Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan stares at the two powerful Force-sensitives. Both are in their mid-to-late teens, dressed in a strange style of robe not native to this planet or in line with current galactic fashion.

The Darksider, who feels so much darker and more powerful than Xanatos du Crion in the Force, has brown hair and red eyes, and wears a black robe with green highlights. 

The other Force-sensitive is a Lightsider if a strange one; however, Obi-Wan has no idea what Force tradition he trained in, for it is certainly not that of a Jedi. The Lightsider, with dark hair and green eyes, is dressed in a similar dark robe with red accents. He wears a ring with a black stone on his finger and carries a stick in his hand, which gives off a bad feeling in the Force.

The Lightsider starts talking in an unknown language. Obi-Wan shakes his head and responds in Basic. The Lightsider shakes his head before turning to the Darksider and saying something. The words are unintelligible to Obi-Wan; however, the tone and the impression in the Force suggest a request.

The Darksider heaves a heavy sigh and murmurs a couple of words that echo strangely in the Force, then waves his hand.

“Hello, I’m Harry. Who are you? Where is this place? What is the local situation like? You look to be child soldiers or homeless children in an undesirable situation. Would you like some help?”

The Lightsider, now known as Harry, asks eagerly. This causes the Darksider to sigh and start talking.

“We are not local in any sense, and have no context for your society, ethics, laws, or culture. Please provide broad strokes, then the more pertinent details.”

Obi-Wan blinks once, twice, then asks carefully. “Are you familiar with the Galactic Republic?” Receiving a headshake from the Lightsider, he asks, “Are you familiar with the Force, Jedi, or Sith?” Receiving another head shake, Obi-Wan puts aside his instinctive mistrust and starts talking at the urging of the Force.

“The galaxy currently is divided into many factions; however, the biggest and most powerful is the Galactic Republic, which was founded by the Jedi, who are Light Side force users. It's a galactic democracy that sends Jedi to act as peacekeepers and problem solvers. The Jedi can be divided into five branches—agricultural, Exploratory, Medical, Educational, and Knights. We are on the planet Melida Daan, which is in a state of civil war between the Melida and the Daan. Currently, a third faction has risen, the Young, which is comprised of children under the age of fifteen who want the fighting to stop.”

Obi-Wan says, answering the questions to the best of his abilities, summarizing as much as he can into pertinent points.

“I see, and is this planet a member of any galactic faction?” The Darksider asks in a near purr.

“Not currently; the civil war prevents them from joining any Galactic faction.”

Obi-Wan answers hesitantly. Harry nods with a grim look in his eyes.

“Alright, I understand the situation. Lead us to the children. Tom can heal and build fortifications and protect all of you while I handle the child killers.”

Harry says, and the force… moves strangely. Obi-Wan is not sure what it means outside of this being a good thing for the Young. They don’t look like elders; they look just a year or two older than him, so he leads them to the Youngs' base in the sewers.

Obi-Wan's scouting team gives him a questioning side-eye but trusts his judgment and 'bad feelings.'

Upon reaching the entrance to the sewers, Harry wrinkles his nose and waves his stick, saying a word, and all the filth and smell disappear for several dozen meters. Obi-Wan stares for a few seconds at the absurd Force technique before shrugging. Harry continues to clean as they go. Obi-Wan has a half thought about leaving such a trail, but the force gives him a don’t worry about it feeling.

Obi-Wan gives an all-clear signal as they approach the area claimed by the young. After arriving, Harry glances around and waves his stick; every inch of ground, cloth, skin, and hair becomes spotless. Without hesitation, he moves over to the area with the wounded and starts healing injuries. Flesh knits, bruises fade, and bones straighten.

“I can heal basic injuries, not sickness or infection. Tom can handle that while I go deal with your elder problem.”

Harry proclaims ominously after finishing with all the now clean and healed children. Harry then marches out the way they had come.

This leaves over two hundred clean and healed children staring after him before they turn their gaze to the Darksider, now known as Tom.

Tom heaves a sigh. “Healing is not my specialty, and I don't have a wand. I am, however, proficient in blood alchemy, which, as it would translate to you, is magical genetic engineering. It would be much easier to simply change all of you to be immune to the mundane diseases and infections you currently have, and to make you immune to most other diseases. So what traits would you all like to have?”

After a few seconds of processing to understand what he ment and a few older Children explaining what he meant to the younger ones, they start shouting out answers, not thinking too hard about it, given all the things they have seen Obi-Wan do and talk about others doing, saying that ‘all things are possible in the Force’.

“I wanna be strong!” “I wanna heal fast!” “Can you make me see in the dark?” “I want to be fast!” “Can you fix my hearing in my bad ear?” “Can I have claws and sharp teeth?” “Could you give me red hair like Obi’s?”

The children call out requests, and Obi-Wan finds himself holding off a panic attack as Sith Alchemy is used on children. The Darksider uses the Force to carve a circle on a flat piece of ground and glyphs around it with idle flicks of his fingers.

“So health, regeneration, strength, speed, dexterity, increased immune system, nocturnal vision, along with a vision boost, super hearing, The ability to overcome malnutrition fully at any point in your lives, sharp nails and teeth and the hair of the redhead,” Tom says while carving before striding over to Obi-Wan so he can pluck a hair out of his head ignoring Obi-Wan’s panic attack before returning to drop the hair on a rune, and finish up his intricate carving.

“Now, children lay in the circle one by one, so I can add your desired traits.” 

Tom says easily, as if using Sith Alchemy on children was the most normal thing in the world. A seven-year-old girl goes first; she has a bad cough with fluid in her lungs. Obi-Wan knows and worries that she will not survive much longer.

Tom gets on one knee and chants a few words as the circle glows, and the Girl changes before all their eyes.

Her hair changes to a bright metallic red; her eyes change to have vertical slit pupils, her canines sharpen, and her nails turn to small claws. She gets up with more energy than any child on this planet has had in centuries and looks around in wonder, hopping on the balls of her feet before she jumps up onto the ceiling, latching on with her claws, and laughs a loud and bright sound as she hangs upside down. It's not long before Tom is changing the next child and the next. Before long, all of the children besides Obi-Wan have been changed.

“We have more Young hidden outside of the city. Will you be able to change them too?”

 One kid asks Tom, the Darksider.

“Yes, now give me a few minutes to craft a focus using all the bloodshed Harry is causing from dealing with your Elder problem.”

Tom says that before continuing with his next task, he bites into his finger and uses the blood to craft another, smaller circle. Before long, there is a red crystal stick growing out of it, the same shape and size as Harry's stick. Are they like our Kiber crystals? Obi-Wan wonders to himself.

It's been a week, and everything has changed. Harry and Tom have transformed all the surviving children into a new species and killed off every adult on day one. On the second day, they repaired the city, cleaned it, and began transforming select government buildings into communal housing. They transformed old, used cloth and rusted metal into new-looking four-poster beds, large enough for children to make massive cuddle piles to sleep in. The changes in the children have been significant, as they are now far from their baseline human state. 

Oni-Wan is trying to keep track of everything. Asking questions of the two is confusing. They claim to be wizards, and that's fine. A lot of Outer Rim Force users claimed to be wizards with magic. They also claim to be bound together, coming from another time and place—something about cursed immortality through reincarnation and the tying of their souls together.

Harry is most certainly light. Obi-Wan knows this because he summoned a light side manifestation in the form of a herbivorous quadruped with antlers. Tom is most certainly dark. The best Obi-Wan can figure is that they are a dyad of some sort, one light and one dark. When Obi-Wan asks further about their theological views and tries to explain the Jedi, he is pulled into a lecture about all things being in balance, light and dark, yin and yang, male and female, life and death, order and chaos, the cylindrical nature of reality, and the turning of the wheel.

Which would likely be considered heretical by the modern Jedi Order.

After Harry had killed all the adults in ‘purifying fire,’ which Obi-Wan suspects is code for light-side pyrokinesis, he gathered all the children and food in the restored capital. The children, who now number around 5,000, include the Young, surviving Melida, and the Daan children.

Now, the leaders of all the kids, Obi-Wan, Nield, Cerasi, Deila, and a few other older children, gather around the meeting room with Tom and Harry.

“This planet is in the outer rim and is barely habitable after the last few centuries of war. I recalled the ghosts of past leadership to inquire about any resources or hidden accounts and found nothing. The first order of business is to terraform the planet into something more usable.”

“You can do that with your Force Magic, Obi?”

Cerasi asks with wide eyes.

“Yes, the Jedi agricultural corps specializes in repairing ecosystems and terraforming.”

He confirms hesitantly.

“Now, as the first planet in my soon-to-be empire-” Tom starts earning an eye roll from Harry and many side glances from the children. “-it must be grand, I will spare no expense. Grand feats of magic require sacrifice. We could slowly change the planet over years or centuries; however, why wait when we could do it in a day? So, I will be using the spilled blood of all those who died in battle on this world, along with their names, as fuel. From death, life, and their names will be the sacrifice. I won't bore you with the details, but please note that for the next day, don’t leave the city. I put up some heavy wards to protect it while the planet adjusts to its soon-to-be new state.”

Tom finishes his statement, gets up, and strides out of the room without waiting for a reaction. The children turn their gaze to Harry once Tom's out of sight.

 Harry smiles sheepishly and scratches his cheek.

“Doing big things takes sacrifices or time; you can’t just snap your fingers and create an impenetrable fortress. So, Tom is going to utilize all the essence of death that this planet has absorbed over the past few centuries to bring life as part of the natural cycle. Beyond that, sacrifices can be used as fuel and as a source of power. Names have power to them; to name something is to gain power over the thing named, and to give a name is to provide power. Since I have slain all the Melida and the Daan, I have claimed them through the right of conquest. Tom and I are soul-bound, so he has claimed them as well. Now, he will be sacrificing their names to power this ritual, which, in practical terms, means that everyone who has ever known the names Melida and Daan will forget them, and all written records will disappear. Now this leaves us with the practical concern of what to call the planet and ourselves.”

Harry explains, trying to clarify just what is going on.

“This planet has been poisoned, and there is very little nature left. We can’t pay for what would be needed to restore it. We will also need food, so Tom is going to terraform the world. That is, change it from what it is now into something with more plants and nature so that we can have farms and fruit trees. This will involve altering the atmosphere, weather patterns, soil composition, and many other factors.

Harry concludes with a sheepish smile, earning a bunch of disbelieving stares from the children.

“We can call the planet Tom’s planet?”

“Please, no, don’t give him any more ideas.”

After a few more suggestions, they settle on calling the planet Melidaan. 

One child stares out the window, prompting others to do the same. A massive bubble encloses the city as the world outside descends into chaos with hurricane-like winds. Lightning, storms, and dirt flying everywhere. It's as if the world is howling with agony as it's forcibly changed. 

Obi-Wan passes out from the overwhelming feelings in the Force.

Melidaan has forests now. A jungle planet filled with fruit trees and a single city that runs on Force magic to conjure water, keep people warm, and keep the streets clean. 

Melidaan also has a self-styled Dark Lord Tom, who, when not interrogating Obi-Wan about galactic politics, is off performing unknown Dark Side rituals of dubious purpose. 

Obi-Wan has been conscripted into being a teacher now that he no longer has to lead a war with an army of children against adults. 

Harry, their very own Light Lord, and Tom’s minder has been going around transforming the city into something new and beautiful. All the Duracrete has been transformed into a beautiful white stone, enchanted to be unbreakable and always clean. Harry raised a battlement wall around the city with that same unbreakable white stone. Meeters thick and taller than any house. He claims it has all the standard enchantments, whatever that means.

The buildings have not been spared Harry's treatments, along with a newly created bath house, a dining hall with magical food storage, magical outhouses, empty shops, and other essentials. However, they do not currently have a use for shops. Harry insists, however, that they will be helpful one day to the unconvinced children who have never seen such a thing before. Harry has also made little balls of light that appear each night to float gently over the streets, creating what Obi-Wan will admit is a breathtaking view.

All this and Tom’s castle in the middle of the city that could house all the current inhabitants of the planet.

The children, the newly superhuman children, have been foraging among the many fruit trees when not in makeshift classes run by the older teenagers, who teach lessons on how to read and write, along with those who have been taking care of the babies and toddlers.

On another note, the children's coppery red hair has some metallic properties, which means it's nearly impossible to cut or tame. Obi-Wan thinks that this will further the feral child aesthetic that they are building towards.

“We have a pirate ship inbound.”

Tom said casually while lounging on his throne-like chair during the next meeting in his castle in the middle of town.

“First, how do you know we have a ship inbound? Second, how do you know it's a pirate ship?”

“I set up a ward to attract ill intent so that I might have acceptable targets due to Harry’s delicate sensibilities. Thus pirates. Numerology to determine when. Divination to scry the ship itself.”

Tom says with an airy wave of his hand.

“When they land, I'll kill them all, take and repair the ship, enchant it so it's not so useless, use Numerology to find a derelict dreadnought or two, repair and enchant them to the best of our abilities, and use them to start my plans for my future empire.”

Tom says this with a self-satisfied smile.

“The city wards should keep us safe from planetary bombardment and infiltrators.”

Harry adds helpfully.

Obi-Wan watches a Dark Lord storm an unsuspecting pirate vessel and can only offer a silent prayer for them as they go screaming into the Force. All except the Captain, of course, whom Tom interrogates via mind-reading, then mind-controls to have him transfer ownership of all the Droids and systems.

“Harry, protect my holdings and minions.”

Tom commands before taking off in his newly commandeered ship.

“Don’t worry, Tom, I'll keep the house and kids safe while you go conquer the galaxy.”

Harry replies with a smile.

Four days later, Tom returns with a newly restored Harrower-class dreadnought from the New Sith Wars.

Obi-Wan stares as Tom lands the thing outside the city. Obi-Wan keeps staring as Harry and Tom get to work dismantling and rebuilding the thing. Each piece is carefully enchanted with runes engraved to make them indestructible. Each hull piece can conceal energy signatures and life signs from outside scans. The weapons are refurbished with piercing and predictive enchantments. They even somehow manage to make the thing run purely off the Force without the need for fuel.

They have even managed to make the thing move and attack off the Captain’s Intent instead of needing a crew. Obi-Wan is unsure if giving such a ship sapients is a good idea, but will admit he would rather not have the Young run the thing. Such ships often require thousands of crew members to run, as AI-run ships have been banned after a few to many Droid rebellions and ghost fleets.

Four months after they finally finished refurbishing the greatest ship in the galaxy, Tom declares it to be the Nagini.

Harry rolls his eyes at Tom naming his new ship after his snake.

Tom proceeds to take The Nagini on to terrorise the Hutts and purge most of the slave trade.  Killing off the slavers, freeing the adult slaves, and offering the orphan children and young teenage slaves a place as his minions while magnanimously giving the former vessels to the freed and sending them on to Alderaan. 

All of the children were put through the ritual to increase their survivability and dumped off back on Melidaan for Harry to manage, along with whatever spoils Tom wants added to his stronghold.

Harry has to start making new cities for all the new children. For some reason, probably having to do with seeing Tom eviscerate their abusers and slavers, the children are all really loyal to their Dark Lord.

Several prized force-sensitive children who have been enslaved have been given over to Harry to teach and aid him in creating more magical city fortresses to harbor all of their new minions, err, citizens.

Tom Riddle does not care about one's race, creed, religion, culture, force sensitivity, species; they are all equally beneath him and thus deserving of minion status.

Chapter Text

He was hurt. He had an explosive collar around his neck. The bastard pirates killed his parents while talking about how much they could get from selling him. It has been three days, and he has been given just enough water to stay alive in his cage on the pirate ship.

A sudden shaking of the ship makes him stir from his daze. Mandalorians or droids dressed in Mandalorian-like armor are sweeping the ship. He watches as one beheads a pirate, ignoring blaster fire as it advances.

He hears a voice that doesn't sound like it came from the ship's coms; it's too clear.

“Hello, I am Tom Riddle,” A smooth male voice says. “I am here to free all of you. Adults will be given the contents of this ship and will be set free once all the collars and bomb chips are removed. Orphans under the human age of 16 or equivalent will be offered the choice to return to my planet and emigrate, helping to fix our population problem.”

He is freed by the armored droid and is ushered along corridors and hallways to the mess, which has been converted into a processing station of some kind.

“Form two groups, one for adults who want transport to Republic Space. I understand that Alderaan has programs for freed slaves, and you all will be headed there, another for Orphans under the age of 16 or the human equivalent who want to immigrate to the planet of the one who has freed you and killed your abusers.”

The man, with brown hair, red eyes, and a black robe. Waves a stick, and the collars vanish. He is too numb to be amazed adequately by the Force magic Tom wields.

“Immigrants follow me, the rest of you. You can keep the ship and everything on it; the slavers are dead, and you have enough food and fuel to get yourself to safety. The navigation droid is working and will follow any commands.”

With that, the strange man turns and walks to an airlock connected to another ship. A vague thought of repaying this man and seeing more Force Magic causes him to follow along with many other children.

Not having any experience with being freed from slavery, he assumes that this is normal and follows his savior.

“Here is the immigration procedure. One at a time, you hop into the circle, it will heal you using what you know as Force Magic, and it will change you into a native of my Planet. A near-human species that is better in every meaningful way.”

Still in a partial daze from the trauma and days without food, he goes first without nearly enough hesitation that the situation warrants and lies down in the circle, and the world changes. All his pain is gone; he can see better, and everything feels fantastic. He can feel strength, the likes of which he has never known in his life. He can move faster and has more energy than he has ever felt as if he has downed ten cups of caf.

He takes the next few minutes getting used to his changes as the others go through the same process.

Once they have all gone through the change, Tom holds out a rope.

“This is a portkey. It will teleport you when you pick it up and say the activation phrase. The man says. Grab hold, and I will tell you all the phrase once you all have a grip. My governor will handle you once you all arrive.”

Grabbing the rope with both hands, he waits until the rest of his cohort does the same.

“Prosperity.” The man says, and he feels like someone has driven a harpoon into his navel and is dragging him through a wormhole.

He opens his eyes from the floor of what looks like a white entrance hall made of white stone. There are many children, and only one older teenager who has Black Hair and green eyes. There is a big table filled with fruits that he is encouraged to go and eat by one of the children here. He is warned to eat slowly or else he might throw up.

Once all the freed slave children have eaten and drunk some water, the older teen speaks up. 

“Hello everyone, I’m Harry. I doubt that Tom has told you much, so I'll clarify some things. You are all free and safe. No one is going to hurt you. You are on the Planet Melidaan. We have a lot of food. The planet is mostly jungle, with a lot of fruit trees and a wide variety of berry  bushes.” You will all be given clothes and rooms. You can have your own private room or share one, it's your choice.”

“We are a new government; the last one was unsuitable and had to cease existing for the high crime of harming children. We have free food and housing, along with educational modules, which Tom found somewhere. Alright, let's start a brief tour to show you all where you will be sleeping. I’m sure you are all exhausted.”

He takes it in and follows along with the rest.

Eavesdropping on conversations over the next few days, along with the introduction packets, let him learn a lot about his current situation. Apparently, this planet was at civil war until the adults started killing off their kids, at which point the Jedi came and left, abandoning them.

Tom and Harry came by the planet through magic, presumably. They found adults killing kids, and promptly killed them all. After this, Tom and Harry began healing the children and transforming them into a new species that is significantly more durable. Tom then proceeded to terraform the war-torn planet with Force Magic. Harry then renovated the city to run on the same Force Magic. Noticing the lack of minion population, Tom went to create more minions by killing slavers. Harry, finding himself drowning in a never-ending tide of feral superhuman children, needed to build more cities and get an educational system up and running to try to occupy the hordes. Thus, Harry had Tom steal a super high-quality set of educational modules meant for rich core-worlders and used force magic to duplicate them so every newly emancipated child could have an education reserved for the children of planetary rulers, senators, business Tycoons, and others of similar stations.

At one point, He listened to a kid from Hutt Space explain taxes to another fresh immigrant who likely had a similar background.

“Tom said he wanted his minions to be well-educated and healthy so they could grow up well, pay him taxes, have lots of kids to pay him more taxes, and expand to more planets, thereby attracting more people to pay him more taxes. 

Taxes are a cut of the pay you get for working that the government takes, and Tom is the government. Think of it as protection money, but everyone pays it. In exchange for the taxes, you get protections. No slavers can take you. No one can come and hurt you. Everyone gets a free place to live and free food. 

You work, such as collecting fruits, repairing ships, or making stuff. You get currency for your work, and you pay a bit of that money as taxes. The rest of that money you give to other people who work on different things than you, so you can specialize and focus on what you like to do. Beyond the free houses and food, Tom will pay people to do stuff for him. Like kill slavers, get more ships and soldiers so he can free more planets from the slavers and expand his empire.”

That conversation also gave him a purpose. Joining Tom’s military, they were going to have to make one eventually, and then he could join Tom on his crew, both to repay Tom for saving him and to help kill all the pirates and slavers. He can't wait to sink his teeth and claws into the kind of people who killed his family. He blinks at that thought; the instincts of his new species are odd and keep sneaking up on him at times. 

He goes back to his educational module on military strategies in gorilla warfare. The future was looking up.

Chapter Text

Tom was lounging relaxedly on his captain's chair that looked more like a throne on the bridge of his ship, idly flicking his wand in the direction of the Golem that had been laid out before him on a raised worktable so he could enchant them. He has been making war golems for armored knights since his time back on Earth. The enchantments include kinetic and thermal absorbers and converters that convert energy into mana to power the things, along with their own slow siphoning of the atmospheric energies, allowing the golems to absorb incoming blaster fire and convert it into fuel for the golems; one does not want to be wasteful after all. The unbreakable enchantments have also been a great help in using his golems on raiding hostile ships.

Tom sighs; his days have started to become somewhat repetitive and have started falling into a pattern. The things he does for his future empire. It has been a near-endless stream of counter raids. Tom couldn't even call them proper battles; they have been so one-sided. 

First, Tom would have the Nagini jump into hyperspace, navigating via a mix of numerology calculations and divination enchantments to find nearby pirates. The enchantments have been super effective, and he has been killing a near-endless stream of them. How does this so-called republic even function with all this filth scattered about? Surely all the pirates would have massively affected trade, he idly wonders to himself. 

After finding the prey, Tom would have his ship catch the pirates in a tractor beam that they had no hope of resisting due to the extreme difference in the relative mass of the vessels before dragging them in. 

Once the ships were in position, the Golems began raiding their vessels and began search-and-destroy tactics. 

Tom had, of course, created a spirit to run the ship for him; the Nagini was fully sapient, spoke in the noble tongue of serpents, and had the morality of a snake. She was perfect. The Nagini could also command the Golems and took great pleasure in hunting Tom’s would-be attackers and saving the hatchlings.

For now, Tom had to make do with Golems lacking a proper army and unwilling to fight Harry over throwing the option of child soldiers at his prey, no matter how powerful and well-protected he could make the children.

With an elegant twirl of his wand, he finishes enchanting this golem and sends it to join the rest in stand-by mode, waiting for further orders from him or the ship.

After the Golems have killed the scum, he would have them escort the survivors to the mess hall and would graciously free the adults and children, using a subtle confundus charm to persuade the children to leave with him for an unknown future. It's not hard to reinforce the gratitude they are feeling, so they go along with his instructions. 

A stronger confundus on the newly freed adults to not comment or protest on his taking the vulnerable children away, along with magically removing their collars and slave chips, generally keeps them cowed until he moves on.

Finally, Tom would personally transform the children into Ferals before teleporting them to Harry, which would help reinforce their loyalty.

Ferals, what a creative name the children have given their new species, Tom muses.

Hopefully, the transformation into Ferals will be viewed by most children as a gift and instill more gratitude and loyalty to him. 

As for the thought of the Sucm plotting against him, Tom is not worried. Tom has been having the Nagini magically block all communications from nearby ships, which Tom knows will only stall the information of his hunt from spreading for so long, regardless of Tom's stalling tactics. They will not notice the disappearances, or the news will leak from the freed slaves Tom has been shipping off to Republic space. 

Tom's next issue will be hitting hardened targets, such as massive space stations, moons, and planets. However, for that, Tom will need a Navy to perform proper blockades and manage multiple locations, as well as an intelligent force of ground troops to manage ground warfare beyond what a dozen golems can handle.

Tom has plans for his planet's defenses, both hiding and magically creating planetary shields. So he's not worried about defense, and beyond all the preventive measures, Harry will never allow the children to come to any real harm. Tom would pity anyone trying to attack his minions, that would be if he were capable of feeling such an emotion.

Now, how to create a Navy and an Army? How about a short luck boosting spell? It has been at least seven years since he used one. Tom decides before casting with an expectant grin on his face.

“Pray.” The Nagini hisses moments later, before they exit hyperspace as The Nagini is locking onto the text ship. Tom, in a languid, fluid movement, stands from his throne and makes his way towards the airlock, letting the Nagini handle the details of the hunt.

Something interesting happened: one of the adults on the spice freighter did not stay meek once Tom was separating the children to bring them to their new, better lives. A man by the name of Mandalore Jango Fett, of house Mereel clan Fett, declared that he owes Tom a debt for breaking his chains.

Tom's translation magic translated Mand’alor into the king of Mandalorians. Tom then has a private interview with the man whose mental shielding was enough to keep basic compulsions away, but did nothing to stop Tom’s legilimency.

Tom learned many valuable things in this interview.

First Mandalorians are a warrior people. Tom has numerous needs for soldiers and an army.

Second, Jango Fett is the leader of one of three factions fighting for the rule of Manda’yaim. Manda’yaim is a planet in Mandalorian space that holds the most significant known Mandalorian Iron mines, also known as Beskar, which is one of the best metals in this galaxy, primarily used for creating armor known as Beskar'gam. The other factions are one of pacifists that hide in their enclosed self-sustaining cities, and one of warrior extremists that indoctrinate and abuse children. Tom will have no problem warding the Cities, turning them into glorified prisons, trapping the people so none can leave unless they swear never to return to the system and make intent wards to deter traitors in Jango’s ranks. Throw in some divination to locate all those Death Watch camps, and Jango will be puppet king in no time.

Third Manda’yaim is barren mainly due to the Republic and Jedi’s orbital bombardment some few hundred years ago, making it dependent on importing food. A complete terraforming or a few enchanted greenhouses could fix the food shortages, earning Tom allies and loyalty.

Fourth, the Jedi have killed most of Jango’s warriors, who were on a legal contract with him hunting terrorists. This bit of information will make a good weapon in the field of public opinion against the Jedi, should Tom need to deal with them. Nothing says bad PR like enslaving a planetary ruler from a system outside Republic space and killing his men.

Fifth Mandalorians love children and have an adoption culture. Tom knows this can solve a significant number of his problems. The thousands of superhuman children Harry is managing are getting out of hand. They need proper training to be useful in their future conquest of the galaxy. What better than this galaxy's most historically skilled warrior people?

Sixth Mandalorians are against slavery and would not be opposed to making war on the Hutts to free children.

After Jango falls asleep in the Nagini’s medbay, Tom finishes transforming and transporting the children, sends the newly liberated spice ship off to Republic refugee stations, and commands the Nagini to set course for Manda’yaim.

Chapter Text

Quinlan Vos is not happy. His friend is missing, and Quinlan hasn't seen his Obi in months. Luckily, Quinlan is the best shadow in training the Jedi Order has, and he has no issue hacking into the Jedi High Council’s servers to get a look at Qui-Gon Jinn’s mission history. Immediately, Quinlan finds discrepancies. There are numerous holes in Qui-Gon’s narrative, as he takes creative report writing to an extreme that Quinlan doesn't think is legal. 

Qui-Gon’s reports claim Xanatos du Crion died on Tellos, which Quinlan knows is not true. Obi-Wan told Quinlan about his time under Xanatos’ questionable instruction before being tossed in a deep sea mine, and how Qui-Gon only took Obi as his padawan after his offer of suicide to save people. Qui-Gon had the gall to say that Obi left the order for a girl. 

First off, Obi’s priority is helping people, and to do that, he needs to be a Jedi. Obi wouldn't jeopardize his dreams for a girl. 

Second, after the malnutrition and his young age, Obi hasn't even started puberty yet, and doesn't even know what to do with a girl. There are so many holes in Qui-Gon’s reports that Quinlan is confused about how this guy is still allowed out of the Temple.

Eventually, Quinlan concludes that the Order has failed due to nepotism. Qui-Gon Jinn’s master is Yan Dooku, a Jedi High Council member, and his master, Yoda, is the grandmaster of the order. Quinlan knew in an abstract way that Jedi favored their own lineages. Still, he never thought it would stop them from doing the right thing or investigating an underage padawan leaving the order without following proper procedure.

Upon further investigation, Quinlan learns that Obi-Wan’s case did not go through the council of reassignment before he was sent to Bandomeer, contrary to established temple law. Quinlan wonders if this counts as a kidnapping. Quinlan concludes that the Jedi High Council, or at least two members of it, are corrupt, and this state of affairs has led to his Obi being hurt. 

Quinlan's first impulse is to burn the temple down. Quinlan, however, has had several years working as a shadow with Master Tholme on how to burn corruption out of the system, allowing for change. Hence, he sets to work using his skills to craft the most damaging reports he can manage, including all the keywords he knows will trigger alarms, and then sends them to the appropriate authorities, who just so happen to be outside the Temple. Leaking his newly crafted anonymous report to several reporters and anti-Jedi politicians while he's at it should only help add to the chaos.

Now that change is in motion, Quinlan still needs to find his Obi. Scribbling a quick note on some flimsy for Tholme, who is out on a mission, Quinlan promptly sneaks to the hangar bay to steal a ship and head to Obi’s last known location. 

A few hours after Quinlan sent his report of Jedi kidnapping, corruption, child abuse, child abandonment, and incompetence to Coruscant Child Protective Services, Republic Judicial, Republic Judicial Internal Affairs, every Republic Senate committee dealing even remotely with Jedi, several news outlets, reporters, and every Jedi-friendly politician. Xanatos du Crion enacts his revenge, and several bombs go off in the Jedi Temple, coincidentally destroying Quinlan’s rooms along with the note he left for his master.

Quinlan, after making his escape from the Jedi temple and several days in hyperspace traveling in his stolen ship, makes his descent onto the planet that was Obi’s last known location, making his descent outside any sightlines of the city, where he can feel Obi's force presence. Although the name of the planet appears to have been corrupted, the coordinates for the system remained valid. Quinlan was allowing the force to guide him from there.

After landing, Quinlan used his shadow training to make his way towards the city he could feel Obi from. It is essential to note that Quinlan doesn't harbor any hostility towards the residents; he simply wants to protect his Obi, who is a city inhabitant. 

Making his way past the open gate that surrounds the strange, white-walled city, Quinlan can see that the city is constructed of uniform white stone, as well as its streets. The local species all have the same red hair with a hint of metallic as his Obi. They were an odd species, that's for sure. Obviously predatory, with claws and carnivorous teeth, they moved with a predatory grace, seemingly always ready to pounce at any moment. They all seem to look like children. If this is a near-human species that resembles children, it's not one that Quinlan has encountered before.

Making his way stealthily through the city to hide the fact that he was not a native, Quinlan eavesdrops on some conversations; they are all in a strange mix of accents, mainly originating from the Outer Rim. One or two, however, had particular accents and vocal ticks from merchants. Their conversations tend towards lessons, how kind a guy named Harry is, and how Tom is going to change the galaxy.

Finally, Quinlan comes upon his Obi, who is making his way along the streets, holding a holo novel in his hand. All at once, Quinlan stops hiding his force presence and tackles his Obi in a hug, knocking them both to the ground, and starts babbling.

“Obi Qui-Gon said you left the order for a girl and no one would listen and the high council is obviously corrupt, so I made proper legal reports to the appropriate authorities, like Master Tholme showed me! Then I stole a ship to bring me here, and the force feels weird! And you look different! What happened to your teeth and nails? Now that I’m up close, your eyes look different to! We are supposed to wait for knighthood before body modification!”

Obi-Wan's initial surprise and reflex to stab an attacker was stalled by Quinlan's forceful presence. Obi slowly relaxed in Quinlan's hold, listening to him babble as he started to pet him as Quinlan held him. Meanwhile, a group of curious children gathered around watching the spectacle.

“Oh, Quin, I have so much to tell you, and I would prefer not to do it while lying in the middle of the street.”

A few hours later, after Obi-Wan had relocated them to what will probably be a restaurant away from the public mess. Fed them both a meal of sliced fruits, with a side of berries, along with fruit juice to drink. They had exchanged stories on what had happened to each other.

“So Qui-Gon abandoned you to childhunters, then a force dyad of some kind showed up, killed the adults, terraformed the planet, and genetically altered all the children with Sith alchemy? Afterward, Tom killed some pirates, stole their ship, retrieved a dreadnought, fixed it with the Force, and used Force enchanting to make the most dangerous ship this galaxy has seen since the Sith’s last superweapon. Tom then decided to fix the population deficit with freed slaves and left, leaving you to aid this Harry guy in managing thousands of traumatized genetically engineered juvenile super predators. And your thought was to join them in becoming a traumatized genetically engineered juvenile super predator so they wouldn't look at you as a outsider?”

Quinlan asked in exasperation at the stuff his Obi gets into without him.

“I believe the current name of the species by popular consensus is Fearls.”

Obi-Wan adds mildly with a sharp-toothed smirk.

“Where do I sign up for the change and immigration?”

Quinlan asks, making Obi-Wan sputter.

“If the Jedi are becoming corrupt and are leaving younglings enslaved or to childhunters, I might as well take a career change. Master Tholme will probably join us once he gets back and finds the note I left him.”

Quinlan says with a nonchalant shrug.

Chapter Text

Jango Fett had no idea how his life had come to this. Standing at a clan head meeting with all the clans of Mandalore before him, swearing fealty. He can recall the past few months as a series of flashbacks, crystal-clear moments, and a blur between others.

Jango remembers the mission hunting terrorists, Kyr’tsad, and the battle against Jetiise, whose Jetii’kad’s humming resonated in his bones as they slaughtered his people in droves.

Jango remembers the rage he felt when the Jetiise handed him over to the governor, the humiliation of having his armor stripped from him.

Jango remembers pain and the so-called justice that the Governor gave him by selling him into slavery.

Jango’s time on the spice ship is recalled in a haze, marked by inhaling the spice in the air, forced labor, and plotting his escape.

Jango remembers a fever dream where armored droids storm the ship and kill all the slavers.

Jango remembers, his mind in a daze, being guided to the mess, where he thinks he sees a Dar’jetii, a figure out of myth and stories, freeing people. His robes billow dramatically as he ushers the children out, standing up and proclaiming his debt to this man who has freed him.

Jango remembers with confusion entering a grand dining room aboard the Dar’jetii’s dreadnought, where he was interrogated over a meal about his people and planet.

Jango remembers waking up in an infirmary, whole and healthy, feeling the best he had in his life. No lingering pain from old breaks, muscles restored from what they had atrophied to from his recent diet and enslavement, and not a hint of addiction in his mind over the spice he has been forced to breathe in for weeks. The hissing voice over the intercom informed him that they were heading to Galidraan so he could reclaim his armor and survivors, then to Mandalore to unite his people.

Jango remembers with vicious glee the Governor's broken body beneath him, and blood on his hands, restoring some of his honor before putting his armor back on.

Jango remembers with tears in his eyes, saying the remembrances for all those who have died under his command: over three hundred warriors, the pride of their clans.

Jango remembers being lost, searching for a purpose, standing aboard the bridge of the Dar’jetii’s dreadnought as he is convinced to form a plan with the Dar’jetii to take Mandalore whole. Discussing what resources are available, what clans are loyal to him, Vizsla, and Kryze. 

Jango can remember feeling terror at the Dar’jetii chanting words in an unknown tongue. Jango’s blood floating in the air, forming strange glyphs that expand to encircle the cities, to entrap pacifists so they may never leave unless they swear to never return or pledge themselves to him as their Mand'alore.

Jango remembers the anticipation as the Dar’jetii led him to Tor: the challenge and the fight, quick and brutal. He recalls the members of Kyr’tsad taking a knee from where they circled him to observe the formal challenge.

Jango remembers the uncertainty that preceded his contacting his allied clans. The ones that had supported him as Mand'alore, and his subsequent call for a clan gathering, allowing the disparate factions to vote and settle the matter of leadership.

Now here he is, standing in front of all his clan heads, being named sole ruler of Mandalore, the people telling him that they will follow him, die for him, just like Galidraan. No, Jango dismisses that thought spiral before it can start. He has a world to fix, a people to lead, and a Dar’jetii to survive.

The Dar’jetii smiles at the gathered clan heads as if he wouldn't flay them all alive, salt them, then freeze them in carbonite, conscious, just so that he can listen to their pain in the Kara.

“I see your confusion; however, let's establish first that I am not a Sith or a Dar’jetii, as you call them. I do not follow their culture, theology, sorcery, or methodology.”

Naturally, no one believed him.

“I am a dark wizard bound to a light wizard; we balance each other. Now, onto my goals and what I have to offer beyond the debt your Mand'alore owes me.

“I can move all the Beskar buried on this planet to the surface so that you can relocate, or I can terraform the world to be green once more.” 

The Mandalorians nod at this statement—impossible claims of magic and the ability to pull through on such promises are typical for Dar’jetii.

“As for what I want, I want an empire. To get that, I need troops and ships.”

The Mandalorians nod again. This is also normal for Dar’jetii; they are very predictable in their wants and goals.

“What I have is the most dangerous warship in the galaxy, Magical powers, and a planet full of feral orphan children being protected and managed by my partner, who will annihilate any threat to his charges.”

Silence greets the Dar’jetii’s statement.

“How many children?”

The Sornell clan head asks in a carefully neutral voice.

“Oh, we have a few hundred that we saved from the childhunters that my partner killed, then I built the Nagini, my ship, and went hunting to fix our population shortage. I raided at least three ships per day for months as to free slaves in that area for a few months. We should have tens of thousands, if not over a hundred thousand, of Feral Orphans running around by now.”

The Dar’jetii said in an almost musing tone.

“It is clear it is time to plan the exfiltration of Manda’yaim. We conquered it for the super predators and mega fauna to hunt, and the Beskar mines. If we can take the Beskar with us, why stay?”

Jango asks rhetorically, It's clear that they will be relocating anyway, it's best to go with it, he figures.

“How will we transport the Beskar?”

The Tenau clan head asks.

“I learned how to fold space in my youth; my ship could store a moon, leave the objects and non-organic resources to me.”

The Dar’jetii says while smiling at them, while looking no older than a human seventeen.

“How will you get the Beskar out of the planet's depths and into orbit?”

The Head of Clan Werda asks the Dar’jetii boldly. Best to figure out if this gift had teeth.

The following explanation of the principle of similarity, like attracts like, and quantum entanglement, using vibrations to remove the surrounding attached material, and reversing gravity, causing all of the Beskar to leave the planet and enter orbit.

“How will this affect the pacifists who have Beskar mines beneath their cities?”

The head of clan Ordo asks their voice carefully neutral, not betraying a hint of emotion, so as not to show his thoughts on the Dar’jetii’s explanation.

“Do any of you care about their survival, given that they are outsiders? As I understand, Mandalorians are defined as people who follow the Resol’nare?”

The Dar’jetii asks the council of clans mildly?

A lot of planning, discussing, and arguing later, they had a week to get everything they cared about off the planet before the Dar’jetii did his ritual to rip the rest out of the earth, sending it to orbit for his dreadnought to pick up. The Mandaloreans lacked the number of ships required to transport everyone and everything, so the Dar’jetii volunteered to transport as many clans as were needed.

Chapter Text

Mace Windu was not having a good year. After taking his place as the youngest Master of the Order in the temple's history, everything that could go wrong did so and quite drastically.

First Qui-Gon taking a padawan so soon after the supposed death of his first long-term padawan, who was on the cusp of knighthood. Then, the bombing of the temple, which was the worst tragedy the Jedi Order had suffered since the New Sith Wars.

Hundreds of Jedi died, taking their already small order to under ten thousand members. And on the eve of this tragedy, they get news that they are being investigated for Child abuse, child abandonment, and a host of other crimes.

Mace, in all his naivety and confidence in the Jedi Order as a council member, and master of the Order, allowed the investigators full access to clear up this matter quickly, not wanting it to spiral out of control and affect the order's already poor morale.

Obi-Wan Kenobi has been writing and submitting reports detailing his missions from even before Qui-Gon accepted him as a padawan. The Jedi Council does not read Padawan reports unless an investigation is required for one reason or another. It is supposedly expected that the Master's reports will be sufficient.

With the access that the investigators had obtained from Mace into the Jedi servers, they continued and expanded their investigations. From looking into Qui-Gon's past, they discovered what happened to Xanatos du Crion. Apparently, Qui-Gon did not provide any real information on what happened, and Xanatos did not die as Qui-Gon claimed, but fell and went rogue after Qui-Gon killed his father in front of him. Xanatos is even responsible for bombing the temple. 

All this was brought to light with the accusation of nepotism and a host of other allegations that the investigators received from an anonymous whistleblower, presumably a Jedi of high standing, who seeks to end the corruption, which led to some serious charges that have evidence and proof behind them, not mere allegations.

It is a dark day for the order when legitimate charges of child trafficking, child endangerment, and nepotism can be laid on the grandmaster of the Jedi order.

It was at this time that a formal complaint, along with evidence, came from the Mandalore sector about Jedi killing and enslaving planetary rulers.

To make matters worse, the Jedi whistleblower who started this mess ensured that copies were sent to the bloodthirsty press. 

The ever-growing list of legitimate charges now includes incompetence. If only the Jedi could explain that the Force has gotten darker and more clouded, a fact which most of the High Council firmly denies, and the ones who do accept such a thing won’t publicly admit to it because, according to them, the Order shouldn't show weakness.

The riots outside the temple are not helping. Thousands of angry Sentients have been directing their hatred toward the order for days, and have been making everything worse.

The reactions from his fellow order members have been incredulity at well, everything. Yoda has always been known to meddle, but protecting his lineage to this extent and keeping Qui-gon from the mind healers. It was days of shock and disbelief.

To wrap up this whole kerfuffle, the Senate, in its infinite wisdom, has decided to kick the Jedi out of the Republic. Witch apparently they can do, seeing as the Jedi are a people from a world, Ilum, and now the Republic wants to deport all the Jedi to their world, which would be fine if only Ilum weren't a frozen wasteland incapable of supporting life.

Sheev Palpatine wondered how this had spiraled so grandly. He was delighting in the Jedi's suffering following their recent losses from the bombing. Aiding Xanatos had been one of the best decisions he ever made. 

Then reports of Jedi corruption, incompetence, child abuse, and child abandonment came out of nowhere and poured more attention on the Jedi who were already at the top of every news feed from the bombing.

Sheev never even thought such accusations could be legitimate. The Jedi would never knowingly allow one of their precious younglings to come to harm. But by the miracle that is the Force, the accusations were legitimate.

So naturally, Sheev had to capitalize on such a grand opportunity to further the Jedi's slow fall. The Sith have been infiltrating the Republic for centuries, slowly clouding the Force. Slowly reducing Jedi influence, clarity, and freedom. So, naturally, to further this cause, Sheev recommended the Jedi be removed from the Republic.

Naturally, no one would have allowed the Jedi to leave. The Republic needs the Jedi to be their dogs, and this idea would have been debated and compromised down to more chains on the order, less funding, fewer freedoms, fewer children admitted to the order, and other concessions. This is when news of the Jedi overthrowing legitimate governments and enslaving planetary rulers came out and hit the media like a Sith super weapon on an Ecumenopolis.

The Jedi's terrible reputation from giving their youngling to the Hutts. Corruption. Nepotism. Forcing children to watch their Jedi Master kill their parents, and now, replacing the leaders of the Republic’s allied governments. All this was aided by the Sith's influence to spin everything in the worst way possible for the Jedi.

The public was ready to lynch the Jedi in their temple.

Sheev's obscure idea to exile the Jedi Order suddenly gained a lot of popularity. So naturally, if the Jedi were going to be free, he had to find a way to kill as many as he could as quickly as possible. Deportation to Ilum, the frozen death world, should finish them off, then have a few pirate fleets orbitally bombard them. A few pirates with their personalities readjusted should work just fine; it has been done before, after all. And who would suspect the Sith? We have been extinct for centuries after all.

Mace was rubbing his temples as he sat in the Jedi High Council's meeting room. He has been doing a lot of that recently, both sitting in this room and warding off headaches.

“Ignoring blame and fault, the facts are that our welcome on Coruscant is expiring. Soon, we will have to relocate. These are facts. What are our options?”

Mace interrupts the petty bickering and arguments flying through the disunited council, trying to create some order and get a direction for them to move forward.

“Fact: at the end of the New Sith Wars, the Jedi numbered over ten million; now we number less than ten thousand. 

Fact: Without the Ruusan reformation, our rules would be different; we could wear armor again, reestablish an army, carry weapons other than lightsabers, have guns on our ships, and we could receive monetary support from outside the Republic. 

Fact: Yoda and Qui-Gon's reputations are toxic.”

Jocasta Nu’s voice is clean, laying down the facts of the situation in a no-nonsense tone.

“Officially and publicly excommunicate Yoda and Qui-Gon, both to distance ourselves and appease the public. 

Spread the Jedi to cover a wider area, we own several planets and temples that we have acquired over the millennia. Grant the Corps freedom and independence. Have each counselor take one of the twelve creche clanss, a few masters, several hundred knights, and padawans divided by lineage, and establish their own temples. Then expand and recruit without age limits from outside the Republic. 

The galaxy is massive, and the Republic doesn't even officially claim forty percent. We have fallen so far, and the galaxy has become so dark. This is our chance to spread and bring light back, return to the beacon of light that we once were without the chains forged by the Republic.”

Jocasta Nu’s voice proclaims, rising with determination through her impromptu speech.

Sometimes Mace forgets that Sifo Dyas, Yan Doku, and Jocasta Nu are crèche mates and best friends. Now that Yoda has been removed from the council and his influence and reputation have turned toxic, the Trio’s radical ideas are starting to sound reasonable.

After a minute to let what Jocasta just said sink in, Mace looks around at his fellow Jedi High Council members and reaches out to feel them in the Force. 

Sifo Dyas and Yan Doku are clearly radiating approval. The radical Trio came up with this plan together, and it's probably backed by endless research from Jocasta Nu’s archives. 

Yaddle, the head of the shadows, radiates agreement in the Force with these ideas; clearly, she is in favor of spreading the Jedi across the galaxy and fighting the dark, no surprises there.

Adi Gallia and Plo Koon feel uncertain, but a tentative sense of agreement is emanating from their Force presences.

Ki-Adi-Mundi and Yerael Poof are outraged by this plan, no surprise there; those two are hardliners, mostly opposed to change, and have always supported Yoda in his patience and long-term views, which stem from the nature of most long-lived species.

Even Piell is giving off the feeling of being in favor, but he was always one for action.

Oppo Rancisis and Eeth Koth are suspiciously quiet in the force.

Depa will probably agree, Mace realises, knowing her temperament as he does.

Two against, two undecided, and seven for. With Mace still pondering the idea. It's going to go through Mace realizes releasing his anxiety into the Force at this change, and what it will mean for the Jedi in the future.

Mace barely listens to the lecture on the uniformity of belief and teachings versus healthy diversity, which turns into a discussion on how to divide the shadows when almost all shadow lineages stem from Master Yaddle.

Chapter Text

Quinlan Vos is having the time of his life. Over the past few weeks, many things have changed on Tom’s planet. First, Tom returned with a fleet of Mandalorian ships and all the clans of Mandalore, which has surprisingly led to several improvements. As it turns out, a wizard, an army of child soldiers and freed slave children, and two Jedi younglings can’t run a planet, who knew?

Quinlan watches the Mandalorians meet the Ferals, and what would you know, Mandalorians have an adoption culture that will take anyone, and they view biting as cute. Then, to stop the mass adoptions, Harry told a few children to spread around that giving your name to a Mandalorian means they can adopt you. The children naturally learned that this means they have to hide their names unless they want to be adopted, and giving their names amounts to permission. The Mandalorians, for their part, were stifled from their mass adoption efforts by this name game and did not hesitate to adopt children once they got them to say their names, further exasperating the idea that giving your name means you're willing to be adopted.

Tom, after staying a few days on his planet to settle his Mandalorians, took a few dozen ship mechanics from the Mandalorian clans to help him repair and salvage a few more dreadnoughts to add to Tom’s navy.

The Mandalorians met Tom’s planet's government, which consists of Harry, Tom’s Riduur, who is stretched thin feeding a few thousand kids, trying to establish a government, train kids in force magic, repair all those many cities, and being the impromptu governor and problem solver. Two feral Jet’ika who have been conscripted as teachers, leaders, organizers, and immigration officers are also stretched thin. And five child soldiers: three from the former faction known as the Young, and one from each of the former factions of child hunters.

The massive number of Mandalorian clans, their leaders, and the Mandalore integrate quite well into this small quasi-government, and by integrate, Quinlan means take over and pay nominal lip service to Harry while indulging the children and asking after their names.

One of the first sensible things Quinlan thinks the Mandalorians did was focus their farmers on the massive agricultural deficit; apparently, a Planet should not live off pure hunting and gathering, no matter that every tree is a fruit tree and every bush is a berry bush, and the food seems endless. They quickly established farms, cleared land, built homesteads, and built long-term food storage.

After establishing a sensible agricultural industry, the Mandalorians then went on to discuss architecture, and by architecture, Quinlan means defences. Apparently, there is little difference between the two. Apparently, they don’t like Harry’s whimsical style, even if the stone is nearly indestructible. Harry's solution was to introduce the Mandalorians to the five freed Force-sensitive slaves and two former Jedi padawans whom Harry had taught and given wands to. Harry's rushed education had taught them all what he viewed as the immediately essential things to learn: a shield spell, a stunning spell to deal with hostels, and a lot of utility magic. 

Harry had taught them all how to permanently change stone form one type to another and permanently reshape it so long as it's the same mass, how to repair damaged objects, create light, clean anything, and how to make objects such as stone nearly indestructible until someone removes the enchantment.

Now, with Mandalorians having access to seven one-child construction crews, Quinlan found himself fending off inquiries after his name while building clan compounds, walls, fortifications, mini-cities, and reshaping the existing cities in Mandalorian styles, which are impressive and designed to fend off sieges, orbital bombardment, and invasion. Quinlan finds himself having dinner with his Obi, laughing as they discuss their futures while pondering becoming architects.

After finishing fortifying homes and cities, the Mandalorians moved on to planetary defenses. At the same time, their armorers got to work on the mountains and the small moon of Beskar Tom left lying around. Apparently, the Mandalorians aren't so quick to trust Tom and Harry's purely magical defenses and want technological planetary shields. They also don’t like the fact that whole cities run off magic, and they can’t do anything to maintain them. This leaves them to build a tech backup system that can handle heavy loads, and with the additional time to work on it, they build fortified systems that can last millennia.

It's around this time that Tom returned with six more dreadnoughts and a call for any Mandalorian warrior not busy with their clans to aid him in liberating slaves from the Hutts while recruiting more children.

The Mandalorians still have their bounty hunters out running jobs to fund the clans, who have had to waste most, if not all, their income on importing food from the Republic, and their ever-increasing fees meant to cripple the greatest warrior people known to be left in the galaxy.

After recalling most of their bounty hunters and sending the hot-blooded youth along with some older members to keep them in line, Tom’s fleet moves out to rid the galaxy of the Slug problem with his Mandalorian army and magic fleet.

It’s not a few weeks later, Tom’s world starts getting an endless stream of traumatized red-haired feral super-predators newly freed from slavery from the magical transportation circle Tom and Harry made to funnel their new charges. The Mandalorians see this and quickly try to capitalize on new children who don’t know not to give their names to tall people in armor. Not that the Children who have gone native aren't quick to notice and immediately try to warn these poor unsuspecting souls.

During his time on Tom’s planet, Quinlan finds himself learning Mando’a as it is becoming the primary language of Tom’s planet. The Mandalorians all speak it and make the adopted children learn it, and the few immigrants know a mix of languages and don’t seem to mind. 

Quinlan thinks the only reason no one has adopted Obi-Wan is that Obi-Wan’s home world is Stewjon, and Obi-Wan means no one. The Mandalorians are convinced that Obi-Wan has adopted the name Obi-Wan purely to prevent adoption.

In more recent news, it turns out, Beskar knives can cut Stewjon’s metallic hair, so any child who wants a haircut has to approach a Mandalorian one way or another, and the Mandalorians who view Beskar as a sacred metal refuse to give it to anyone not Mandalorian, including the non-adopted children.

The bureaucracy was turning into a nightmare, with over a hundred thousand children refusing to share their names, until Obi-Wan implemented citizen ID numbers paired with photos.

They have a distinct lack of knowledge from the outside galaxy, and Quinlan is wondering how much longer Tholm will take to join him. It's been over half a year since he arrived on this planet. If he takes much longer, Quinlan will have to take a break from all his fun to send him a message or track him down.

Quinlan would hate to miss the establishment of the future spaceport and a working economy.

Chapter Text

Mace Windu has mixed feelings about the Jedi scattering. He was glad to be off Coruscant, the planet was steeped in the dark side and infested with politicians. But it was his home for all his life, and he grew fond of the Temple and the memories he made there. The last few weeks were unpleasant, and the hurried rush to evacuate the younglings, archives, and vaults was an experience he would never like to repeat.

As for his new home, Tython, he has mixed feelings. It is a Jedi-owned planet that they left when hyperlanes shifted, making it out of the way. It is very rich in the Force and filled with jungles, abandoned temples, ruins, and weird Force phenomena.

The Jedi refugees, and that's what they are, refugees who were evicted from their home for over a millennium. The Jedi refugees of Mace’s group settled in an abandoned temple in the Temperate region, which had been left abandoned for centuries. 

The Jedi who followed him started repairing it to the best of their abilities, dividing their tasks by specialty. 

His contingent of Agricultural Corps was setting up farmland to help make their new home self-sustaining, while the Educational Corps was managing the crèche clan that he was now responsible for. 

The exploration corps was divided by specialty: some repaired and explored the Temple, while others began planning surveys and mapping the many ruins. The Medical Corps had its hands full setting up a medical wing while attending to the varied needs of such a mixed group of species, including the Younglings. Mace’s Knight and Masters were, for their part, dedicating themselves to defense and building the temple.

Defense Mace can hardly believe it. Pirate fleet after pirate fleet seems to know their location and are trying to raid them for Force-sensitive younglings, artifacts to steal and sell, and, of all things, reputation. 

Unfortunately for the Pirates, Jedi are protective of the innocent and even more protective of younglings, and even more protective still of Jedi Younglings. The pirates found out as Mace and his Jedi Knights and Masters ripped their ships from orbit with the force, before hunting anyone who used escape pods to land on the planet. 

What happened to Obi-Wan is an abhorrent tragedy that Yoda should have never allowed, and Mace will make sure all the Younglings in his care are safe, happy, and able to defend themselves.

Yan Dooku has mixed feelings about the Jedi's eviction. He always wanted the Jedi Order to have more independence from the Senate. Free to follow the will of the Force and not the will of ever more corrupt politicians, but the way they obtained their newfound freedom left a bad taste in his mouth.

After the eviction, Yan returned home to Serenno only to find that his brother had been mismanaging the planet terribly, treating the people like livestock, allowing pirates to operate, and taking advantage of their sister. Naturally, Yan, as the firstborn and no longer bound by the Ruusan Reformation, soon became Count of Serenno, which translated to all the Politicians around him, both from his planet and abroad, regarding him as Jedi Lord Serenno.

Yan will admit he had a lot of fun, condescendingly explaining to reporters exactly what the Ruusan Reformation meant and how the Jedi can change now that it no longer applies.

The ability to wear armor, hold military ranks, re-establish their Army, Naval, and starfighter forces, free themselves of the supervision of the Supreme Chancellor and the Judicial Department, train anyone anywhere they want, hold political office, and so much more.

Evicting the Jedi from Coruscant did not evict them from the Galactic Republic, as most Jedi are now citizens of Republic worlds. It's not like the Senate can prohibit them from being Jedi, since the Jedi are a religion and freedom of religion is a fundamental right enshrined in the Galactic Republic’s constitution. No politician would dare touch fundamental sentient rights lest they be evicted from office in a most violent way from over half the galaxy, cheering their removal.

Now, if only Yan could figure out why so many pirates and assassins are targeting the newly built luxury Jedi Temple of Serenno. Oh well, at least Yan can spin their attacks for more Jedi Sympathy in the media.

Sifo Dyas is happy; he and his friend Jocasta Nu have relocated with a chunk of the Education Corps to the beautiful planet of Alderaan with most of the Jedi Archives. Alderaan has been a long-time ally of the Jedi order and saw the Jedi’s sudden eviction after millennia of dutiful service over a few misguided members as the perfect time to steal for themselves a Jedi temple of their very own. Sifo Dyas deliberately does not look into the relationship between Aldraan and Corellia and the implications of wanting to have a Jedi temple on the planet due to a political rivalry.

Disgruntled by the Obi-Wan affair, Yoda is. Ment to be in his lineage, the boy is. Shines brightly in the Force, the boy does. Meddle in matters of lineage, Grandmasters do. Normal, this is.

Unexpected, the Jedi relocation is. A good thing, the relocation is. Relocate to Dagobah, Yoda did. Bring Younglings, Yoda did.

Complain, Younglings, do. Hospitable, the planet is. Survivable, the humidity is.

“Master Yoda, we are still having trouble setting up a sustainable agricultural system. There are too many unknown species in this world. Building sustainable farmland in an unknown swamp biome is not a matter of just doing.”

Complains the head of Yoda’s agricultural Corps contingent.

“The Temple we are building will need more maintenance due to the humidity and the Force-made weather phenomena on this planet.”

The Jedi in charge of the Temple's construction complains.

“Another Jedi has caught another unknown disease. Master Yoda, are you sure we can’t convince you to move to a more agreeable planet?”

The Head of the local Medical Corps asks in a pleading tone.

“Are you sure it's a good idea to build a temple on top of a Dark Side Force nexus?”

The Head of the local Education Corps asks, eyes pleading.

“Build temples atop Dark Side Force Nexus, done before has been. For this reason, Coruscant’s temple location was chosen. Purify the dark side, Jedi should.”

Yoda explains. Seeing their unchanging expressions, Yoda continues.

“Left me in charge of this Temple, Yerael Poof has. To the Force, I listen. To the Force you all must listen.”

Yaddle is having the time of her life. 

She left the Jedi Corps members and the younglings to manage the building of a new secret Temple that no one, not on the planet or in her lineage, knows the location of. Judging by the lack of pirate attacks compared to all the other Jedi temples, she was wise to keep its location hidden. 

Yaddle, for her part, has been taking her shadows and has been conducting slave raids, following the will of the Force and acquiring Force sensitives, and not just children. With the Senate's meddling removed, they no longer have to restrict themselves to just children with a specific, rare high midichlorian count. 

They don’t even have to restrict themselves to Force sensitives if she just so happens to obtain an army, and if the Hutts just so happen to lose a few thousand slaves, then it must be the will of the Force.

Yaddle will grow her temple and bring light and change to the dark places of the galaxy, and if newly freed peoples want to help her, she will be happy to have them.

Chapter Text

Seven dreadnoughts hovered over the world, shooting down any ship that tried to escape. Nal Hutta, translated as Glorious Jewel in Huttese, is also known as Hutta and is the capital of the Hut Empire. It also happens to be Tom’s first target. Utilising his superior stealth, Tom has snuck his newly created fleet through the hyper roots deep into Hutt space to target his enemy's capital first. The Mandalorians, while weary, can agree that a suitable alpha strike is a winning strategy and that such a move will throw all of Hutt space into chaos. This, along with the fact that no one knows their planet of origin, while the planet Manda’yaim lies abandoned, will prevent any accurate retaliation.

With no threat of retaliation, Tom intends this to be the first battle in a grand campaign. Tom has the seven most dangerous ships in the galaxy, the greatest warrior people, and advanced magic with centuries of practice. The Hutt Empire is currently the galaxy's strongest unified military force. The bloated beast that is the Republic has lost their wizards in no small part due to Tom releasing key information at certain times, along with a ritual of misfortune that used little Quinlan Vos' actions as a catalyst, magnifying their repercussions. The only united threat in the galaxy currently is the Hutts, and Tom will see the back of their empire broken. Tom doesn't have to purge, conquer, and control all of Hutt space; he has to break its relevance and its ability to project force.

It is much easier to conquer a broken, disparate territory with many squabbling factions than it is to conquer a united empire after all, and this way, Tom can start conquering at his leisure once Harry has his new homeworld’s government ready for expansion. Shuffling more children and resources obtained from his raids to Harry can only help speed the process.

To prevent those pesky hostage situations that slavers and other lowlifes enjoy so much, Tom will issue a quick warning on the repercussions of such an action. A quick ritual for Tom to speak to the whole planet with spells that translate everything spoken into one's own understanding, transcending language, will further his shock-and-awe tactics.

“I am Tom Riddle, and behind me are the united clans of Mandalore! We are here to free the slaves! SLAVERS, YOU ARE ALL GOING TO DIE!. The only question is how slowly. Should you attempt to use your slaves as hostages or kill them outright, you will live. You will live in the type of constant agony that the Sith of old wouldn’t dare inflict upon their enemies!”

For Tom, enacting a planetary ritual to reinforce people's sense of self so that ensouled biological bodies could block signals to stop slave chips from going off was a fantastic idea. A short planetary ritual at the same time as Tom started his blockade was a simple enough matter.

Letting the Mandalorian warriors lead his golems in ground combat to target the slave pens. At the same time, the orbiting ships bombard key locations to prevent any organised defence from forming, which is a simple enough matter to determine through divination and scrying.

Tom ignores all incoming calls and messages from the Hutts. He doubts they would have anything helpful to say; after all, it would be bribes and threats, and it's not like Tom will be accepting their surrender. He has firm plans to put every slug in the galaxy to the sword. It's like these creatures never learned the golden rule: don't make oneself an acceptable target.

His warriors have been briefed on the process for freed slaves. It's a simple process. Families and adults are shunted off into ships with enough supplies to get them to a Republic slave refugee world, and the children who are unaccompanied or orphans are pushed through a quick ritual to make them Ferals, then moved into the runically carved teliportation circle to shunt them off to his planet for Harry to deal with.

The Mand’alor watches events unfold before him. Nal Hutta is burning, his people are united, and the Dar’jetii, when not cackling, is watching events unfold with dispassion as if watching worlds burn is normal.

His clan leaders are somehow fine with this turn of events; everyone is getting what they want. The clans are strong, recruiting new foundlings, getting farms, and a habitable world. The former Death Watch members are entering battle and building an empire. The Armours are getting Beskar to turn into Beskar’gam. Tom's empire may be Tom’s to rule, but it will be Mandalorian by culture, and apparently, that is enough for the Clans. Everyone is happy, well, everyone except for the Pacifists who have been robbed of their houses and left on a forgotten farming backwater with maybe one ship coming to the world every few years.

Jango watches the lost, thin, bruised children be ushered through the Dar’jetii’s ritual, watching them come alive with life, energy, and strength they have never known before, and then being ushered back through the circle to Melidaan, or more commonly known as Tom’s planet.

Jango watches the Dar’jetii wave his wand, and slave collars fall off as the freed stare at Tom with something like hope.

Jango watches the Dar’jetii rip information out of the Grand Hutt Council's minds, their contingencies, the locations of their secret droid armies, and the locations of their old ships kept in case of war. Information on finances, on what worlds are critical to maintain their empire. Jango watches the Dar’jetii take every valuable secret out of the Hutts until every plot and plan they could come up with has been exposed, until the hope for revenge is gone from their beady eyes. 

The Dar’jetii Tom Riddle is going to break the Hutt Empire, Jango realises, and Jango is going to help every step of the way.

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan woke up slowly. He was warm and comfortable. The mattress was soft. Quinlan was lying on top of him, and Neald was cuddled up to his side. Obi-Wan didn't know quite how the culture promoted the massive piles of sleeping children. Well, thinking about it, he did know how it started: the Young huddling for warmth in the Sewers as the adults hunted them. Then, when Harry remade the city with massive mattresses, things were strange. The children stayed sleeping together for comfort, then, with an influx of Freed who grouped up or wanted to stay with their friends, the culture only encouraged giant sleeping piles of children. It reminds Obi-Wan of the Jedi Crèche, and he finds comfort in it. 

Relaxing as he drifts, Obi-Wan takes in the Force presences of those around him. Quinlan, who enjoys acting as his blanket, Nieald cuddled up on his side, and Cerasi sprawled on the edge of the bed. Several members of the Young and a few of the Freed who have arrived during Tom’s earlier campaign to increase his population. The Mandalorians find the whole thing copikla.

While he's so warm and comfortable, Obi-Wan slips into a light meditation to contemplate the past year. They were doing fine, Harry was teaching them his and Tom’s Force tradition when he wasn't running himself ragged trying to care for the thousands of children and the constant new arrivals. 

Harry made wands for Obi-Wan, Quinlan, and the three Force-sensitives Tom rescued. His Force tradition emphasizes a highly specialized, personalized non-kyber Focus for delicate Force manipulation. The Jedi would never have thought to use the Force in such a manner, for they believed in minimising its use and doing nothing with it that they could do on their own. Obi-Wan remembers the lectures on frivolous use of the Force all too well.

Harry didn't really have time to teach them all the theory; however, he assured them that each of the spells he taught was based on advanced math, which was explained with something he called arithmancy. Obi-Wan will admit he enjoyed the lessons, learning to reshape matter and change one material to another in what Harry calls permanent transfiguration.

The basics of combat Harry taught them with the stunning spell go almost completely against what the Jedi teach, never to use the Force to harm another sentient. The most the Jedi would use is a Sleep compulsion or a Force suggestion. Harry, however, taught them a spell called stupefy, a Force technique to instantly and harmlessly force another person unconscious. The shield spell protego Obi-Wan believes is at least something the Jedi would approve of, unlike the transfiguration, which the Jedi would argue is a frivolous use of the Force when proper construction could accomplish the same thing.

Obi-Wan has a lot of mixed feelings about Harry; he is so obviously light, full of love and compassion, and he cares deeply for all the children; however, he did lay waste to the adults who tried to hurt them. The Jedi of now wouldn't do such a thing; they could strive to have the adults face trial and would never involve themselves in fighting a war. 

Harry, after seeing Obi-Wan watching Quinlan do his lightsaber Katas with what must be longing on his face, created an enchanted sword for Obi-Wan so he might resume his saber training and spar with Quinlan. 

The sword, while made of metal and lacking a Kyber crystal, does have enough enchantments to spar with a lit lightsaber, never dull or break, cut through nearly anything, and return to his hand when he wants or needs it. Needless to say, Quinlan was jealous but happy for Obi-Wan.

Then the Mandalorians arrived in a grand fleet, and Tom told them that his new soldiers came from a wasteland that couldn't grow its own food and would help build up the planet. Mandalorians wore lots of Armor, which differentiated them from the Armorless adult childhunters that Harry purged, and the Freed children were never enslaved to a Mandalorian before, for the Mandalorians do not believe in slavery and would rather adopt a child than own one and would shoot any slaver if they thought they could get away with it.

Things were really hectic once the Mandalorians arrived. They had many thoughts on what needed to be done and the requirements to build Tom a proper empire. Their priority, much to the children's confusion, was food and water. Apparently, the children's approach to magically created tap water when thirsty and foraging when hungry was unacceptable. Apparently, they needed proper farms. The Mandalorians also insisted on a wastewater treatment plant to help with farming. According to them, each piece of infrastructure should feed into others, reinforcing and supporting them.

It is shortly after the Mandalorians solve the ‘food crisis’ that Harry gives the Force-sensitive children over to the Mandalorians to help them with the city building due to how difficult the material is for them to work on, and by difficult to work on, Obi-Wan means the stone is nearly indestructible and shaped into designs with a total disregard for structural stability.

Obi-Wan found himself learning a lot about traditional Mandalorian architecture. At the same time, he was plied with food, lessons in Mando’a and fighting, and by strong, armored people asking him for his real name.

Slowly, Obi-Wan found himself loving his new life. Sure, at one point, the Force was really insistent that he was meant to be a Jedi, but now it is just giving him warm, happy feelings, saying he's meant to be here.

Sure, some of the new instincts from his Feral biology are strange sometimes, like the fact that he and the other Ferals lunge when startled. Or that Ferals will all freeze and track food someone else is caring when they are hungry. How they all really like sinking their teeth into things, and how the fleshy fruits help soothe that instinct. 

Thinking of Ferals, the Mandalorian Medics have been having a tough time trying to find things they can’t eat. When the Mandalorians first arrived, they were concerned that the fruit and berries would not make a balanced diet; however, it turns out they can eat almost anything in any amount they want and will be fine. This brought up another one of the Medic’s concerns; apparently, the Feral children are already much stronger than normal adults. How strong will they be when fully grown? And speaking of growth, what is the maturation cycle? What is their life span? 

When Obi-Wan asked Harry privately, he was told they would finish maturing at around 25 and live for between 200 and 300 years. A Force-sensitive with healthy living could get up to another 200 years. Obi-Wan was unsure of how to take the news, nodded mutely, and left, not saying anything.

Once Tom returned with his new ships and left with a bunch of young warriors, things started to pick up and get more hectic. There is a difference between only orphans from up to three slave ships a day vs a planet's worth of unattended children.

Now the Mandalorians are in a rush to build more cities to handle the influx, and with the number of children outpacing the adults again, a trend that will only increase with Tom's continued conquests, they are struggling.

Harry is snatching up each new Force-sensitive child and is teaching them his brand of construction magic so that city creation can keep up with their population growth.

It is during this population crisis that the farms finish growing their first crops, which turn out to be Mandalorian spices, which Obi-Wan is assured are essential, for no Mandalorian would want to eat bland food. Obi-Wan sometimes wonders about Mandalorian culture and values.

Obi-Wan thought about getting up, thought about shoving Quinlan off him, glanced at the clock, and, upon seeing the early hour, yawned, blinked, and decided to snuggle up and go back to sleep. 

Chapter Text

Mace loves his new temple. It is so very Light here on this ancient world rich in the Force, filled with nothing but Force phenomena, wildlife, and Jedi. Coruscant was such a dark and evil place filled with so much suffering that the Jedi could do nothing about. 

Sure, they had outreach programs and free medical centers. Still, on an oversized space station with more than 3 trillion sentients, housing hundreds of thousands of politicians of a corrupted and dying government and the endless gangs and crime of the undercity, there is not much they can realistically do, even if they had a hundred times the resources and personnel.

The only genuine concern Mace has is the many pirates targeting his new temple. No constant barrage of dangerous missions from the Republic Senate, no Jedi High Council to manage with endless arguments to suffer through, no Qui-Gon will of the Force Jinn giving three-sentence reports with Yoda covering for him, no budges to manage carefully. Just Younglings to teach, a temple that the Corps is practically building on their own with no oversight needed, a few interesting reports on what new thing the Exploration Corps has found, and an occasional pirate ship to telekinetically drag from the sky with the other knights and master. 

Life was wonderful, and Mace's days fell into a routine. Lead the younglings on saber drills, take in the exploration corps detachments' reports on the planet, help drag pirate ships from the sky, and lead the younglings' theater class. 

It took time, but after they were settled and most of the planet had been explored, the Exploration Corps, along with some Jedi from the Education Corps, went out to start recruiting, following the will of the Force. Mace is unsure about allowing adults to join his temple, but he has made his preference for children to young adults known.

The new masters of these 12 new temples do have holo calls to communicate, but more often, they just share key information through brief encrypted reports.

Most concerning is news from Yaddle about the Mandalorians, who have united and are now waging war against the Hutts. The Mandalorians leading the charge are reported to be in seven different dreadnoughts. There is confusion about whether each is a different remodeled historical design or a refurbished ship that was mothballed and/or hidden. 

In more personal news, Yaddle has confirmed that the bounty on Jedi is relatively high, which is causing all the pirate attacks. The bounty hunters who would go for such a bounty are not currently faring well due to the Hutts attempting to throw them against the Mandalorians, who have been the galaxy's premier bounty hunters since the Mandalorian excision.

The separation of the Coruscant Jedi led to another problem: the Jedi Service Corps and who was in charge of it. The Jedi used to have six branches: the Explorer Corps, the Agricultural Corps, the Education Corps, the Knight Corps, the Medical Corps, and the Starfighter Corps. The Starfighter Corps was disbanded with the Ruusan Reformation due to the Jedi being forbidden from maintaining a military; however, that left them with five remaining Corps, nominally led by the Knight Corps, which were stationed on Coruscant.

The Jedi were primarily responsible for fixing all the Republic's problems, or at least what felt like most of them that didn't involve legislation or making decisions and policies.

The Knight Corps was responsible for negotiating disputes from interpersonal to planetary, investigating crime, acting as envoys, serving in the military only during a crisis, and protecting the Service Corps Jedi during their tasks. 

The Explorer Corps was responsible for charting the galaxy, discovering new worlds, spices, and hyperlanes, making first contact with new civilizations, recovering artifacts, maintaining the hyperspace relays, and assisting the other Corps.

The Agricultural Corps was responsible for using the Force to support galactic food production, fight famine, maintain healthy ecosystems, end blight/drought, and research alien flora, terraforming, and reversing disasters.

The Education Corps was responsible for providing education to underprivileged children across the galaxy, preserving knowledge, and serving as scholars, teachers, and lore-keepers to expand the Jedi's understanding of the Force.

The Medical Corps, who provide medical care across the galaxy, serving in disaster zones and acting as medics, surgeons, and healers, dealt with plagues and diseases from planetary to galactic scales.

The Jedi have done all of this for centuries, understaffed, underbudgeted, and underappreciated. So now that they have their freedom from the Republic, they have two problems: the first is leadership. While the Jedi High Council had nominal control and leadership over the Corps and their councils, now, with the Jedi High Council’s disbandment, the Corps are independent, at least mostly independent. 

The Education Corps and Jocast Nu’s Jedi Temple share space on Alderaan but haven't definitively defined their relationship. The second issue is funding, as the Corps requires significant resources to operate. While the Jedi could fund them for a time with their massive amount of savings and interest they haven't touched since the Ruusan Reformation, that would not be a viable long-term strategy. 

The Jedi conclude the Republic now has to either replace the Jedi or pay them a reasonable amount, not as much as the profit-hungry corporations certainly, but at least enough so the Jedi aren't paying to fix other people's messes.

The Jedi conclude that they can either have each of the Corps negotiate on their own or they can use the services of Jedi Lord Dooku. Dooku assures them that negotiating as a group will give them greater leverage. After several arguments, they conclude to lay out everything they do, what the Corps would charge, how much it costs the Jedi, and their newfound ability to work outside of the Republic. They decide to let Dooku handle it; he is the most familiar with politicians after all.

Darth Sidious was furious. His absurd opening position of banishing the Jedi meant to be negotiated down to more chains around the Jedi’s necks was taken seriously, and now they were free. The Sith’s ancient enemies, who have been lulled into a false sense of complacency over the course of centuries, so that they might be weakened before being slaughtered, were scattered. The Jedi were now noticing things they would have been blind to while smothered in the Dark Side Shroud that was so painstakingly crafted over Coruscant. 

Sidious’s master, Darth Plagueis, was most upset with him for his failure and took hours making his feelings known. Sidious still shudders remembering the feeling of agony as his flesh burned and muscles spasmed from the Force lightning.

One day, he is going to kill his master, and everything will be worth it all the pain and sacrifices. Pain is temporary; it is a step toward higher and higher realms of power.

How could he fix this mess? Making himself emperor is simple enough: create a crisis to obtain emergency powers as chancellor. But forcing the Jedi to throw themselves into such a conflict will be much more difficult now that they aren't chained to the Republic.

If he waits too long, the Jedi will recover their numbers. The longer he waits, the more power the Jedi will gain, so he must cull them in this generation or else the Sith will have to retreat for a few more centuries, and he might not be the Sith ruling the galaxy if that comes to pass.

The age-old Sith tactic of pinning the Jedi against the Mandalorians would be simple enough if he knew where the Mandalorians were hiding; however, it seems they have left their abandoned and crippled homeworld. It should not be too difficult to find some Mandalorians or someone dressed as them to attack the Jedi.

The Mandalorians, that is another problem; they are regaining strength after all these centuries that the Sith have spent suppressing and dividing them. Now, suddenly, they unite and go to war against the Hutts, one of the primary contributors to pain and misery in the galaxy. A new Jedi Mandalorian war is just what this galaxy needs.

Yaddles' spies are sending her concerning news from Hutt space: the Mandalorians have united and are waging war against the Hutts. They don’t seem to be taking planets, just killing slavers and collecting foundlings. 

This is classic Mandalorian behavior; however, the suddenness of this campaign and its lack of warning are concerning. The Jedi haven't kept an eye on Mandalore in years, a wounded system that can’t feed its people, forcing them all into mercenary work to import food instead of forming armies and resuming their conquering ways. The only recent news she has received is that there was fighting between internal factions.

The reports have holo recordings of seven distinct dreadnoughts, each from a different past Galactic War. These are not new ships; whether they were found and restored, or someone kept them for a situation she does not know. She and no Jedi set to the task can get any information about these ships through the Force, a blind spot. The rumblings of a Dark Sider or possible Sith influence are even more concerning.

A possible Dark Sider, a united Mandalorian Empire, and a fleet of dreadnoughts. Three mysteries. It would be a relief that this potential threat was aimed at the Hutts and freeing slaves, if only this weren't a blatant attempt at the mass recruitment of children who will be eager and desperate to support those who freed them from slavery: a cause, a creed, a mission, and a target.

This whole situation feels as if someone is setting the foundations of an empire.

In more heartening news, the Jedi have begun recruitment. Without the Senate limiting recruitment to only Republic children at a certain age with a ridiculously rare midichlorian count, recruitment has been going very well. 

The Jedi used to teach everyone with even a hint of Force sensitivity, not just those who have a midichlorian count of over 7000. Throw in older children and adults, and they now have more students than they can readily teach. The Education Corps has been busy making up for the lack.

Yaddle never approved of the infant indoctrination as a fall prevention measure, and having the freedom to abandon it completely, even if not all of the new temples are readily following her and Jocasta Nu's example, having most open to the idea will be a great boon to the light.

Gardulla Besadii the Elder has taken her children and fled Tatooine. Let that upstart Jabba choke on it. 

If a Sith has united the Mandalorians and is now waging war against the Hutt clans, then she is not going to stand against them. She is old enough to remember her history lessons and the tales her parents told her about the Sith and their powers. 

She knows they can divine information about preset plans and extract information from their enemies' minds. The best ways to deal with Sith are to stay unnoticed or to make it so that it's more effort than it's worth to fight them. There is a reason why the Hutts have been crime families holding backwater systems.

Taking all she can with her into hiding on a ship for a few decades until this Sith dies to an apprentice or a Jedi is something she can manage easily. Hutts live for centuries; a human lifespan or the lifespan of an average Sith is an inconvenience. She has no plans to go against the Sith; let the Younger fools, with more ambition than sense, feed the Sith's bloodlust. Gardulla and her kids will visit a vacation planet in the core for a few decades, until the chaos settles down and the new landscape becomes apparent. Only after the situation becomes clear will she start making any plans.

Selling off all of her slaves before fleeing is only practical; first, she won't be caught with slaves in Republic space. Second, this Sith is using a moral objection to slavery as an excuse to slaughter Hutts. Imagine the absurdity of a Sith with a moral objection, a more ridiculous notion she has never heard. This is just a new rallying cry to gather an army that the Sith might bend to its will.

Her bodyguard and assassin droids will have to be enough. Few bounty hunters are worth anything if they are not Mandalorian, and those are not to be trusted at the moment. While she is very wealthy, she won't have a stable income stream for some time, and living guards are expensive; it's better to rely on her emergency droids.