Where can you get off a submarine?

The ship flew in the silent blackness of space, farther and farther away.

It is true that being aboard the ship was not so scary, because I had at least Erdva, my constant companion and friend. I spent the day after the jump into the unknown, purely mechanically doing the work of repairing the ship and making sense of everything that had happened. No, I was not an insensitive cynic, but I had seen enough death, take for example the races "riot eve classic", where more than half of the participants die.

It's one thing when some rubber face dies, having climbed into the frying pan itself, and another when an innocent, seemingly purely for the press, visit ended in the death of someone close to me.

The meditations helped, but not for long-the desire for revenge on the ghouls who had arranged it never left me.

But even so, while I was fixing the holes, I had time to think hard about what had happened.

It started like this: a press conference, a bunch of outdoor guests, beautiful weather, the Duchess signing her document and smiling a charming smile for the cameras. And then I smelled danger. If the danger had been to me personally, the feeling would have been different, more concrete. What was my first guess? A terrorist attack, bombs under the podium, or one of the guests being a suicide bomber or assassin.

Then an alarm went off and the guests were taken away from the podium and divided into groups, gathering perhaps fifty guardsmen in power armor who would protect the guests and respond in case there was an assassin, but the danger had not diminished! This means that neither the guests nor their location had anything to do with the danger.

What could I have thought? Of course, that now at least - everything would blow up. At a minimum, and at a maximum, it would feel that way if the entire planet was about to explode, or if a dangerous virus or something like that were to be dispersed.

The first and most logical thought I had was to flee. Smugglers have a reflex that is hard-wired into them - whether it's a terrorist attack, an attack by little green men, or a death star shot, nothing can reach me in hyperspace, especially when I'm running the ship and ignoring the gravity mines.

I did the right thing here-whatever the enemies were planning, it was clearly not a targeted assassination, but at the very least, a powerful bomb blast that would have damaged the entire palace, because the danger was general, not directed at anyone in particular.

Under such circumstances, I did all that was required - I ensured the evacuation to a guaranteed safe place - to hyperspace - but fate decided that playing with it was a dangerous business. Whatever danger was present for the palace and the guests, it was also present for me-it was a fighter. A confluence of circumstances. How a fighter jet entered the planet, how a battle-ready ship was in the skies over Keldabe on the day of the press conference, remains a mystery. But for sure the terrorists do not eat their own bread, they can plan an attack.

For a while I even worried about Satin - if she was killed, then my position would be greatly shaken, and I would lose the possible help that the duchess had so rashly promised.

But there were no answers, only a wrecked yacht and a complete blindness to the navigational instruments.

Some of the damage I had repaired by force, some I could not, but it was mostly decorative elements like panels of rare wood or lights from some large crystal.

The right engine was torn out by the roots, but since the engines on my ship were some of the most powerful in the galaxy, I could still fly on one, and I still had two of them.

The reactor, thank the Force, sustained no damage, though only by a miracle, since the fighter's fire came at the back of the ship.

When I finished my work, mentally I was more or less in working order and went to the cockpit to the droid. I left Erdw with the instruction to look for any trace of civilization that I could detect with the sensor-radar armament that was on our ship. Unfortunately, even the yacht's powerful radar equipment was no guarantee of success.

I did not have time to taste the hopelessness - I was too immersed in myself for an indefinite time.

However, I managed to find the traces of civilization - a few hours after beginning another search, Erdva gave out the information - it was picking up the signal of hyperspace beacon, and at that on the frequencies of communication, which were outdated for a long time. The clever droid quickly found the reason for this - it received the current coruscant date and time from the beacon. Turns out I'm a hell of a long way off!

- Erdva, are you sure about this? - I asked the ironclad hopefully. What difference does it make now...

- The beacon is transmitting information. It is now twenty-two thousand three hundred and eighty-second year from the founding of the Republic.

I would have sworn in three or four languages, but I didn't want to. The jump with the broken hyperdrive seemed to have thrown me really far. I could have thrown it to Rakat, though, and he would have done just as well. I decided to think logically about how to get back now, once I cooled down.

- Do you have any idea how that happened? - I asked the droid.

- No. None. Cases of moving into the future due to time relativity happened, but moving back in time did not. More precisely, not registered.

- And understandably, who in their right mind would tell...

- Perhaps, - the droid was not indebted, - the negative charge of the field on the circuits responsible for the nonrelativistic flow of time inside the field hyperdrive.

Well, well, well... the complications were getting bigger and bigger.

- How much autonomy do we have?

- Three months, captain. Then we'll run out of water and food.

- That's pretty swell. - I couldn't help myself. The credits I had were not yet issued, and therefore they could not be used. That is, I had no money that would get me out of any trouble. There was a ship, a droid, a lightsaber, a pair of blasters and a speeder in the hold, and, of course, the Force. At least I wasn't bare-assed; I didn't have to begrudge my situation to get out of the bottom of it, out of slavery! I had a ship, though the backup hyperdrive was first class, which was a relic now, in this day and age, for I knew second class was a rarity, let alone first, a droid that could do more than its iron counterparts, and in the end I had weapons and freedom of movement! What else did you need for a happy life?

For a happy life, I had to go back to my time. I had to go back, by all means, and show those assholes who had killed Ali that I was no Jedi, and if I was a Jedi, I was no saint!

- Erdva, our location?

- Half a light year from Mandalore.

- Mandalore be damned. We need to figure out the hyperdrive and find out how to get back to our time," I thought aloud. - And who can help us with that?

- Unselfishly? The Sith. And the Jedi.

- That's right. Let's go to Coruscant. - I said, "Plot an itinerary.

- How about the Sith?

- Is your cooling not working? What Sith? They look like lunatics to me, not to investigate, much less help. And if they do, they'll kill us and take everything we've got, including you. There's a chance I could at least get the Jedi interested in information. And they probably have techs, so it's okay to ask for help.

- In that case, I'll start preparing for the jump," the droid answered meekly.

It was a standard trip, one might even say lazy, during which I made an audit of everything I had and made a rough plan to talk to the local Jedi leaders. At the very least, they should be interested in the fact that I came from another time.

However, it is not clear yet, because according to the historical records, there is a centuries-old cold war with the Sith and they will probably consider me a spy or an agent of the Sith. However, if I show them my equipment, the question should be removed. Not because it proves that the tech is from the future, but because even if the Sith have such tech as stable first-class hyperdrives, a bunch of equipment inside a ship, or a superdroid, it would be utterly idiotic to put samples into Jedi hands, even if it's to send an agent. Even a large-scale diversion with a good chance of ultimate victory is not worth it. That would just be silly, so I figured that would be enough.

The ship came out of hyperspace five days later. But there were exemplary inspections right after that - a couple of ships similar in size to corvettes took me on escort and questioned me in detail about the purpose of my arrival. The only reason they didn't send an inspection party was that the ship was unarmed and visibly damaged. Because of this, I was able to get ahead of the freighters and other ships and enter the atmosphere of the planet above the Jedi temple. The descent was slow and long, since the lack of one engine ruined the aerodynamics, and I couldn't just turn up because the speed was increasing.

This was not the first time I had seen Coruscant, but like the last time, it was impressive - a planet-city, flooded with a sea of lights, with monotonous architecture and skyscrapers sticking out over the gray mass of buildings. The picture was a little different from what I'd seen when I was on Coruscant in my time - there was no big "federation" apartment complex where we'd lived during our visit.

I recognized the Jedi temple immediately-a large square building that looked like a truncated pyramid, or rather a ziggurat, with four towers at the corners, which reminded me vividly of the famous Taj Mahal shrine. While on earth, I once visited this landmark. The concept was similar, but the execution was radically different.

Sitting in the pilot's seat, I looked down through the video sensors as everything below was extremely tiny from above.

Galactic City was getting closer and closer-as I thought about what I would say to the Jedi. What did I even know about this era? The information I knew was extremely sketchy, like a YouTube clip about a new game, or a description of some game, or even a cartoon.

True, I also noticed a difference between this information and what was real. First of all, in that the only source that hasn't been disproved so far is the movies. By the way, for me, that's the biggest source. And what do I know from the movies about the world?

There is the Republic. The Republic hasn't fought a war in a long time, the reality is that there have been wars, but the last one ended over five hundred years ago. There have been no wars involving more than two sectors since the founding of the republic. The only exceptions are the wars with the Sith, which ended a thousand years before I was born. But the sectors the Sith were reclaiming, they were just as active in draining back. From the official data, the internal structure of their society was authoritarian, without any rigid hierarchy, and therefore the teamwork was much worse than that of the Jedi. And here I thought it was worse than that. The two Sith, even if they could only win if they were united in the face of danger, could easily fight and kill each other in a fever, leaving the Jedi against them clapping their eyes and thinking, "Is that it?

Studying their society helped me understand the current state of the Sith - even if there were not one but two groups, it would lead to them feuding with each other, competing with each other, and eventually becoming easy targets. Leaking information about each other to the Jedi and stuff like that. And with one unified teacher-student group, they could have no fear of competition. And disclosure.

The next important difference from Alter Canon, as I called the cartoons and games, was the political system. It was much more realistic, without any true democracy or love of one's neighbor. The laws of the jungle ruled the galaxy - whoever was strongest was right. The bonzes only agreed not to shoot each other, so as not to have a complete collapse, but to act economically. Looking through the prism of the three courses of "state management" I began to understand what had happened much better.

At first I was very surprised, if not more frightened, that the Senate had a vendetta against the Neimodians, but now everything was falling into place. The Trade Federation was the local equivalent of the Jews. No, not the sons of Israel, but the Jews, who are described by anti-Semites, and forgive me for being rude, the offensive word "Jew" might be used here. The incident on Naboo was not the first in a row, and not even the tenth - the planet Belkadan, due to bribery of the government, lost almost all the trees especially valuable in the galaxy; the planet Melida-Daan, shortly before my birth, as a result of the civil war, was forced to sign an extremely unfavorable contract, because the Federation blocked all attempts to trade with outside vendors. There were dozens, if not hundreds, of such planets that the greedy Neimodians milked, not to mention the fact that they usurped some trade routes or made clearly profitable contracts for themselves, taking advantage of the planets' plight. The Senate was a federation, where each on one side was an individual wolf in a pack, but on the other, the wolves could unite to maul a larger wolf. The Senate protected them anyway, since economic aggression that did not violate the law was not forbidden, there was only a separate taboo on the use of force. If it hadn't been for Palpatine leading the occupation of the planet, Nute Gunray would have simply sued, and characteristically, he probably would have won! That's the style of the Neimodians. But what happened is what happened. The public, I mean the Senate, had already been warmed up by Palpatine, prepared for public speaking, in a way that would make the Chancellor's indecision his coffin lid. If it was about, say, Satin Kreese against the Techno-Union, no one would be so worried, but here was a sore spot for every other system - the case involved the Neimodians, who, to put it mildly, were disliked. To put it mildly, by that point the Senate was expecting decisive action from the Chancellor; the outer ring systems were counting on the Republic to have some value, and to be able to protect them, to justify the taxes they were paying.

To some extent, up to this point, everything has gone according to plan - the Sith provokes discussion, the Chancellor wrangles, the Queen of Naboo is constantly interrupted by the senator from the Trade Federation, not allowing him to say a word, and the Senate, or rather most of it, that is representatives of small systems and races, see that a small system is attacked, but the Republic can't do anything, it is powerless to stop the bloodshed. And then, under the noise, a Sith comes out and accuses Valorum of indecision. The representatives of the central worlds and the corporate sector, of which there are exactly two hundred and fifty-seven senators, will probably keep quiet, but the other two and a dickish thousand senators will raise a howl about "wotum-votum-votum". They're paying the republic for order, and they're getting a lump of butter.

But then I intervene, and the Chancellor, seeing that the public expects him to act decisively, suggests that the Trade Federation be disbanded. A pack of wolves agreed to pounce on one particularly large, but harmful, and devour him. This is what happens in politics. The Queen was not allowed to say a word, because the Senators get the right to vote as soon as the Chancellor finishes his speech, and he cannot be physically interrupted - while he is speaking, all the senators' pods stand still and the speakerphone is switched off. It's already a replica of the State Duma or the U.S. Senate.

Once all the representatives of the outskirts of the galaxy started whistling and demanding the destruction of the local "kikes", there was nothing more the Nemodian, or even the representatives of the central worlds, could do - the genie was out of the bottle. The public, which Palpatine had been assuring for years that Valorum was incapable of decisive actions and cared only for the central worlds, received a direct, and most importantly, a visible denial.

The main thing followed later. Having tried to overpower the Trade Federation, the Chancellor suddenly, one might say, all of a sudden! Discovers that he can do nothing. That is, if one system goes to war on another, there is nothing he can do! Neither the power to stop the obscenities by diplomatic means, nor the army to break up the brawlers, no! So comes the realization that if, say, Mandalore wants to take over a neighboring sector, no one can stop it!

This has caused the rating of the Chancellor, who has taken a course to strengthen the Republic, to skyrocket-primarily because most of the inhabitants of the galaxy have seen changes for the better. I myself have felt the difficulty of smuggling since the new corvettes and inspection systems came into service with the Justice Department. The Central Worlds could have prevented it, since they do not benefit from strengthening the outer and even middle rings, but it did not happen - either Valorum has his own "deception of reason", or he really convinced such mastodons as Moons, Corellians, Alderaans, Kuat, and others that his course is useful to them. And the benefits were not insignificant - the outskirts, paid money, and with that money the republic was being armed. Loans were taken from the Moons, Corellians and Kuat received orders for ships, weapons, the staff of justice increased and, accordingly, there appeared their "pocket troops". Pocket troops, but pocket troops. That is, the central worlds enriched themselves on this, pulling resources from the outskirts. The lobby of the Corellians, Kuat and banking clans was enough to keep the rest silent...

On the one hand, it could prevent destructive clone wars, because the Chancellor realized not then, but right now, how close to the fact that individual systems will begin to withdraw from the Republic. On the other hand, the outcome could be unpredictable, primarily because the changes could prolong the agony of the republic or, conversely, change power and political course instantly.

Uncertainty terrified me-I would have been happy to live like a common man, but that was not my fate. Fate gave me the Force, knowledge of the future and, in part, personal advantages over what I was in "that" version of events. If I become a commoner, I will not forgive myself, it will be the greatest missed opportunity and the most unrealized potential in the galaxy...

The ship descended enough that I could see through the windshield of the Temple.

- Erdva, take me to the Jedi Temple," I ordered, and the ship began to pick up speed toward the Temple while simultaneously descending. Five minutes later I had to report that I was on my way to the temple, alone, no explosives, and so forth. But they didn't need to shoot me, all I had to do was to look at the ship that had been in trouble, with its engine cut off, and the gunners would relax.

The droid also took the ship into the hangar, I just got out and went to the ramp. I made a plan to talk to the local authorities - I hope to get help.

*Jedi temple, council chamber

The council didn't meet very often. This time the two masters were present as holograms. In the center chair sat a man of pleasant appearance, but already quite old in appearance, gray-haired, but not losing his athletic figure. Suddenly, a secretary entered the room and bowed to the council, which was distracted by him, and said:

- Master, a man has arrived. Claims to have a personal conversation with you.

- What man? - raised a gray eyebrow at the head of the order. - Why me? Have you checked?

- Yes, we have! A young man came in a ship we did not know, sat in the hangar, asked to have an audience with you. He surrendered his weapon," the clerk held out a lightsaber to the head of the order. The head of the Order accepted the sword, and immediately examined it with the force.

Anakin Skywalker's calculation proved a hundred percent true - the Head of the Order could not penetrate the protective sheath consisting of countless neuranium threads. There was no sense of the sword's power at all-as if he were holding an empty space in his hands. The change in the face of the Jedi master drew the attention of the entire council. True, none of the masters dared to interrupt the tense silence of the first among equals.

Abandoning the attempts to look into the sword, the Master of the Order took the interesting artifact in the pocket of the cloak and turned to the council:

- The sword is not readable at all. It was as if it did not exist.

There was a short discussion, which quickly came to naught, and the Master, showing authority, dismissed everyone to their own affairs. As the visitor had expected, the creation of his power would interest the master enough to make direct contact, and then he could tell them about his delicate situation and the prospects for help. Not for free, of course, but Anakin was willing to make a deal and do a little work for the Jedi with his power forging to pay for the help, especially since he wouldn't have to hide, and he'd be well covered from the Sith.