Dark Days: A Star Wars Short Story

DARK DAYS III: Darkness Rising

Four years.

That's how long it had been.

Four years since Wossuro, since he had tracked down and killed his old friend Nyree, since First Brother had become the Grand Inquisitor. He thought the endless series of recon and intelligence gathering assignments would end. That these dark days would have long since been over by now.

Instead they only grew darker.

And in that time, Lord Vader had become a frequent presence. He made no move against him, nor did he show any signs that one was coming. He was far too careful for that. If anything, Vader had been more forthcoming in that time than ever expected. Even told him about "the weapon." That was only ever how it was referred to. A weapon that had been in construction since before the Empire existed; one powerful enough to destroy an entire planet and strike fear into every beating heart in the galaxy.

The odds of this were calculated again and again and came up with the same conclusion every time. Either it was because Vader truly did trust him—doubtful—or because he was hoping that this information would be used to betray him by leaking it to their enemies.

That's what he was doing. Testing him and his allegiance.

In that First Brother did not waver. Not once.

And so he continued in his role as Grand Inquisitor. Co-ordinating missions, assigning the others to them, which were becoming of far less significance nowadays with most of the Jedi gone. They had turned their attentions to the Rebels, the Nightsisters, the Knights of Ren, anyone who might be a threat to them.

Until one day, at long last, it happened. Lord Vader summoned him. Nothing out of the ordinary, but this time he was to come to Mustafar. Whenever they had met in person it had always been at Fortress Inquisitorius or off-world in the field. Never at his home.

First he was to immediately recall every inquisitor to the Fortress for "training purposes". The reason for this, he deduced, was so obvious it didn't even require the use of his probability matrix—Vader planned to kill them. Of course he did. The Jedi were gone, the Rebellion was scattered. The last real threat was from within. All it would take is to flood the building with dioxis or have a star destroyer bombard it from orbit. With the inquistors gone, it would be just the two of them. And together they would overthrow the Emperor. He would no longer be First Brother or the Grand Inquisitor. Vader would be Emperor, and he would be his right hand. He would finally be a Sith.

Despite his title, he very much still thought of himself as First Brother. D'zan Shen died the day the Jedi died. But whatever had stirred in him that day on Wossuro had only grown. The dark side was no longer working for him. Survival wasn't enough.

Time was short. Luckily, he had been anticipating this for years.

Word was sent to the rest of the Inquistorius. A transmission encoded on a specific signal designed to degrade. They would attempt to clear it up and by doing so, discover a second message interlaced with the original telling them exactly what Vader planned to do, imploring them to join him, stand with him, and together, defeat him.

He had no way to know if this would work. As agents of the Empire, the Inquisitorius were united in their goal of hunting Jedi and other insurgents. But other than in that one common thread, each inquisitor was at odds with each other. Frequently prone to infighting. Lusting for power. All secretly (or not so secretly in some cases) seeking to dominate the other. Sometimes people would rather take their chances running than standing, and as such, he calculated a high probability that they would simply flee. A course of action he warned them against in his hidden message since, if he failed to defeat him on his own, Vader would surely hunt them down himself. With Vader it was different. Personal. A matter of need. But if they defeated him, together, he calculated only a 10% chance that the Emperor would waste time or resources on them afterward as they would be no threat to him at all in either practice or power.