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Chapter Twenty Five: Red

The Emperor.

No.

The Chancellor had called Kaar to meet him. To meet the mysterious General Sunna, who returned to the order as if appearing from thin air. The general who had fought and won as many battles as he could. The liberator of Kalee.

Kaar was about to meet his worst nightmare. The man who had enslaved his people. The man who had caused his mother's death. The reason his sister and father died.

The very reason his master had even existed in the first place.

And that fact pained Kaar more than he could say. The very fact that without Palpatine, without the war, and without, by extension, the Empire... he never would've had his master. Jango Fett would've been a footnote in the records of Mandalore. His master's grandfather would've been lost to the sands of time, instead of immortalized in the home towns of his grandchildren.

Maybe some good had come from all of this.

He had refused to bring Satahl with him. Instead, he took Droidbait and Sparkler. The Commander — both of them — often teased him about how fond he had become of Droidbait.

"He looks at you like you personally hung every star in the sky y'know." Sparkler hummed while they waited on Droidbait to leave the barracks. Kaar sighs, "I'm well aware Sparkler. But that can be platonic as well. I looked at my master the same way. Paladin Chessa looked at Paladin Kaminoa like that, though they did eventually have riduurok. Same thing with Paladin Murraa and Paladin Kes. But every padawan I've seen since my crowning has looked at their master like they hand crafted each and every star for them. Just because Droidbait looks at me like that doesn't mean anything."

The conversation had swiftly fallen to the back of his mind once they reached the Chancellor's office.

When Kaar came face to face with the bastard, he slammed his shields in place and promptly began restraining himself from either stabbing him or throwing him out the nearest fucking window.

It took every ounce of restraint he had to keep his eyes from turning gold and red. To keep himself from looking so obviously murderous. He was very keen on the concept of homicide, faced with Palpatine. He put on his best cheery voice, which was scarily easy to do.

"Chancellor Palpatine. It's an honor to meet you." He grinned, hiding the want to kick the Sith into the nearest moon.

"General Sunna! I see you haven't brought your padawan with you?"

' 'As if I would let her anywhere near you, you filthy backstabbing piece of banthashit.' '
He thought to himself, calmly saying, "No, she had some reading to catch up on. We've been in the field quite a bit as of late. But I brought two of my most trusted men with me. Commander Sparkler and Lieutenant Droidbait."

He was still focusing on not committing treason.

"Ah yes, I've seen the reports. Excellent work on Kalee, Master Jedi." Palpatine offered a warm smile, and it made Kaar's blood boil. His master's words echoed in his mind. Her old advice when he was a padawan.

"Adiik," she had began "not all monsters look like monsters. Some monsters hide their monstrosity on the inside."
"Like us, master?"
"No padawan mine." She shook her head, gazing out at the sunset, "We can use our monsters to help others who have none. It is when you can no longer do that, that you must fear."

He had taken those words to heart. To bear his monsters only when he had to. To keep a watchful eye on his actions. Palpatine, he supposed, also kept an eye on his monsters. It still filled Kaar with rage thinking about what the man had done to his people. Had done to him. He still had deep lash scars in his back from when he was a child. Still had deep claw marks in his wrists from where he clawed at his chains.

None of it would have happened if Palpatine had just died. None of it would've happened if only he'd made even a single slip up, or a single misstep. Palpatine needed a downsizing and by the gods above would Kaar give him one. Not just for the Republic or the Jedi, but as revenge for all of the torment he suffered because of Palpatine's iron grip on the galaxy.

"Yes, I'm quite proud of my men." Kaar said with a fake smile. "They work very hard, Chancellor." He decided to try striking just a little twinge of fear into the Sith. "I'd loathe to see a day where they're treated like droids only there to take orders without question."

It wasn't a lie, but Palpatine couldn't possibly know that Kaar was referring to the as of yet nonexistent Empire, where clones had acted as unfeeling droids without a shred of mercy or personality. After all, how could anyone uncover his grand master plan? It wasn't as if the two clones standing next to Kaar were dechipped.

Except that they were. More and more battalions were becoming dechipped by the day.

Kaar was winning, and Palpatine didn't have a clue.

When the meeting was over, and Kaar was still seeing red, he had to tell that little voice in his head screaming at him to just run back in there and murder the monster while he had the chance. The paladin roiled in his anger beneath his shields. He wanted to do every wretched and painful thing in the book to that Sith. Make him scream for mercy only for him to find none.

"General." Sparkler said in a tone of warning. "What is it Commander." He held back his tone of rage as much as he could. Sparkler gestured to his eyes.

Kaar sighs, "Right. Apologies." He took a deep breath, slowly letting his perfectly reasonable rage bleed out into the Force, instead of building up inside him to "Kill The Chancellor" levels.

He had to keep control of himself.

Or he may doom everyone.

•—END OF CHAPTER—•