9 Chapter 9
Disclaimer: The only thing I own is the oc. Animes, video games, movies and books referenced in this fic are owned by their respective creators and companies.
AN: This is an alternative Universe. For Star Wars it is a mix of Disney Cannon and Legends Cannon. There will be things that may have been sped up, slowed down, removed completely in the timeline. I'll try to keep it as close as I can.
"Speech"
Thoughts/letters/emails
Chapter 9
The digging would have taken hours if not days if it weren't for one big cheat, the Force. William had remembered on Empire Strikes Back, that Yoda had lifted the X Wing out of the swamp. William had meditated on that one scene for a few hours and had come up with a theory on it. If the Force could lift a space fighter why was it that other Force wielders struggled to be anywhere close to that in regards to their powers and William had thought he had figured it out.
It was mental blocks, just like when a runner is about to give up but then they push past that limit and get that sweet runner's high. It's all about your mind limiting your potential. If you thought something was heavy then it would feel heavy. If that was true then the inverse was also true. The best example of that on Earth was monks who could walk on hot coals.
William decided to put his theory to the test and decided to use his Force trance to hypnotize himself to forget any and all mental blocks. His hypnotic command was simple. Everything is possible through the Force. Once he had completed his self hypnosis he eased out of his trance and focused on the pungent carcass.
JW had radioed the astromechs on his ship to bring it to their location so that they could not only have a way of fending off any larger Krayt dragons but also as a plan B in case William failed his experiment. William focused on the carcass and simply imagined a large bubble encapsulating the carcass and easily lifting it out of the sand. William had closed his eyes to focus on the image but JW had witnessed the carcass being lifted with apparent ease. William opened his eyes and saw that the carcass was no longer buried and was now on top of the layer of sand next to the crater it had created when it was removed from the ground.
William gave an excited grin beneath his helmet and he and JW went to work on cutting the creature open. The ship arrived as William and JW were digging through the innards of the giant lizard. The two were covered in viscera. They had been very careful not to puncture the stomach when they were skinning the dragon and had to feel out its organs trying to find hard masses. They found what could be classified as the dragon's gizzard. William cut the organ open and watched as acid, bile, remains of a tusken raider's armor and stones were dumped at his feet.
He was glad that his helmet had an air filtration system, because he was sure that the smell was awful. The two collected the stones and some other parts of the carcass such as a few fangs and horns. William, happy with the haul, was excited to go back to base and start constructing his lightsabers. With all their business taken care of, he and JW boarded the ship. He could definitely understand why Skywalker hates sand.
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William spent his time in hyperspace meditating and becoming more and more proficient with his Force abilities. He had always hated that Force wielders somehow threw out all tactics just because of the Force. In the movies and shows it made for good action but in real world scenarios they could be used more effectively not to mention subtly with great effect. He decided that he would always continue to train his Force abilities but that he would only use them when his mundane military tactics failed. He wasn't a Jedi or Sith so why would he fall into that trap. He was a big believer of the Law of the Instrument. It was an old saying back home, if the only tool you have is a hammer, you would treat everything as if it were a nail. It basically meant that you should beware of over reliance on a familiar tool or tactic.
They arrived in the Kessell system and arrived at their base. William and JW disembarked and went about their tasks. JW and his droids went to the maintenance shop to get cleaned and repaired while their ship was cleaned, refuelled and restocked. William made a beeline straight to the fresher and to clean his gear. The droids would unload their cargo for him and would be prepared in the room he had designated as his workshop/training room. He would build his lightsabers after he got clean and rested.
He had showered and dressed, he made his way to the workshop/training room and took a lotus position. The crate with the crystals was on the workbench along with all the beskar parts he might need for a lightsaber. He went into his meditative trance and centered himself and once he felt he was at the optimal state he reinforced his mental conditioning by assuring himself that everything was possible through the Force.
William sat in front of his work bench with his eyes closed while crystals, electrical components and the manufactured Beskar pieces floated around him. One surprising addition had been the Neuranium casing from one of the lightsabers that he had stolen from Grakkus. It took a lot of his efforts to mold the piece but it finally gave way and became two thin sheets that would later become the crystal housing. The two crystals floated out of his pockets and joined the other items orbiting around William.
The parts consisting of the frame, blades, casing, power cells and wires assembled themselves. The lightsaber handles were nearly complete; all that was left were the crystals. William felt two of the smaller Krayt dragon pearls crack and chip until they became perfect spheres the size of marbles.
Next, the two silvery crystals floated nearer but halted their flight path. William frowned in confusion, he somehow knew something was still missing so he delved deeper into the Force to figure out what else he needed. The two crystals orbited around the Krayt dragon pearls and were then joined by two more crystals from the workbench. Two smaller Stygium crystal pieces floated to the silvery crystals and collided into each other numerous times, chipping away at each other until both sets of crystals seemed to fuse together.
William was quickly becoming exhausted by his use of Force. The act of not only shaping the crystals but then fusing them through pressure and heat was taking a lot of his admittedly large reserves. The process felt like an eternity but the final result was two hexagonal prisms with concave tops that were perfectly shaped to hold the pearls. The crystals then floated to the housings and then the two lightsabers assembled themselves.
William felt the two handles gently land in his palms. He opened his eyes and inspected his new lightsabers. They were dark grey handles with the signature ripple pattern of Beskar. The handles had three buttons. He tried out the first button and two Beskar blades popped out of the handles of the lightsaber hilt.
The blades were of a talon design so they looked like two claws with a gap in the middle where the hidden emitter was located. He tried his other hilt and the blade function worked perfectly as well. He pressed the buttons again and the blades retracted back into the hilts. William was happy that at least that feature worked. His next test was what had him feeling both nervous and giddy. He depressed the lightsaber activation buttons on his hilts and two thin silvery white blades quietly hummed to life. The centers were as black as the space between the stars but they were surrounded by silvery white.
William felt ecstatic, his lightsabers worked perfectly. He inspected the hot plasma blades and noticed something peculiar. Although the silvery blades seemed thinner and shorter than what he initially expected he realized that his lightsabers were deceptive. He noticed that the outer edges and tips of the bright blades seemed to be translucent in a sort of mirage effect, like heat rising from a blacktop.
He stood from his seated position and walked over to an empty crate and slowly lowered one of the blades down over the top of the crate. He watched as his blade cut through the crate and discovered what his blade's unique quirk was. The Stygium crystals had made the first 12 inches from the tip and an half an inch from each side of his blade invisible; the sound was also quieter than the other lightsabers he had tried.
William tested his other lightsaber and found similar results before shutting them off. His unique crystal setup made his lightsabers not only powerful but also made it so that an enemy would be deceived by the dimensions of his blades since the blade had an extra foot and half inch on each side of the visible parts of his blade. So if someone thought they had dodged his blade's length they would be fatally mistaken.
He had finished testing the unique quirks of his blades and decided to continue to meditate on his new weapons. According to the knowledge he had stolen from the Jedi Temple, the more one attuned themselves to their lightsabers the easier they would be to use and the more difficult it would be for anyone else to use. All in all it was a good day for William and with his new weapons in hand he would be able to start on phase two of his plan to hinder Palpatine.
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William had spent a week getting used to his new weapons and had created special holsters for his hilts. One was located over the left side of his chest, it looked like a run of the mill vibro knife sheath. The other holster was on his lower back next to the slug thrower. The rest of his time was spent plotting their next course of action.
He had gotten around to building Hydra its droid body. It was a black and grey camouflaged BD-1 chassis; the only difference was that it had foldable wheels above its little feet. It would be able to either walk/climb or roll depending on its environment, It still had a small It had a small jetpack in case it needed to float it had everything the little droid would need to be his mobile cyber warfare support. He had used a command droid brain and added a stealth cloak. The little droid could be seen wandering around the base from time to time.
William was glad he had Hydra use the Titan Prospecting Company identity to have a state of the art lab built in Lah'mu while he was still on Kamino. He knew that would be the best place to set up shop while avoiding the war. Circumstances had changed but the location was still a great fallback. He had almost forgotten about it if he hadn't had Hydra send a report on their expenditures.
That would be their next destination. They had stayed in the asteroid base too long. His gut and the Force were telling him it was time to move on. He had all the important items loaded onto the Rogue Shadow and Wicked Raptor. They had taken everything they could fit on the ships and had sanitized the base of any evidence of their stay.
JW had even rigged the base with explosives for whoever came to investigate. William had decided that their state of the art lab would be a series of commercial Prefab containers. The containers were huge compared to Earth standards and would be able to easily accommodate their needs. William took one last look at the asteroid base and boarded the Rogue Shadow. He got into the pilot seat and followed JW out of the system.
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It had been a month since William and his crew had left the asteroid base. They had arrived in Lah'mu and had put the finishing touches on their new base. The containers had been placed on the homestead he had purchased. They had even built a modest home. The labs were hidden but the home looked like any other homestead on the planet.
William and JW were currently preparing for the next phase of his plan. He and JW were to go rescue some prisoners on the planet Vallt. Their primary objective was to rescue Galen Erso and his family. Their secondary objective was to assassinate Orson Krennic. William would take both of the largest contributors of the Death Star from Palpatine while he was distracted by the protracted war he was now stuck in.
Galen Erso was the genius behind using crystals both naturally formed and manufactured kyber crystals to research clean energy. Orson Krennic was the man that Palpatine had put in charge of the Death Star project and was currently trying to manipulate Galen into joining the Republic R&D division that would later become the Empire's most notorious branch. William would take the two off the board and watch as Palpatine was setback by the losses. The Death Star would either be delayed, flawed or abandoned.
William had charged Hydra with helping the Republic and Jedi in the war which had Palpatine scrambling to stall the GAR and Jedi because they had become too effective with all the intel they had been receiving from numerous sources. It had caused the war to grind down to a stalemate which caused William to both feel guilty for the additional lives lost but had also shaken Palpatine which meant he was more prone to mistakes to take advantage of.
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William had been right to leave the asteroid base when he did because not even two weeks later one of Palpatine's hidden death squads had arrived to investigate the base. William had received a live feed of their infiltration of the base and waited for all the forces to descend to investigate before he had Hydra trigger the bombs.
From what Hydra had gathered from the senatorial systems, Palpatine had not received the news of losing one of personal death squads and any leads about the mysterious seer that had been hindering his plans very well. That day William had celebrated by getting drunk.
After their celebration, they had gotten around to planning their Vallt operation. The plan was fairly simple, JW would infiltrate the area where Lyra and Jyn Erso would be located and William would make a ruckus in the jail. William had decided to take care of a few birds with one stone. He had decided that he would free Galen and any other scientists that would want out of their prison and Zerpen industries. The company that had left them to die. He would also be dressed as a Death Watch member so even if he were to be discovered he would be blaming that bunch of slaving terrorist d-bags. Lastly, he had actually reached out to Cad Bane.
It was not something he particularly liked but he knew his faction's own limitations. He had been able to make contact and they had haggled over the price of Orson's untimely death. He was very clear on his instructions that he wanted physical proof to be taken. Hydra wired half the payment when he accepted the job and Bane would get the second after completion of the assignment. Cad Bane had been pleased with William's way of doing things and agreed. It seemed not many would pay part of the bounty before completion but William had and had even complimented the bounty hunter on his reputation so he would be more inclined to accept. He had hated every minute of that part of their interaction.
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William, Hydra and JW boarded the Rogue Shadow and prepared for their long trip to Vallt. They spent their time doing weapons and armor maintenance. Hydra was happily bouncing around the ship exploring every nook and cranny. The little droid had a quirky personality. William loved to observe the little droid and its developing personality. It was like watching over his niece and nephews all over again.
The thought was always bittersweet for William. He may have spent over a decade away from home and gone through more in that one decade than all of his previous life but he still missed his loved ones. He wondered how he would explain everything once he got home. A little evil voice in the back of his mind decided to pipe up at that time, 'IF you get home'. William shook that doubt out of his head.
William had decided that he would only give up when he had truly felt that he had made every effort possible. William went back to watching the little droid jump on the holo chess table and try to play with the pieces. William got a good laugh when the little droid fell off the table when one of the pieces scared it.
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The travel time was far longer than William had been used to, they unfortunately had to travel across the galaxy. He was still surprised by how long travel actually took to cross the galaxy. The shows and movies never really convey that since it's always a cut away to the next scene. In reality having to use safer hyperlanes which made their trip more of a zig zag than a straight line. He had split his time between learning more about the ins and outs of his ship, doing maintenance on his equipment and droids as well as meditation. He would also spend time studying physics, engineering and planning his steps after rescuing Galen.
After a few days of travel he put together the fake Death Watch armor he would be wearing. He created the outer armor to fit his existing beskar pieces. The outer shell would be made of thin durasteel pieces that snapped on to his existing pieces. He would have used actual Death Watch armor but most of the pieces had been melted down to create his armor and to replace parts on JW and Hydra. He painted the normal clan sigils and colors of Death Watch Mandalorians. He knew that when Death Watch saw clips of him in the armor they would immediately know that he is an imposter, the rest of the galaxy wouldn't and he was counting on that.
Everything was prepped and he still had a week and a half until they arrived in Vallt space. Whenever they dropped out of Hyperspace he would check on the state of the galaxy. From what he could tell the war was mostly a stalemate. For every Seperatist victory there was a republic Victory to make up for it. He had also been keeping an eye on Kamino. He may hate the Kaminoans for their frankly disgusting business practices and culture but he cared about 99 and his "little brothers". He knew he would have to intervene when the attack on Kamino happened but he was not looking forward to it.
William had spent some of his time sparring with JW using lightsabers. He had been able to download the lightsaber forms into a chip Which JW had been able to utilize and learn lightsaber combat, JW had taken one of the lightsabers they had taken from Grakkus' vault as his own. He had customized it and now had the hilt hidden in one of his forearm compartments. They would spar with their lightsabers in stun mode and with repeated practice they both improved. William grew more accustomed to dual wielding while JW became more proficient in his forms.
After two weeks in and out of hyperspace they had finally arrived in the Vallt system. The ship dropped out of hyperspace at the edge of the system and went into stealth mode and used their sublight engines the rest of the way. They were able to sneak past the system's security and flew in the shadow of a large freighter until they entered the atmosphere. They were able to find a place relatively close to their objectives. The plan was for JW to quietly take Lyra and Jyn back to the Rogue Shadow and once William received word that they were safely on the ship he would go wild in the prison.
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JW and William were able to take a Swoop bike into the city where they were able to have Hydra hack a speeder. JW split from Hydra and William and took the speeder to where Lyra and Jyn were being held, which turned out to be The Keep. The Keep was where Vallt's government ruled from.
William and Hydra took the swoop bike and stashed their bike near their exfil point and snuck to Tombolor Prison where Galen was being held for suspicion of treason. Count Dooku had played his hand well and had completely taken the planet with minimal bloodshed. William had snuck past a few patrols and had allowed Hydra access to the security systems. The cameras had been placed on loops and the security sensors and bots had been hacked so they wouldn't be able to register William and Hydra on their prison break.
William had been able to climb a wall and make it past the security, as he watched droid and Vallt security patrols go about their duties he couldn't help but grin. This would be fun.
