Private The Eyes of Cassandra

[Antipater]

DIADOCHRON - JAEMUS​

The skies above Diadochron were choked with the curling smog of industry. From orbit, the capital seat of Jaemus looked more like a continuous, sprawling factory than a city... A black mold which grew at the heart of things and spread out, reaching for more and more. One million people lived and worked here, ferried back and forth by an impressive, but decaying, network of railcrawlers, hounded into compliance by patrol troopers and omnipresent probe droids.

It had been an unpleasant place before Antipater had seized control, dogged by a lack of amenities and rampant corruption. It would yet remain that way a while longer.

All the vicissitudes of life in Diadochron played out under the shadows of the administrative ziggurats: towering, sloping structures of black metal. Proud but hollow symbols of a now severely contracted Imperial authority. At their apex, hundreds of thousands of functionaries labored away within each. The wheels of Empire had been kept turning over in those abyssal halls. The shipyards, the prothium mines, the manufactories, the conscription centers, the auditors, the census takers... Now they were only the withered, cast-off appendage of something greater. Abandoned.

Except one - the largest - which Tydeus of Tion had been dragged into. The slick white halls were occasionally marked by blaster fire. Remnants of a short but violent coup. Furniture and livery were occasionally found piled in discrete corners, wrapped and labeled for sale or recycling. Trappings and creature comforts which had been deemed extraneous for the future of Jaemus.

It was a short trip. No elevators or monorails. A pair of heavyset doors peeled themselves open and the stormtroopers tossed the scion in dispassionately. Far from the worst treatment he had endured in his short life. They started to rattle close again almost as soon as he cleared the threshold.

Inside, the large room was barren and only dimly lit. The strongest source of light came from the occasional flash of sparks from a deftly wielded fusion cutter. A large, humanoid battle droid was restrained on an operating table, its chest and face split open to expose wires, electronics, circuitry... The droid "Moff" loomed over it, one hand behind his back, the other held the fusion cutter with a delicate confidence that called to mind an artist with a brush.

Rather unlike an artist, he wore the crisp uniform of an Imperial functionary. Rank plate and all.

"Welcome to Diadochron, Tydeus," Antipater greeted him flatly, occasionally intercut with a flash of sparks, "You will forgive the... Sudden interdiction. Some matters require a personal dialogue."

 

[Tydeus of Tion]

Interdicted. Boarded. Stunned. Dragged all the way down to this manufacturing world, whose gears continued to spin as if any of this mattered. But perhaps that was the only thing they could do, mindlessly churn on absent of any true purpose beyond that motion.

Tydeus massaged his wrists and looked at the ranked droid with the eyes of a viper, coiled, evaluating.

Aboard the ship they’d taken were the last vestiges of everything he’d ever known. He wore the clothes of noble of Tion, a deep blue shirt and trousers lined in silver. He felt foolish in them. What need had he of finery in a galaxy laid bare for what it truly was? Barbaric and cruel. His hands ached for a weapon.

“Diadachron?” He repeated dumbly, the name unfamiliar to him. “Why did you bring me here. Who are you?”

 

[Antipater]

The droid's response was automatic. "Antipater. I rule this city."

His title was technically Moff, as it had been claimed by his predecessor. But his influence on Jaemus did not extend far beyond Diadochron and the immediate countryside. The shipyards were beyond his grasp, to say nothing of the system, the sector... Problems for another day.

"The expurgation of Tion and its triplet moons by the Sith has set into motion a chain of events..." Antipater paused to allow Tydeus a moment to seethe, grieve, or whatever else it was organics did when confronted with loss. Perhaps a mix of both. "...In which you have been projected to play a key role."

The odds were not favorable. But the only surefire way to lose was to not play them at all, and the material costs of pushing this piece forward were negligible. If not Tydeus, then someone else, so why not him?

Antipater finally looked up from his vivisected project. His faceplate was inscrutable and polished to a reflective sheen. When he watched Tydeus, he only reflected the poor boy back to himself: ruined, lost, and frightened. He appeared to stare for a moment, then he looked away again, and the sporadic flashes of the fusion cutter resumed.

"When you escaped your dead world, where was it you planned to go?"

 

[Tydeus of Tion]

Expurgation.

What a word for the obliteration of centuries of civilization, homes, families. The cruel casualness of it could not begin to describe the visage of three moons encased in fire, or the way a planet smelled when it burned, or how his sister’s charred skin had crumbled beneath his fingers like fragile charcoal.

Or perhaps it did. Perhaps the entire end of a billion beings boiled down to a single word. Expurgation.

Tydeus’ mouth felt suddenly very dry, throat constricting.

Antipater continued speaking. What did they call a droid king? Maybe nothing. He existed. It was enough.

“To oldest enemies of the Sith. To the Jedi. I thought they would…”

A flash of sparks, fading quickly. Another. Circuitry splayed out from Antipater’s project like intestines. A droid creating a droid.

“I thought they would be more.”

Instead he found them full of gilded promises, but utterly divided in how to accomplish any of them.

 

[Antipater]

"I see," said the droid. Precisely on schedule. "Your disappointment is to be expected. The Jedi, even their schismatics, are less prone to outward displays of power... Unlike the Sith."

He continued, "Nevertheless. They are known quantities. When we are finished here, you should return to their ranks and learn from them what you can. It will lend you credibility. Unless you believe your cause would be better furthered by becoming one of Kilran's Imperial Custodians..."

The screaming, lunatic "emperor" Kilran had barely been a variable at the battle of Tion and was nowhere to be seen in its aftermath. Conservative calculations indicated the Imperial remnant operating from Lianna would fold shortly. When they did, the only collective poised to strike against the Sith - any Sith - in a meaningful capacity... Would be the Jedi.

So it goes.

 

[Tydeus of Tion]

Tydeus nodded slowly, coming to the numb understanding that for some reason, this droid king sought to aid him.

He did not think he could stomach the sight of one of Kilran’s loyalists right now. What lessons could the vanquished give but how to die.

“And what exactly are we starting here?” he asked hoarsely.

 

[Antipater]

The fusion cutter sparked one last time. Antipater paused and inclined his head, inspecting the work. A pedestal rose from the ground behind him, the top unfolding to reveal a neat arrangement of worn tools. He the fusion cutter with a short micro probe.

With one hand, he tilted the droid's head to one side and jammed the probe into the access port there. A quick and deliberate motion. Almost like an execution.

"It is already started," he told poor Tydeus. "What remains is to guide the conclusion."

Streams of data - neat, scrolling blocks of aurebesh and numbers - flooded his vision. What a better place this galaxy would be if it could be split open as deliberately as this droid. Its parts assessed and replaced, its deficient code excised... More than that, the whole history of the droid, every stray bit of data that made 'it' was laid bare.

A picture so complete that its behavior could be predicted with perfect accuracy. There were some in this galaxy who sought that kind of power and knowledge. It was far beyond Antipater's ken. One of the few limitations of being a droid. He could dream, though, and play his part.

"You were witness to the Malsheem, the planetcraft of the Sith 'Kainate'. Tion was not the first of its victims, only its latest... And the most depraved showing by far. The desired conclusion is simple: the Malsheem must be destroyed."

 

[Tydeus of Tion]

As the droid worked methodically, Tydeus watched, listened. He saw the chance opening up before him, he need now but seize it.

The boy's hands balled into fists, fingernails biting into his palms.

“I will make an end to everything Kaine Zambrano built.” He spoke as a matter of fact. Passion in his words, yes. Rage. But no more than a man reciting history yet written.

“Every prized work he forged I will unmake. Every city he founded I will raze. Every child he fathered I will kill. Let the stars bear witness, I am where his legacy dies.”

Haunted eyes bored holes in the back of the droid’s metal cranium.

“If the Malsheem is his, it will burn. Why? What is it to you?”

 

[Antipater]

Antipater removed the micro-probe with a loud click. The data-stream winked out of existence, and the project-droid's head sagged as he turned from it.

"A touching proclamation. Truly." Antipater sounded more amused than convinced. "I suspect your expectations will change as you become better acquainted with your quarry."

Death had proven only a temporary impediment to both of the Kainate's chief architects. They returned with some regularity through mechanisms Antipater did not fully understand.

The Malsheem had taken decades to construct and would prove a great blow to their ability to prosecute their endless wars. Far greater than the loss of their mortal coils or extraneous children. He did not expect Tydeus to understand. Too impassioned.

Antipater selected a pair of pliers and used it to adjust the wiring of the project-droid. Good cable management was an often overlooked element of ensuring high droid performance. "The Kainate is an outsized impediment to long-term galactic stability..." The droid trailed off. His response was forceful and rote, as if being recited from memory.

When he continued, it seemed more thoughtful. "Without the Malsheem, their future ability to obstruct the Empire's designs will fall within more... Acceptable parameters. It is a problem that is better solved now, while the Sith are largely transfixed with other matters."

 

[Tydeus of Tion]

And there it lay, the motivation behind this droid’s machinations: the calculus of Empire. The moment of anger came and went like a summer storm, as violent as it was fleeting. Tydeus drew in a breath through the nose, then exhaled slowly, his gaze falling from Antipater to study the floor.

So be it. It did not matter the cause Antipater served, so long as he would provide Tydeus with the tools needed to achieve a mutual aim.

After a long pause, Tydeus nodded, “Fine.”

He straightened and looked up at the droid. “I will be your agent of ruin. Bu I’ll need my ship back. My family had accounts with the Intergalactic Banking Clan. I’ll have them transferred into my name, but credits alone won’t be enough.” Tydeus crossed his arms before him, one finger tapping an elbow. “A proper war ship. Soldiers. Weapons. Stygium.“ His lips twitched, “And a blade to kill the unkillable.”

 

[Antipater]

Antipater could not laugh. Otherwise he might have. "Go to them as you are now and you will be killed. For their part, the exertion would be roughly analogous to trimming a fingernail."

It had always been a probability Tydeus would rush in and die. It had been accounted for. Not an insurmountable inconvenience, but a disappointing one. If it could be avoided wholesale, all the better.

To the left of Tydeus, a floor panel slid away, and another pedestal rose from the ground. The box it carried hissed as it opened, panels sliding away to reveal a sumptuous lightsaber embellished with silver... But to hold it was to know it was missing something. The weapon was inert and unresponsive.

Next to the blade was some sort of unassuming device. A rectangle, thin and simple and featureless aside from a holoprojector in the middle on one side. A name was inscribed on the bottom of the inverse side: "Kryptus."

The intended recipient had never bothered to pick it up, or so Antipater had assumed. Now it would serve Tydeus.

"You will need to find a crystal for the lightsaber. I am told this is a crucial step in the development of your kind, whatever it is you may become," Antipater was finishing his business with the project-droid, closing its chest piece and realigning the head. "The rest you will acquire with time. For now, the dissident Jedi will serve your purposes."

 

[Tydeus of Tion]

His brows furrowed and he approached the pedestal. Curious, he picked up the lightsaber and examined the silver embellished hilt. He'd seen a blade or two, but never held an actual lightsaber. Perhaps it was time he learned what such a tool could offer him, though he saw it as no more than a blaster or vibroblade. A means to an end.

Tydeus clipped the lightsaber to his belt, then picked up the device it sat beside. He ran a thumb across the word inscribed there.

"Kryptus?" a question.

 

[Antipater]

Darth Kryptus. A Sith Lord of ultimately middling competence despite his strength. Possessed of vision, even if lackluster. Details that Tydeus had no need for. "An unimportant figure. Dead or vanished for some time. He never received it, and it is better off in your hands anyway."

Antipater doubted the information was useful to himself either. Something to overwrite later, when time permitted. Sith trivia was beneath him. Antipater clipped free a large cable, which he held up to inspect. The casing frayed, the edges mangled. He discarded it, letting it fall to the ground.

"If you have more questions, ask them. Otherwise our business is concluded."

 

[Tydeus of Tion]

"I see. I suppose I should thank you, but it would be an empty gesture from me... and I expect mean nothing to you."

Tydeus pocketed the device. He would inspect it later to see what exactly this "gift" contained. The boy started toward the exit, unsurprised when the door whooshed open and the same two guards stood outside, ready to escort him back. He paused after passing the threshold and looked back over his shoulder.

"How can I reach you?"

 

[Antipater]

A correct assessment. You 'thank' people when they have gone above and beyond their duties. Not when they meet expectations. A stunning concept that left many of the organics in Antipater's chain of command disgruntled and displeased.

Antipater looked up from his work once again. "You," he spoke to one of the stormtroopers, who seemed - even under his plastoid panoply - genuinely surprised to be addressed. "Give him your transceiver."

If there was a moment's hesitation, it passed by without notice. The stormtrooper unclipped a rather unwieldy looking, brick-shaped electronic device from his belt. It resembled some sort of primitive radio, though in fact the internal components were far more sophisticated. He held it out for Tydeus to take.

The Moff of Diadochron was already refocusing on his work. Another wire disposed of. "I am very busy and have little time for idle chit-chat. If we must speak, I will contact you."