Chapter 9: Plans of War

Chapter 9 of Burning Shadows

 Thomas landed his ship in the docking bay and several Jedi and security troopers appeared and began escorting him to the Jedi High Council room. Once he got into the room, the windows closed and a sensor droid swept the room for possible hidden microphones. Thomas sat himself down as several other Jedi entered the room and were scanned. As they all sat down, Thomas told them everything that happened on Estanoki. They all pondered this with great concern.
“We should let the chancellor know about this. He will prepare the state troopers and we will prepare the troopers here in the Jedi Council. Then we will take back the outer rim territories.” one of the master said.
“Fool. The chancellor will not help us. He tried to hide the existence of the Sith Lords from the state, and told us to stand down. It is more than likely he is working with them.” Another said.
“Impossible.” Master Kenobi said. “The Chancellor would never give up the outer rim territories to a small band of Sith Lords.”
“Unfortunately, they are not as small as they used to be.” Said Thomas. “As I mentioned before, they have a huge army and a lot of them are Sith Lords. And I also saw they had troopers of their own. This isn't just some small scale riot. This is an all out war. An attack on the Republic itself.” The room fell silent. Then master Elzan spoke up.
“Help us, the chancellor will not. Act smart we must. Raise awareness about this to the people we must. Stand by us they will, and no choice, will the chancellor have. Help, we will receive.”
“But master, if the chancellor has been working with the Sith Lords, won't that mean that the state might be in on this plot as well, leaving us to be the scapegoats for what happened. Or he might even blame the Sith Knights for this plot. I mean, I know the public respects us, but they don't turn to us for important information across the galaxy. They turn to the news issued by the state. They will either say nothing has happened, some disease has broken out, or blame somebody else for this whole mess. We can't beat the state in this case scenario. I think that we should take in the Sith Knight refugees and fight back against the Sith Lords behind the backs of the state.”
“Don't jump to conclusions as if you belong here earthman!” Master Kenobi yelled. “You are only on this council because you saw what transpired on Estanoki! Personally, I think that the council would be willing to kick you out of the Jedi Order if not for this event!”
“Master Kenobi! You are out of line! Sit down or you will be excused from the chamber!” yelled one of the masters. Master Kenobi sat himself down, still fuming a bit. Thomas made sure not to look his way, and focused back on the meeting.
“The Sith Knight that saved my life said that all Sith Knights loyal to the Republic would be arriving on Courascant soon. So I think it would be wise for us to set up a diversion to keep the state off their scent until they get inside the Jedi Temple.” The Jedi pondered this for a few seconds, then Master Fulson stood up and said,
“I agree with this plan. Anybody have any other ideas?” There was silence for half a minute, and nobody spoke up.
“Very well then. We shall prepare to smuggle the Sith Knights into the Jedi Temple.” Everybody stood up and made their way out of the room. Orders were being given left and right. Troopers started tuning in to atmosphere traffic control, Jedi preparing living quarters, and padawans whispering. Thomas was given several orders as well, but then received an order from one of the masters. He was to try and sneak into the chancellor's office and place a spy bug. Thomas hopped into one of the Jedi's undercover speeders and made his way to the Senate office. He had to apply a special face camouflage program in order to get past the face scanners without being identified. As he entered the building, he launched a tiny scouting droid to hack into the systems cameras to make sure that nobody noticed him. They couldn't run the risk of having a droid place the bug because the droid detection devices in the chancellors office might go off. As Thomas made his way through the building, he got a notification from the droids charging station that it had accomplished its task. Thomas quickly made his way to where the chancellors office was, and was confronted by a few troopers by the door.
“Identification please sir.”
“You don't need to see my identification.”
“I don't need to see your identification.”
“You haven't seen anybody here for the last hour.”
“I haven't seen anybody for the last hour.”
“The same goes for you to.” Thomas said to the other trooper.
“The same goes for me to.” Thomas opened the doors using the force and made his way into the chancellors office. As he looked around, he realized that not even the chancellor himself was there. This made his job all the easier. He looked around, and decided the safest place to put the bug was on the chancellors chair. He placed the bug, then sent a signal out to his speeder to park right outside one of the windows in the office. A little message flashed back and told him to be ready in about two minutes. Thomas paced back and forth. Even though it was a short time, it felt like forevor. Suddenly, he got a blip from the charging station of the droid in the security room. A holo-message appeared in front of Thomas saying,
“Chancellor identified. Moving towards your location. Estimated arrival time, thirty seconds.”
“Anyone with him.”
“One tall hooded man. Unidentifiable.” Thomas immediately thought this might be somebody working with the Sith Lords. He activated his cloaking device, sent a signal to the speeder to wait for his orders, and ducked into a shadowy corner close to the chancellor's desk. The door slid open, and Chancellor Sempti and his mysterious friend walked in.
“Sempti, I told you. You need to upgrade the helmets of your troopers. I just did a mind trick and they both fell for it. This gives the Jedi an advantage we cannot allow.”
“An advantage? An advantage for what? I told you already, I will shut down the Jedi Council from action to make sure that you will not face any retaliation anywhere in the outer-rim territories. Your only business here is to give me the information I desire.”
“Oh, I don't think so fool. You see, we faced resistance on Estanoki. From a Jedi.” Sempti took a few steps back.
“What...? But, but, I made sure that there would be no such thing! I kept tabs on all registered ships of the Jedi! I kept a close eye on the logs! No Jedi has left the planet or gone to any of the outer-rim territories without my knowledge! I would have known about this!”
“Well you didn't. According to one of my Sith Lords, I lost one of my lieutenants to a Jedi Knight on the planet Estanoki. And another interesting thing I found out.” He walked over to the computer on the chancellor's desk and pulled up a log.
“I notice that you gave a specific mission to the Jedi to exterminate Sith Knights on the planet Estanoki. Your orders were to send each and every Jedi somewhere other than the outer-rim territories. Rather convenient, don't you think? That on the day of the invasion, a Jedi is just perfectly placed on Estanoki.”
“I...I didn't know how big your army was. So I figured I could figure it out with a low ranking Jedi investigating and then...”
“Enough excuses. You have broken our arrangement. And now, I will break mine.”
“What are you saying?”
“Now that I have lost a soldier of war, it is only proper I avenge him. The Sith Lords will now begin the conquest of the galaxy.”
“WHAT?! But...you can't...generations of peace...you would destroy it all?!”
“Fool. I never intended on keeping my end of the bargain in the first place. Now, I have a justified reason when my armies take over Courascant. But first, you will die.” The Sith Lord drew his lightsaber and raised it over the chancellor's head. But then he quickly turned around and rushed right to where Thomas was hiding. He jumped out of the way and tried to stay in the shadows.
“No point in hiding Jedi. I know you are here. Face me, and die.” Thomas grabbed his lightsaber hilts, but remained cloaked to gain the upper hand. He used different force techniques to throw him off, then when he felt he had the advantage, he activated his lightsabers and went in for the kill. But then the Sith Lord jumped right out of the way and parried the blow. He used a single-bladed two-handed blade, and was very skilled with it. The two of them clashed across the whole chamber, even slashing the chancellor's desk in half. As they were fighting, several troopers came in and prepared their blasters.
“Attention Darth Miyata! You are under arrest for the attack on the outer-rim territories and assault on the chancellor and a Jedi Knight.” The Sith Lord laughed and used a force push to knock all the troopers off their feet. Thomas tried to take this chance to strike him down, but he parried with relative ease only using one hand. The two of them continued to go back and forth, but then as time went on, Thomas realized more and more that he was very outclassed. He decided to try and risk one last gamble with a frontal charge, but then one of the windows exploded and glass flew everywhere. Thomas looked outside and saw a small two-man fighter right outside the window. Darth Miyata jumped out and landed in one of the open cockpits, and the ship flew off. Thomas tapped a button on his wrist watch and jumped out the window. He fell about a story when he landed perfectly in his speeder. He activated the thrusters and began his pursuit. This time, he made sure to memorize the ship he was after, but after following them for a short time, they pulled straight upwards. Thomas realized they were heading for the atmosphere and to leave the planet. He put his speeder to maximum power in hopes of catching it, but when his air supply became weaker and weaker, he had to back down. Then he saw several state trooper ships pursing it, but Thomas realized it was already too late. The enemy was either right on their doorstep or preparing to attack. He quickly went back to the chancellor's office and found him talking to several troopers. When he saw Thomas step in through the window, he told the troopers to wait outside.

“I won't resist you Jedi. It is all my fault. Darth Miyata came to me and threatened me and the Republic with a war of which hasn't been seen since the first Clone Wars. He said that all he would take was the outer-rim territories and then he would leave the rest alone. I didn't trust him completely. That's why I sent a Jedi out to Estanoki to try and scout the scale of the army. I didn't know if he was planning on a small scale takeover or an all out invasion. Now I know I guess. Please master Jedi, allow me to make amends with one last executive command before stepping down as chancellor. To have control of the state troopers be given directly to the Jedi Order so that they may fight this upcoming war with all the help they can get.” Chancellor Sempti rose, then handed himself over to the troopers right outside the door. As he walked off, Thomas was still trying to put all of the pieces together in his mind. And he was also wondering why the Sith Lords hadn't begun their invasion yet.

The ship approached a large convoy in orbit of a nearby planet. It made its landing procedure and put down the ramp. A trooper walked up to the bottom of the ramp and got down on one knee.
“Lord Miyata. Welcome back.” He rose to his feet. “What are your orders?”
“For now, we wait. The seeds have been planted in the garden. All we have to do is wait for them to grow into full bloom. Then we will take Courascant, the state and the Jedi in one fell swoop. And when they fall, the rest of the galaxy will have little power to deny us what is rightfully mine.”
“Yes my lord.”

Author's Note

A chapter released a day early?! Wow! Well, it's a good thing to because I am graduating this Sunday, and that will be a lot of boredom where I can't write my book. :(. Ah well.
Please review and tell me what you think!

Reviews

[New Theory]

A movie is going on man, that's how I feel, awesome action and tension and the plot is moving in a very interesting way :)