How to Take an Empire

Chapter Seventy: Mortis

Most times, when Vader looked at Ahsoka, it was easy to forget that once upon a time, she'd been a jittery little teenager and eager to prove herself, hiding behind a bravado of confidence that wasn't always false but definitely sometimes exaggerated. Now was not one of those times as he watched her pace the conference room back and forth, a habit he didn't remember her having.

"You're nervous," he stated gently. Or at least, he tried to state gently. Everything came out loud and booming through the respirator. Something he hadn't been very self-aware of until lately. And only around Ahsoka, though, she didn't seem bothered by it.

"You're not." She paused. "At least, not about this meeting."

This meeting being the assembly of their most trusted agents to form their own contingency. Vader had seen the future. He knew they would win. He'd even foreseen that they might even win sooner than they'd both thought possible. But if there were one thing he'd give credit to Jedi philosophy for, it was that the future was always in motion. Nothing was set in stone. Something that had taken him much too long to learn. And at any given time, the balance could tip against them. If Sidious was willing to fight them from the grave if necessary, then so would they.

"No. I'm not," Vader replied.

She didn't need to know the precarious position he was in dealing with Sidious right now. Even though Sidious only knew a partial truth concerning Ahsoka and had fallen for the subtle suggestion about what had been their true relationship in the past, Vader had to tread even more carefully around the spies he knew watched him. It had taken five months, a month and a half longer into their war than he'd wanted, to arrange this clandestine meeting without alerting the Emperor's spies. To get Sabé to arrange the rumors of quiet rebellion activity on Vendaxa so he could "investigate." Even now, there was a tight window of opportunity. They only had a few hours, at best, to gather everyone, brief them, and disperse.

"You have nothing to be nervous about," Vader said after watching Ahsoka pace the room once more. "I'm the one that has to explain to my all subordinates how I'm planning a coup against the Emperor with our supposed enemy. The people you invited have some inkling of your involvement with me."

"Perhaps. But I'm also asking them to put their biases aside to not just work with some of the vilest people of the Empire, but some of whom they've personally gotten violently entangled with. You, chief of them all," Ahsoka said bluntly.

Vader had no argument with that. Nor was he anymore offended by the reminder of his sins now as he would have been three or four months ago. He hadn't expected her to pull any punches just because she'd allowed him into her bed. That was part of the entertainment value anyway.

Ahsoka's comm beeped.

"My people are here," Ahsoka informed. "I'll go get them while you brief yours."

She left the room while Vader comm'd Sabé to bring his people in. She filed into the room with five people trailing behind her: His clone trooper commander, Dare; His lieutenant, Piett; General Veers, who didn't work directly in Vader's fleet but whom he and Sabé had been watching and sometimes working with for some time and taken note of his politics.

Their confusion was apparent to him in the Force. Vader wasted no time disabusing them of it.

"I have called you here today because you have all been identified as being advantageous to me and my plans to take this empire out of the dregs of decadence caused by none other than our illustrious Emperor."

It said a lot about how much they'd observed and figured out on their own that neither his clone commander nor his lieutenant seemed very surprised by that. Of course, Commander Dare had met Ahsoka. Lieutenant Piett was observant but was competent enough to know when to keep his mouth shut. Vader sensed General Veers was very surprised but knew better than to make any judgments without more facts about the matter.