series. I think I heard something about a conspiracy to take over a sector so maybe it is another army plot."

Tabi let alone a moan of annoyance, "That's a bit overdone. You need to do something new. The TV series has got a lot more going for it than just the possibility of war spinning up once in a while."

"That I agree with." I said, which was rare considering who I was agreeing with. "I'm sure people would enjoy the occasional mystery subplot or that time he had to fight that lunatic, what was his name again bad guy season 4. Peacetaker?"

"Peacemaker." Ordo offered before continuing, "The Mandalorian pacifist who will have peace even if he has to kill to get it."

"That was the weirdest subplot I think the show has ever had. How do you have a pacifist going around murdering people that graphically?" Vai said, rubbing her head as we slowly walked our way towards the front of the building. I had already given the cabbie the money for the trip so there was no need to stick around.

I could have hitched a ride with the Mandalorian Royal Guard. They are most likely in a van around here somewhere keeping an eye on us, but I wanted to keep the illusion of us being just ordinary civilians for tonight. It helps set the atmosphere better in my mind if we did arrive in two different groups. But I'm sure the veteran guards are here, somewhere nearby, in case of an emergency like what happened months ago with the alley fight.

Tabi shrugged before saying, "Beats the hell out of me. I kind of think it was actually based on a True Mandalorian. In fact, I think there was one who called himself Peacemaker during the Mandalorian Civil War."

"Wait, really?" I said, looking over at him with a questioning eyebrow.

Tabi gave a bit of a shrug before, "I don't know much, this was before my time, you'd have to ask Mok for more details as he was a Journeyman Protector before he transferred to the Royal Guards. He's also more of a supporter of the True Mandalorians than I ever was. I heard that there was one guy who was kind of a True Mandalorian who was also a Journeyman Protector. He went a little too far and went on a rampage for a few years, killing anyone who wasn't a pacifistic New Mandalorian. This was after the True Mandalorians got their asses kicked by Death Watch but before Death Watch leadership was destroyed."

"I vaguely remember reading about that." Ordo said, drawing my eyes back to him as we arrived at the console. Quickly, I ordered four tickets to the film as he continued his explanation. "I think he ended up in jail on Ordo. Because he tracked a Death Watch member to our planet after Death Watch was destroyed and murdered him."

"What happened to him after that?" I asked, at this point this has my attention.

"No idea, he was sentenced to jail and as far as I'm aware he's still there. He had a life sentence originally but his lawyers got him down to 20 years. It was due to the fact that it turned out the Death Watch member he murdered, though a upstanding member of Ordo's community, had actually been possibly one of the worst monsters of the Death Watch. I believe I heard something about him hunting down the families of True Mandalorians and killing them for sport as well as settling personal grudges."

"Huh," I said, "well at least he's doing the right thing and staying in jail. Using the legal system for its proper purpose."

"Yeah, I guess that's not so bad, probably whenever he gets out he'll join bounty hunting I assume." Ordo said with a shrug as we arrived at the concession stand. I am still amazed at what products seem to be in existence in both my lives. Popcorn, it exists in this universe, where did they even find corn? I don't know but apparently they did. I actually found two different variants of popcorn. There is regular popcorn which is about what popcorn has been in my universe and then there is bangcorn which is popcorn that is the size of a small child's fist.

The concession stand had fresh popcorn but there was also chocolate, caramel, and many other variants of popcorn for service here. There were also several other kinds of drinks and meat snacks that were very close to the design of hot dogs, all very similar to movie theater fare. I wondered if that was just similar pressure resulting in similar items being created or if there was something deeper at it.

There are roughly 25,000 years of galactic recorded history give or take, so I doubted that there was a possibility that this universe was somewhere in the far future of humanity. But I guess it wasn't impossible. It's not like I'd seen Earth or found any indication that Earth existed and most of the technology seemed to have been found at one point or another. I know a lot of that technology had been rediscovered so it was not impossible that there was something past the 25,000 years and even that 25,000 years had large blank spots. I could not throw out the possibility that there was something else going on in the universe but I would ignore it for now as it didn't matter. Besides, convergent evolution is a thing and this is more likely a result of that.

I moved to the front of the concession queue with the others and ordered a personal popcorn, though it turned out that Ordo and I wanted the same type of chocolate popcorn. So I upgraded mine to a larger size so we could eat together and turned to go into the theater. This was a vacation from doing political things and I was going to enjoy it for what it was, damn it. That was how I was going to spend the night, enjoying a regular normal peaceful night at the theater.

Coruscant, Holo Theater Lobby

Tanya Kryze

Tabi was currently stifling a chuckle next to me as we left the theater and Vai was doing the same. The only one who seemed to not be laughing at the events that had just taken place was myself and Ordo. I was a bit amused, but mostly traumatized by the whole affair and Ordo seemed to be just in complete shock.

To be fair I could see why. We had not expected what we had gotten in this movie and next time I think I'm going to read the reviews or at the very least the synopsis. Although I don't think there'll be a next time, they wouldn't pull that character plot again, right?

To explain the consternation I was feeling would take an hour. Thankfully, as we piled into the cab Vai started the conversation quite clearly. "So who knew the Silver Mandalorian had a thing for the Silver Rider? I sure didn't know that."

"Well I mean they have a shared color interest." Tabi said matter of factly. "Maybe there was some sort of implication there the whole time. Although who would have seen her as a groupie to the Silver Rider and fangirl of his. Well at least he got to ride… her."

I tried to block that out, out of all the things I had expected to come from this night out, finding out that my image of White Silver's image could easily be stolen by movie producers to use however they felt was not one of them. And finding out that one of those things was practically softcore, did not help my mood.

Ordo spoke up then saying, "Guys that was just a weird side-plot. We don't need to worry about it. We should talk about the rest of the movie, I mean it's kind of interesting that they basically just stole the entire False Silver coup from a couple months ago and just retold it with the Silver Rider as the hero."

'Thank you, Ordo. Thank you for trying to get them off this.' I mentally thought.

Tabi nodded his agreement, "Yeah that was pretty weird. Wonder if there's like a copyright lawyer that White Silver could get a hold of. After all, they basically just stole her life story and twisted it for their own ends."

Not without revealing who I was. Currently my only access to lawyers would be through Gargon so I technically could attempt to try and get a lawsuit going. But they most likely would just claim that I was not the real White Silver unless I showed my face and even if I did, that would not really help me in this situation. Publicly, I would simply have to just ignore it for all time. Well, internally I would have to remain at my screaming level.

Ordo shook his head, "I mean didn't they twist it too much? I guess they just made up a lot of stuff for the things they don't know."

"Yeah sure they did." Tabi said, lightly punching Ordo's shoulder. "Lucky bastard." I heard quietly.

Which in all fairness he was, the Silver Rider had pretended to be a Mandalorian, wearing armor, and been White Silver's right hand man during the Colosseum fight. Which was a lot more spectacular than the actual thing in my opinion. But then again, fights are rarely that well choreographed. In other words, while the parts of the Silver Mandalorian have been played by some woman with a rather large bust who never taken their helmet off, which I thank whatever Mandalorian gods there are for that, as that helped continue the belief that the Silver Mandalorian came from Concordia. She even quoted a few of the religious things I'd heard from various Mandalorians who had interactions with them, including the all-famous Mandalorians never remove their helmets. Ordo's part was played by the Silver Rider himself, having stolen the armor of one of the Mandalorians he fought with earlier in the movie and joined up with her in attempting to end Gerr's conspiracy. They separately came to the conclusion of who the False Silver was before meeting and working together on the planet. And yes their version of the White Silver was a fangirl of the Silver Rider and they did the deed at least once during the film. Before the Colosseum incident in fact.

As a film it actually was not a bad thing and I would have had a lot more fun if it wasn't about my alter ego. I felt like I was in a bit of a nightmare. I'd gone from someone stealing my identity to try and raise an army to take over the sector to someone stealing one of my identities to turn into a sidekick of the Silver Rider. Not that I mind that, but I'd rather be the one to hold my own with Silver Rider than as a bond girl.

I would just have to hope that this film was still embargoed by the New Mandalorian government as being too violent for general consumption. If it didn't I hoped it didn't cause an issue that would cause me to make an appearance as White Silver to deal with it. Aunt Satine and Bo must never see that movie, Aunt Bo is just going to be insufferable and I pray for Ordo's safety if they suspect that we had done something similar to our movie version on Gargon.

Having to come back just to say, 'Do not commit war crimes against a film crew.' would not exactly look great for the Mandalorian's image. Hopefully, tempers would win out and I would not have to think about this film ever again.

"So do you think he's keeping the armor for Season 8?" Vai asked.

Tabi nodded saying, "Totally, why else would they go through the effort of designing such a unique set of armor. The set the Mandalorian wore at the real coliseum in Gargon was rather plain compared to that over-designed artwork."

It reminded me that this show tended to have a somewhat stable continuity between seasons at least and the movies were not non-canon events. They were considered canon which meant this big boobed version of White Silver now existed in that universe and Silver Rider now had Mandalorian Armor. And they also actually canon-ized that he also came from the Mandalorian Sector.

If you step back from the embarrassing situation as it was, this was actually good propaganda for the sector, and all I would just have to do is not think about certain parts of this movie in the future then.

Coruscant, Senate Building

Wilhuff Tarkin

Looking over the data pad in my hands I had to chuckle at the ongoing conflicts. It was quite obvious that the Separatist issue was not going to go away, and yet the Republic was acting as if negotiations would somehow come to some sort of peaceful conclusion.

There's only one truth in the universe, and that's 'Those with power dictated the future.' If history taught me anything, it's something everyone would come to realize soon enough. Being a native from Eriadu, I had come to realize thatmuch sooner. But I could forgive the Core Worlders for being foolish to some extent. They lived in a safe and secure bubble here in the Core. They didn't have to deal with pirates, in fact some pirates even came from the Core Worlds. They saw themselves so secure that they thought they could engage in thievery, murder, and other illicit acts out in the Outer Rim and easily have their connections back in the Core get them off.

Thankfully, I had slowly undone that damage over my military career in Outland Regions Security. Of course my anti-corruption purges hadn't changed the perception of the Core Worlders all too much. From the outside, some may even say I've harmed the Core World's opinions of the Outer Rim peoples, but my demands were simple: You do your job, or you end up dead.

Shaking my head I stood up and stretched out. As much as it's interesting to think about my past military exploits, the future was far more important at this moment. There was a war coming, I could see it as plain as day. In fact, I actually had offers from Count Dooku to join the Separatist.

It was amusing, and I could see why he would want my homeworld to join them as Eriadu has one of the largest and professional fleets in the Outer Rim. And though I could see the point in some of his arguments, it wasn't enough. As governor of Eriadu, I would not take my people into a war that would be unwinnable. As much as I dislike the Core Worlds, I knew they would win eventually. Besides, my governorship of the planet would soon be over. I have done everything I can in my goals and to secure the planet's future. It's time for someone else to take the reins and for me to return to the military. This is why I was on Coruscant, I was paying to visit an old friend turned Chancellor. Palpatine had, after all, pushed me to go into politics all those years ago and had been my supporter for the longest time. So I was assured that with his aid I could get myself a good position in the new army that was eventually going to be thrown together.

I was one of many, I think, that were scrambling to try and secure a position in the inevitable conflict, but our friendship was old and I had a feeling it would help me. After all, the Core Worlders had led the government into this mess to begin with, and it would be down to us Rimworlders, people like Palpatine and myself, to fix it.

Stepping over to a window I looked out onto the city's skyline and wondered how quickly the military will be put together. I know it took several years to put together the Outlanders when it was first created, and gaining legitimacy had taken even longer. I wouldn't be surprised that in the early days of whatever conflict spring forth that there would be competing armies, one that was created directly by the Republic, others completed by Senators, and maybe even the Jedi trying to show that they were the true force to work with.

It would be chaos for a good long while. But from this chaos would be born the strongest force, one that would keep this Galactic Republic stable into the future.

My thoughts were interrupted as Palpatine's secretary came up and said, "Palpatine's meeting is ending in the next 5 minutes, but he said that you would be more than welcome to join the discussion proposing some economic reform of the Rim'"

"Really, now?" I said with interest. I hadn't heard about any economic reforms but then again being on the Rim you didn't hear what the Core Worlders are claiming to be working on. It's better to focus on what was before you then what was out in the periphery of your interests after all. "Well then, I think I should join this meeting at least as a bystander. Thank you for telling me."

The secretary bowed before walking away. I walked to the door as I stepped up to the door, the sensor detected my presence and triggered the door to open.

Looking around the office it looked just as I remembered it. From statues around the center table where Palpatine was at his seat discussing something with three other politicians. I didn't recognize a single one of them but I could tell they were from the northern sectors of the Outer Rim, based on their clothing and group of followers. The first one I believe to be a senator was obviously from Tarris. She was wearing a local style of Rimworld urban fashion. The other is a member of the Ithorians, they were officially close enough to the Outer Rim to be considered in any conversations in that region. They were pacifistic people, so they would want out of this coming conflict. The final member, and I think the one responsible for the recent financial windfall, was a Mandalorian girl. I believe many of the symbology she's wearing reminded me of some artwork I had seen in one history book or another. She is blonde and wearing a green dress; nothing too outlandish, but definitely done in a Northern Rim style. Most likely a New Mandalorian, another pacifist. What did catch my attention is her age, she was fairly young to be sitting in the center of the group.

Of course, three pacifists would be working together to try and find some peaceful way to stay out of the conflict. A shame really, the ancestors of the New Mandalorians were once a powerful military force, they would have been a useful core of infantry in the upcoming conflicts.

"Governor Tarkin, welcome. It's been a long time, my friend." Palpatine said as he offered me a seat across from the three.

I nodded and said, "It has been too long as well, my good friend." as I moved to take the seat, "What's this about some economic reforms and the Rim?"

Palpatine smiled and said, "A little side experiment to see if I could prevent the Separatists from, well, separating from the Republic. So far it hasn't been very successful, but it has created a bit of an interesting third party in the whole affair. Guaranteeing planets will stay inside the Republic no matter what happens is at least a step in the right direction."

"Oh? Well that is true, but it's obvious that this is going to end in a war. It's one of the reasons I'm here actually. I'm coming to offer my services in the coming conflict." I wasn't one for milling about and went with the direct approach though I knew what response I would get.

"You are too concerned with this possibility of war, my good friend. We will figure this out, I think." That's what I expected but this is also what he would have expected. Now I wondered if he scheduled my meeting to conflict with this on purpose? Palpatine wanted to see the reaction of these three to such a statement. Why did he want that? I don't know but I was willing to play along with his games.

The senator from Tarris shook her head in disgust at the whole thing. The Ithorian seemed unconcerned. The final one, the Mandalorian, on the other hand looked amused. That was not what I was expecting considering how prolific the pacification of their people supposedly had been. Was this what he was poking at to try and find out more about?

The Senator from Tarris spoke up first voicing her disgust rather clearly, "War Hawks are coming out of the woodwork aren't they? This is the problem with this whole idea of even creating a military. This rhetoric is going to start the war."

"Oh that isn't exactly fair." I countered, "I would say that the lack of a military is what's starting this war. If there had been a military around when Naboo was invaded 10 years ago, such ideas about creating a Rimward army to defend against pirates would not have taken hold. And now that there is no military, there's nothing to fear to keep those planets in line that would now wish to separate from the Republic."

The Mandalorian scoffed at that before chuckling, "You think fear would keep the Outer Rim planets in line?"

I raised my eyebrow before saying, "These planets are leaving under the assumption that there is nothing stopping them from leaving. They have no fear of the consequences, if there had been something to fear they would have not considered it."

The girl, I estimate to be around 17, shook her head and said, "I do acknowledge that there is some possibility for that to work in some cases, but I will point out that fear is a terrible tool that doesn't work as well as you might think. Fear begets anger, and anger starts rebellions. I wouldn't say that this Separation Crisis wouldn't have happened with a military around, but it definitely would have happened sooner or later, perhaps later as they take longer to build up forces and secrets."

"Really now? You think that fear of the power of the Republic would not have worked?"

She simply smiled before saying, "Didn't the Republic fear the Mandalorians during the Crusades of the Neo Crusaders at one point? The territory the Mandalorian Empire controlled was possibly larger than the Republic was at that period of time. Yet the Republic was able to shake off its fear and keep on fighting."

"Fear does not determine the outcome. It's just a tool, but a double bladed one. The fear of the Mandalorians only encouraged the Republic to fight harder, to find new reserves of manpower, and to build more ships."

"If the Republic had a national army, the fear of it would simply encourage the Separatist to build more ships and build a larger army. Eventually they would feel completely superior and confident in their rebellion from the oppressive Republic. And that would actually be worse I believe for the Republic than what we're currently heading for."

I had expected a great few things today but finding theological conversation on one of my prime thoughts of power and fear was not one of them, I thought grumpily. But I swallowed my annoyance, as much as I would hate to admit it, there was some logic in the conversation here, enough that I was interested to see where it was going.

"How would this rebellion be worse than the current conflict that's coming up? Aren't they the same thing?"

The girl shook her head before saying, "This is a Civil War, Mandalore has been through several of those. In civil wars, political factions will choose sides and they'll stay put due to material conditions that drive the conflict. For the most part, rebellions are more complex, they are more of the ambitions of charismatic leaders and personal projects of great men of history. Factions might choose a side but people will make up their mind, you could have planets completely in favor of the Republic yet large contingents of their population may move out in favor of the Seperatist. Supporting them either through buying arms legally or illegally on planets that do support the Republic."

"Would not the fear of the Republic coming down on those planets would cause the population to step in line?" I asked.

"They might, and only in a few cases but they are more likely than not to won't give a damn. If someone has set their minds to hate what is over them, they won't see the destruction that's brought up on them as the fault of themselves. They'll see it as the fault of the person doing it to them. Making people afraid doesn't quash Rebellions, it inspires them. The only thing that prevents rebellions is for a people to have their food and their pride. Take those away and, well, things started burning."

"Intriguing theory." I said, putting my hand under my chin and though I doubt her philosophy, it is interesting to see a new perspective to the same problem. I would think more about it when I had time. I ask "What's your name?" I might talk to her again in the future if I could. It was an interesting conversation at the very least, even if I thought her ideas were not to my liking.

"Tanya Kryze, Representative of Mandalore." She said with a smile.

"Nice to meet you Miss Kryze." I said before Palpatine, looked at his watch and said, "Oh look at the time, I have hearings in 15 minutes. I will have to finish our discussion on the Rim situation with you three another time. I need to have a conversation with Governor Tarkin before running off to the Senate. Is that alright with you?"

"Of course that is fine." the Ithorian said matter of factly before standing up from the chair. The other two soon followed and they gave their goodbyes before leaving me and Palpatine in the room alone.

"Oh that was a rather intriguing conversation wasn't it?" Palpatine said with an amused smile. "Didn't think Mandalorians had any warriors left in them. But she seems to be a fine study of war, and their consequences."

I looked over and said, "Why were you poking at her anyways? I thought you dislike the politicians who come to the Senate?"

"Oh I do, I quite dislike some Senators and how they got their position, but that Representative is slightly different. At first I thought she was just another sycophant wanting to get close to the Chancellor in order to gain favor for her world. Now I see there's something more calculated in her maneuvers. What those calculations are, I'm yet to be sure of."

"Do you believe perhaps she will be of help fixing the problems of the Core. After all you've always said it would be those of the Rim to fix it, and she's from the Rim."

"No, I don't believe she will be of use in our endeavors. She plays the game well and has her own goals. I believe she'll not hamper our efforts because her own goals are outside the Core, most likely the prosperity of her sector from how she managed to get the Ithorians to help repair some of their damaged worlds. I will, however, keep an eye on her career with interest." He seemed to look off and in thought before, turning back to me and said, "So you wish to help the Republic building an army. I can't think of a finer man to help in that, and I gladly accept your service as soon as we get the military bill passed."

"Excellent." I grin.