The hangar did not erupt.
It sharpened.
Jedi moved with sudden clarity of purpose, conversations dissolving into assignments, into trajectories, into the quiet efficiency that came from years of discipline. Starfighters were claimed in orderly succession; maintenance droids pivoted and accelerated, tools whirring as diagnostics ran at double speed. The sealed blast doors began to cycle open in segments, admitting narrow bands of bright Coruscant light that spilled across the deck in stark contrast to the hangar's artificial glow.
Engines ignited one by one, low at first, then rising in layered harmonics that reverberated through the vast chamber like the opening notes of some metallic chorus. The air filled with the faint scent of ionization and heated circuitry.
Kael did not step toward a starfighter.
He turned away.
The decision was neither hesitant nor dramatic. It was simply practical. If this were to be an immediate deployment, he would not go robed and unarmored.
He moved back through the threshold and into the Temple proper as the first Delta-7 lifted from the deck behind him, its engines swelling to a bright, cutting whine before fading into the distance. The sound followed him down the corridor, echoing briefly along the high arches before dimming with each step he took deeper into the structure.
The Temple, moments ago filled with anticipation, had transformed into a different kind of urgency.
Knights strode past at controlled speed, voices low but firm as they coordinated squad assignments and hyperspace vectors. A pair of Masters stood near an intersection, speaking rapidly about approach formations and extraction contingencies. Temple Guards adjusted positions along key junctions, their presence now less ceremonial, more defensive.
The stained-glass windows of the meditative walkway glowed brilliantly under the afternoon sun, fractured light spilling across the floor in bands of gold and cobalt. Through them, Coruscant remained unchanged — traffic lanes weaving in endless choreography, distant cruisers cutting clean arcs across the sky. The planet did not yet know what was unfolding above it.
Kael walked through it all with measured strides, hands loosely clasped behind his back.
A headache.
That was what this would become.
He exhaled quietly through his nose, jaw tightening slightly as the engines behind him roared again — another fighter departing, another vow of intervention carried skyward.
Anakin.
Of course, it would be Anakin.
"Reckless," Kael muttered under his breath, the word less accusation than tired recognition. "You couldn't simply remain where you were."
His boots carried him past the bronzium statues lining the mezzanine, their ancient visages frozen in serene composure as if war were an abstraction rather than a recurrence. The Temple's great halls amplified the fading engine noise behind him until it became a distant tremor, then a memory.
What had happened?
The last time they had spoken, Anakin had seemed almost pleased with himself — almost smug. Assigned as personal bodyguard to Senator Amidala, he had carried the responsibility like a badge of private triumph.
Kael had seen the way he looked at her.
He had also seen the way she looked back.
There had always been history there — unspoken, dangerous.
He could picture it easily enough: Anakin abandoning whatever sensible protocol had been given to him, chasing some half-formed intuition into the Outer Rim. A desert world, perhaps. Endless horizon and heat. The sort of place that encouraged impulse rather than restraint.
He huffed softly.
"Shouldn't you be frolicking through meadows?" he murmured to himself, dryly. "Or reciting poetry badly?"
A Knight passed him at a near jog, offering a brief nod before continuing on without slowing. The Temple had grown paradoxically quieter the farther he moved from the hangar. The engines' thunder dulled into a distant vibration, then faded entirely as corridors thickened with stone and distance. What remained was the sound of purposeful footsteps, the murmur of strategy, the rustle of robes brushing against ancient floors.
Kael reached the Tranquility Spire's lower hall, where blue carpet met golden stone in geometric precision. Meditation chambers branched off in symmetrical arcs, their doors half-open where Masters had been summoned from contemplation to conflict. The serenity of the space clashed subtly with the current undercurrent of mobilization — a sanctuary forced to remember it housed warriors.
Anakin captured.
On Geonosis.
The name itself carried heat in it.
Kael's expression hardened fractionally, though no one nearby would have noticed. Anakin did not get captured by accident. He rushed. He overcommitted. He refused to withdraw when retreat was sensible.
And yet.
He was not incompetent.
Which meant something larger had unfolded.
Kael adjusted the fall of his robes at his shoulders, an old reflex that hinted at absent armor. His fingers brushed briefly against the Darksaber's hilt at his side, the cool weight grounding, familiar.
"Of all the worlds in the galaxy," he said quietly, almost to the empty corridor, "you choose a desert in the Outer Rim."
Ahead, the Temple stretched into calm stone and filtered light, its quiet dignity masking the fact that within the hour, Jedi starfighters would pierce the sky in numbers unseen in generations.
Kael continued walking toward his quarters, the sounds of departure now fully swallowed by the Temple's depths.
Behind him, war had begun to move.
Ahead of him, preparation waited.
The corridors had thinned by the time Kael reached the residential wing.
Here, the Temple returned to something closer to stillness. The walls curved inward, narrower and more intimate than the grand halls below, the golden stone softened by long runners of deep blue carpet. Lamps inset into the walls cast a muted glow that pooled gently along the floor, leaving the higher arches in shadow. The urgency of departure had moved elsewhere; what remained was preparation in silence — doors sliding shut, drawers opening and closing, the faint metallic click of armor being fastened behind private thresholds.
Kael slowed as he approached his quarters.
He could feel the shift in the Temple's pulse now — the majority of starfighters already launched, engines no longer shaking the foundations. Only a distant hum lingered, like thunder retreating beyond the horizon.
He had just reached the final bend in the corridor when a voice carried evenly through the quiet.
"Kael."
It was not raised.
It did not need to be.
He stopped.
The sound of his boots ceased against stone. For a heartbeat, he did not turn, shoulders settling, jaw tightening faintly as if he had anticipated this summons before it came. Then, slowly, he pivoted.
Master Mace Windu stood several paces behind him, posture perfectly straight, hands folded before him in characteristic composure. Even in the softened light of the residential wing, his presence commanded the space. Tall — taller even than Kael — his dark skin and completely bald head caught the warm glow of the lamps, sharp features carved in focus rather than anger. His brown eyes were steady, measuring.
Beside him stood Master Yoda.
Small, green, ancient.
Leaning lightly upon his cane, his three-fingered hands resting against its worn surface, long ears angled outward in quiet attentiveness. Wisps of white hair framed his lined brow, and his brown eyes — though half-lidded — missed nothing. At barely two-thirds of a meter in height, he seemed physically insignificant beside Windu's towering frame.
The Force did not agree.
Kael inclined his head slightly, the movement respectful but unbowed.
"Master Windu. Master Yoda," he said, tone smooth, almost conversational. "What a surprise."
His gaze shifted briefly between them before returning to Windu.
"What do I owe the pleasure of seeing you before the mission?"
Windu did not immediately answer. His eyes drifted to the twin hilts resting at Kael's waist, lingering for the briefest moment on the angular beskar of the Darksaber before rising again.
"Departing with the first wave, you are not," Yoda said gently, voice rasped by age yet steady as stone.
Kael allowed the faintest hint of a smile.
"I prefer not to fly in robes, Master."
Yoda's ears twitched slightly, whether at the tone or the implication.
"Speak with you, we must," Yoda continued. "Privately."
The word hung with quiet significance.
Kael's expression did not change, but something in his posture shifted — less relaxed now, more attentive. He glanced toward his quarters, only a few paces beyond the curve of the corridor.
"Of course, Master," he said evenly. "We're almost there. We can speak inside."
He stepped aside, gesturing with an open palm toward the door at the corridor's end. The motion was fluid, respectful, without being deferential.
Windu and Yoda approached without hurry.
As they walked, the contrast between them was striking — Windu's tall, immovable silhouette casting a long shadow across the carpeted floor, Yoda's smaller frame moving with measured steps aided by the soft tap of his cane against stone. Together, they carried the weight of the Order itself.
Kael reached his door and placed his palm against the access panel. It chimed softly in recognition, sliding open with a whisper of displaced air.
Warm lamplight spilled into the corridor.
He stepped aside once more, allowing the two Masters to enter first.
Yoda crossed the threshold with quiet deliberation, ears brushing the air as though sensing something beyond the visible. Windu followed, pausing only briefly in the doorway as his gaze swept the interior before committing to the room.
Kael entered last.
The door slid shut behind them, sealing away the Temple's distant movement and leaving only the subdued hush of his quarters.
Whatever this conversation was to be, it would not be incidental.
And neither Master had come merely to offer well-wishes.
Kael's quarters were as unadorned as the doctrine that had shaped them.
The chamber was rectangular and high-ceilinged, its pale stone walls broken only by narrow pillars that framed the space with quiet symmetry. A single sleeping cot stood against one wall — low, neatly made, its coverings folded with habitual precision. A narrow desk rested opposite it, bare save for a small datapad and a cylindrical meditation lamp whose faint amber glow lent the room its only warmth. There were no trophies. No personal artifacts on display. No indulgent comforts.
Detachment made architecture.
A tall window occupied the far wall, but the blind drawn across it kept the chamber dim, muting Coruscant's brilliant skyline into little more than a faint halo of light bleeding around its edges. The air felt cooler here than in the corridors outside, the stone retaining the day's earlier stillness.
Near the corner, partially recessed into the wall, stood a reinforced chest — plain, durasteel, unmarked.
It was locked.
Nothing in the room acknowledged it.
Everything in the room did.
Yoda moved first, stepping inward with deliberate calm before lowering himself onto a simple meditation cushion near the center of the chamber. His cane rested across his lap, long ears angling slightly as his brown eyes surveyed the space without comment. Windu crossed to the window, hands clasped behind his back, posture rigid and contemplative. He did not sit. He stood with the faintest turn toward the blind, as though measuring the darkness rather than dispelling it.
Kael remained near the center of the room, shoulders squared, hands relaxed at his sides. The door sealed behind him with a soft hiss, cutting away the Temple's distant activity entirely.
Silence settled between them.
It was not awkward.
It was deliberate.
"So," Kael began at last, his tone even but edged faintly with curiosity, "what do I owe the pleasure of my former Master's company… and that of the Grand Master himself?"
The title was respectful. The phrasing carried familiarity.
Windu did not immediately turn from the window. The dim light outlined his tall frame, broad shoulders unmoving beneath the folds of his robes.
"You will not be deploying to Geonosis," he said.
The statement was direct, measured, and absolute.
Kael's brow tightened fractionally.
"Not deploying?" he repeated. "Why?"
His voice was not sharp, but it carried unmistakable surprise. Geonosis was precisely the kind of engagement he would be expected to enter — decisive, dangerous, immediate.
Behind him, Yoda's cane tapped softly once against the floor as he shifted.
"Come with me to Kamino, you will," the old Master said.
The name meant nothing.
Kael's expression betrayed it.
"Kamino," he repeated, slower this time. "I'm not familiar."
"Few are," Windu replied.
He finally turned from the window, crossing the chamber with controlled strides until he stood a short distance from Kael. Even without the elevation of the hangar platform, Windu's height was imposing — nearly eye to eye with him, though broader in presence than in build.
"An army awaits there," Yoda continued quietly. "Long prepared."
Kael's confusion deepened rather than diminished.
"An army?" he asked.
The word felt foreign in this room.
The Jedi did not keep armies.
They were not generals.
Windu's gaze hardened slightly.
"This assignment is more significant than the rescue of Master Kenobi."
Kael's jaw tightened.
"With respect, Master," he said evenly, "rescuing Obi-Wan and Skywalker from a Separatist execution seems… significant."
Windu held his stare.
"You question the priority?"
"I question the information," Kael replied without hesitation. "An army? Prepared where? By whom? And why am I only hearing of this now?"
Yoda's eyes narrowed thoughtfully, though not in reprimand.
"Much to learn, you still have," he said. "Trust required, this mission does."
Kael's gaze flicked briefly toward the locked chest in the corner, then back again. His fingers brushed unconsciously near the Darksaber's hilt at his waist.
"Why me?" he asked.
The question was direct, stripped of sarcasm.
"There are other Knights. Other Masters. Why not send one of them with you?"
Windu's expression did not soften.
"Because this is not merely reconnaissance."
He stepped slightly aside, angling himself toward the dimmed window once more.
"And because you were not trained to overlook what you see."
The implication lingered.
Kael frowned faintly.
"Is this a lesson?" he asked. "Or a test?"
"It is an instruction," Windu replied.
A beat passed.
"You accompany Grand Master Yoda," he continued, voice deep and deliberate. "You will observe. You will listen. And you will conduct yourself with the discipline expected of a Jedi Knight."
The phrasing was careful.
Expected.
Kael's eyes sharpened.
"Have I not?" he asked quietly.
Windu's gaze flickered toward the durasteel chest.
"Your conduct has been… effective," he said. "But this assignment demands more than effectiveness."
Silence again.
Yoda lifted one small hand and made a subtle motion through the air.
The blind over the window slid upward smoothly, bathing the chamber in Coruscant's full brilliance. Sunlight flooded the stone walls, erasing shadow and revealing every clean line of the room. The skyline stretched endlessly beyond the glass — radiant, unaware, untouched.
"Larger than one rescue, this moment is," Yoda said softly. "Changed, the Republic may be."
Kael stood very still.
Kamino.
An army.
Two Jedi required.
He had been prepared for battle.
Instead, he was being redirected into something unseen.
Windu faced him fully now.
"In your Padawan days," he said evenly, "you were taught to understand that not all missions carry visible urgency."
The words carried weight beyond reprimand.
"You question why you were chosen," Windu continued. "Remember the decorum and discernment expected of you when you question the Council's judgment."
Kael held his former Master's gaze without flinching.
The air between them was not hostile.
But it was charged.
After a long moment, he inclined his head.
"When do we depart?" he asked.
Yoda's eyes gleamed faintly in the sunlight.
"Immediately," he said.
The word settled into the room like a stone dropped into still water.
War was gathering on Geonosis.
And somewhere beyond even that, something else was waiting.