He stood alone at the forward-most edge of the command deck, where the layered transparisteel viewport curved like a dagger's edge toward space. Pristine. Wide. Absolute.
The stars outside shimmered with indifferent silence. And yet, to Lelouch vi Britannia, cloaked in his guise as Alan Spacer, the stars were whispering.
Through the Force, threads of fate stretched and twisted in subtle spirals, like spiderwebs in the windless dark. The tension was taut—but steady. Predictable.
Sors had done well.
Not brilliantly. Not with a flourish. But effectively.
The Asari diplomat's decision to delay, the Council's leash tugging but not snapping, the quiet shuffle of strategy under the guise of peace—all of it unfolding in a rhythm Sors had chosen.
And that, Lelouch mused, was the problem. They were not here for a walk.
He leaned forward ever so slightly, and said in a low, amused tone:
"Red."
A beat.
And then she appeared.
A glowing form shimmered to life at his side, slender, composed, with shimmering red optics dancing behind her projected veil of data. The Red Queen—his AI, his adjutant, his eyes within his Empire.
"My Emperor?" she asked smoothly, a far cry from her usual response to any interaction.
Lelouch's smile was faint, invisible behind the pale mask.
"I believe it's time to remind the best of the Imperial Academy about unexpected variables."
He turned to her fully, gloved hands behind his back.
"Contact one of our Omega Nebula recon vessels," he said, voice silk over razors. "Have them transmit an emergency burst across secured Imperial channels—a sudden, unexpected engagement with a Batarian fleet."
Red's avatar flickered once, as if blinking. "Would you like the report to indicate loss of contact?"
"No need, just instruct the captain that the ship's appearance must match its role." he responded smoothly.
"As you command."
===================
The chamber was darkened save for the pale blue glow of the central holo-display, which rendered a slowly spinning model of the Excalibur and the crescent of solar megastructures behind it. Around the chamber stood the Councillors—Asari, Turian, Salarian, and Human—each reading through the latest communiqués from the diplomatic envoy now embedded aboard the alien supervessel.
The tension was unmistakable.
Councillor Sparatus, arms behind his back, talons clicking softly against his vambrace, broke the silence.
"So… Matriarch Althanis has chosen to remain aboard the Excalibur," he said. "Even after everything she's seen. After everything they said. She intends to wait for their so-called 'Imperial Envoy' to arrive."
Councillor Tevos spoke next, calmly. "She's chosen caution. Prudence. We know too little. A single misstep could endanger entire systems if this Empire is as vast and coordinated as they claim."
Sparatus snorted. "An empire that large, that dogmatic, built on worship of a single being—faith and fire—is not an ally. It is a threat waiting for provocation."
He stepped forward, claws tapping as he gestured toward the display.
"You heard what she said: their 'God-Emperor' unified a fractured galaxy by force. They revere Him as more than a man. That alone speaks volumes. Empires like that don't coexist. They consume. Today they smile and talk of cohabitation. Tomorrow they awaken a fleet, and it's too late to respond."
Tevos's eyes narrowed, but it was Councillor Anderson who spoke next.
"Let's not forget," he said in his deep, measured tone, "that it was that same Empire that just released the remaining survivors from the Crescent Nebula. No ransom. No terms. Just… returned."
He leaned slightly on the railing around the central display.
"I don't like it either. Their methods are blunt, their presence overwhelming. But rash judgments haven't exactly served us well in the past. If this Empire wanted to wage war with the Council, they've had more than one opportunity. They didn't take it."
Sparatus growled faintly in his throat. "Not yet. That's the problem. They didn't have to. Look at their arrival—surgical, absolute, and bloodless where they chose it to be. They know they have power. They're baiting us into complacency."
"Perhaps," Tevos replied. "But you would advocate what? Preemptive aggression? Infiltration? Espionage?"
"Exactly," the Turian snapped. "We need operatives in their space. Deep. Hidden. Not just to observe—to prepare. Find weaknesses. Exploit fault lines. We must identify when and where to strike should it come to that."
Anderson frowned. "You want to wage shadow war on a civilization we've barely met? Based on what? The way they talk? We're diplomats, not inquisitors."
Tevos nodded, arms crossed. "You're letting your military instinct overtake reason, Sparatus. Even the Salarian Union sees merit in strategic restraint."
All eyes turned to Valthis, the Salarian Councillor, who stood silently beside his podium, fingers interlocked.
"We are monitoring the situation," he said neutrally. "And I will admit—we are in the process of crafting long-term scenarios. Contingency plans, should hostilities arise. But I agree with the human and Asari representatives: to strike in the shadows now, before we understand their society, structure, or even internal divisions, would be… premature."
He adjusted his collar slightly.
"Besides," he added, "you assume their unity is absolute. Faith-based governments often possess… fault lines. We only need time and observation to find them."
Sparatus's mandibles flared faintly in irritation. "And if they're more stable than we think? If this isn't a cult, but a doctrine that works? What then?"
Tevos looked back at the display.
"Then we negotiate. Slowly. Carefully. If they desire containment within the Crescent Nebula, then let them have it—for now. And while they entrench, we prepare countermeasures, expand covert assets, and build diplomatic channels. That is how we survive. Not by fire and steel, but patience and precision."
Anderson nodded.
"And if they prove hostile later… then we'll be ready."
Sparatus looked from one to the next, jaw tightening. But he said nothing more.
The chamber dimmed further as the model of the Excalibur dissolved into a broader map of the Crescent Nebula, flashing with system-wide Empire presence. Dozens of moons, planets, and orbital stations—once Council-controlled—now marked with the deep crimson insignia of the rising invader.
===================
Location: Outer Terminus Systems, Dead Space Sector 341-Gamma
Vessel: Recon Frigate DR-17V Strife (Munificent-class)
Designation: Tactical Reconnaissance and Intelligence Relay Node (TRIRN)
The Strife drifted quietly amid the stars, its angular prow pointed toward a field of ancient, broken wrecks. Fractured hulls and shattered remains of once-glorious fleets floated like ghosts in the void. The bridge of the ship was dim, awash in the cold blue hues of holo-consoles and command uplinks.
At the center of the command dais, seated in a high-backed frame, sat a tall, skeletal Tactical Command Droid. His designation: T-X45. X45 bore the black-shouldered insignia of autonomous field command. A crimson stripe ran down the side of his dull white cranium—an identifier granted only to those droids with extensive self-learning algorithms and confirmed combat autonomy ratings.
He sat motionless, save for the slow rotation of his ocular receptors scanning the tactical readouts.
A moment later, the stillness was shattered by a chirrup—an alert signal, tight-beamed through high-level command priority clearance. His head twitched to the side as the encrypted message flowed directly into his neural interface. The command came with a set of hard-coded coordinates, pulsating across his visual HUD.
There was no emotion in his voice. Just cold, mechanical finality.
"New orders. Re-route to grid Phaedra 97-Delta-Xenon-6. Priority: Omega-Nine. Immediate compliance required."
The helm droid, a spindly-limbed B1 variant modified for starship control, swiveled its head.
"Acknowledged. Calculating new trajectory."
Its fingers danced across the console, feeding the updated course into the navicomputer. A new vector blinked across the nav-screen. Then… another alert.
"Warning. Projected route intersects dense asteroid field—Class III debris cluster. Recommend course correction or long-range bypass via Nephilim Ring."
CT-X45 didn't even shift his gaze.
"Denied. Appropriate hull integrity loss is required to meet mission parameters"
There was a momentary silence on the bridge, broken only by the low hum of cooling systems and the soft ping of micro-debris against the forward shielding. The helm droid gave no protest—merely acknowledged.
"Understood. Executing directive."
Its hand dragged a dial upward. A sharp, artificial whine rose from the aft compartments as the twin reactor nodes surged to full capacity. The Strife lunged forward, inertial compensators straining to keep up.
The ship accelerated with grim intent—straight into the oncoming chaos.
The asteroid belt loomed ahead, a swirling mass of rock and death, lit dimly by the light of distant stars. Ancient debris—some still bearing the scarred hull-plating of long-lost fleets—tumbled slowly through the void.
Collision alerts erupted in the air. Dozens. Hundreds.
"Impact warning. Impact warning. Impact warning—"
CT-X45's glowing red optics stared forward. Unmoved. Unshaken.
The first collisions were minor—a scattering of pebble-sized chunks glancing off the outer armor. Paint scorched, shallow dents appeared across the hull. The inertial sensors spiked repeatedly as the ship's nose scraped past jagged fragments, some the size of land-speeders.
Then—
THOOM.
The Strife lurched violently, hull groaning as a boulder the size of a corvette slammed into the port-side superstructure. Armor crumpled like foil. Sparks burst from within several outer compartments.
Inside a cramped secondary rapid deployment chamber, Clone Trooper Kess, the sole organic aboard, stumbled against a bulkhead. His helmet bounced off a droid next to him and left a shallow crack. He groaned, lifting his head just as another jolt rocked the corridor.
"Karking droids! Can't chart a straight line if their processors depended on it!"
"I take limited offense to that!" The droid whose optic he cracked spoke up.
He activated his mag-boots and pushed himself upright, watching readouts flicker red along the bulkhead.
"Bridge, this is Sergeant Kess. We're turning into bowling targets dow here! You wanna tell me why we're playing bumper ships in a asteroid field?!"
CT-X45 answered with clinical dispassion over the intercom.
"Mission directive: expedite arrival. Projected survival ratio of vessel integrity exceeded required threshold. Damage within acceptable parameters."
"Acceptable parameters?!"
Back on the bridge, the helm droid turned.
"Hull breach confirmed—Deck 6, Section Gamma. Emergency bulkheads deployed. Engineering reports minor engine damage. Adjusting output efficiency by 6.2%."
CT-X45 simply nodded.
"Continue forward. Do not alter trajectory."
For another ten minutes, the ship bucked and groaned under the constant barrage of micro-impacts. Occasionally, a high-pitched whine would signal a hull panel being sheared off by an errant shard. The shields held—barely.
Finally, with a shuddering lurch and a sudden stillness, the Strife emerged from the belt.
The engine hum fell to a slow murmur. The stars ahead were clear. The fractured remains of the belt twinkled behind them like silent, smoldering teeth.
Inside the command deck, CT-X45 stood.
"Arrived at designated coordinates. Initiating passive scan protocols."
The helm droid ran diagnostics.
"Hull integrity at 82%. Engines stable. No life-threatening system failures."
"All acceptable. Proceed with the prepared distress signal and transmit when ready."
Behind the command dais, the emergency lights dimmed. The Strife now hung like a silent knife amid the stars—scarred, battered, but functional. Waiting for what would come next.
Inside his compartment, Sergeant Kess kicked off a loose panel and sat against the wall, groaning.
"Next time I'm assigned to a recon frigate with a droid commander, I'm jettisoning myself out the airlock... uagh" he complained.
*Hurls*
Right before hurling inside his cracked helmet.
Somewhere deep in the ship, a small maintenance droid wheeled past, whistling an off-tune binary jingle.
The silence of space returned.
=============
Above the Imperial Capital – The Star Forge
It loomed in orbit like a forgotten god, a colossal silhouette against the shimmering surface of Britannia Secundus—the Imperial Capital. Once a relic of hubris and horror from a dead empire, the Star Forge now served as the Empire's crown jewel: reborn not as a weapon of madness, but a forge of destiny. A monstrosity spanning seventy-five kilometers in length and twenty across, its surface bristled with blackened spires, gravity-pylons, and rotating cruciform arms feeding entire star systems of matter into its burning heart.
A marvel. A myth reborn in steel and fire.
And its guardian was no less mythic.
Command Nexus – Star Forge Prime Core
The air hummed with power within the central spire—where conduits of both energy and the Force flowed through synth-crystal nodes, each inscribed with ancient Rakatan glyphs now overwritten with High Gothic Imperial sigils.
Darth Vader stood at the heart of it.
His frame towered at nearly 2.5 meters. A giant among men and monsters. Encased in armor of jet black durasteel, its surface unchanged in silhouette from the last days of the Clone Wars, yet within—rebuilt. No longer the prototype of experimental technology. The breather cycles now silent as death if he needed it, but he opted for the terror his breathing filter granted him on his... admittedly now few enemies. The frame and armor laid in Baskar, a courtesy of the infinite materialization capabilities of the Star Forge, now making their way into ship building.
He was a weapon... THE weapon of choice of the Emperor. His WRATH made manifest.
And so too had the man within changed.
Gone was the instability, the tremors of doubt, the storm of Anakin Skywalker's fractured mind. Vader had studied. Delved. Consumed. From the shattered holocrons of Malachor, to the hidden wings of the Imperial Vaults, from the tomb-worlds of long-forgotten Sith to the innermost sanctum of the Jedi Temple itself—no longer a place of light, but of silent ruin and reclaimed truth.
He had not forgotten Skywalker.
But he would kill him.
That weakness—hope, guilt, love—lingered still, somewhere in the scarred cage of his mind. A whisper. A flicker. A flickering pulse of sentimentality that dared call itself a man. He had not yet cut it out, for the time was not yet right. The Emperor would give him that chance. And when it came… Skywalker would burn.
As he stood motionless before the central terminal, the metal platform beneath him rotated slowly—a subtle movement that brought into alignment the many arrays of the Star Forge's intelligence network.
A pulse of red light shimmered across the room.
And then she appeared.
The Red Queen.
More than AI. More than machine. More than alive.
Projected as a tall young woman in flowing red robes, with porcelain skin and long raven hair, her eyes glowed like twin rubies—burning not with light, but with purpose. A hologram, yes. But not a simulation. She was the Star Forge. She was its will. Created not merely from code, but infused with presence—her every word laden with a breath of the Dark Side.
She did not bow, but addressed him with the respect of a fellow weapon addressing a senior in the Emperor's service.
"Lord Vader," she began, her voice cold. "The Emperor has chosen you to serve as a 'diplomatic' envoy for the Expedition Fleet. You are not to interfere with any largescale conflict. Nor are you to lend material support. The Imperial Knights must be allowed to stand unaided. Their growth must be their own."
Her eyes narrowed, features sharpening into something closer to a smirk.
"That said... instruction, should you choose to offer it, is at your discretion."
There was a beat. A pause filled not with silence, but presence.
"The Emperor has no outcome in mind. You may act at leisure. He expects only one thing: a personal report on the performance and potential of the Knights upon your return."
That was rare. But then again, these Knights were more than pawns. They were legacies. Experiments. Prototypes.
And Vader, their harshest tutor yet, would be the measure by which they were judged.
The Red Queen bowed her head once more. Her voice softened, laced now with an undercurrent of something resembling reverence.
"As always, you serve with distinction. By the Emperor's will."
Vader did not speak at first.
His arms remained at his sides. The lenses of his mask stared directly at the image before him, unreadable.
Then, in that deep, mechanical voice, stripped of any emotion save authority:
"As my master commands."
No other words were needed. None were wasted.
He turned without flourish and began his march toward the hangar core. Behind him, the Star Forge stirred—a monstrous machine awakening from patient slumber. Droid wings shifted formation. Thousands of black-armored engineers bowed their heads as he passed.
Deep within, the fires of the Dark Side pulsed through, lighting the path before him.
In his silence, Vader contemplated.
Not war. Not conquest.
But judgment.
And if they failed?
Then Vader would teach the 'Imperial Knights' the cost of disappointing him.
A.N: Finally finished this one, I've got a lot of IRL work so i've slowed down, and ChatGPT is just... downright dumb as bricks when it comes to helping me with this. Anyway, hope it came out alright and you all enjoy it :)