The being known as the Force slowly felt its attention disperse again as it finished the complete destruction of the star system housing the parasite and its host. It was so hard to focus down there, so far above. Sitting up here, so close to the Apex…

  The Force ushered the spirits of the dead to rejoin with it in the closest node projecting its power into the space where that star system had used to be. One by one the spirits of the dead merged back with the Force one by one to move to the next phase of existence. Those more powerful in the Force retained some small pieces of themselves for a time, while the weaker simply relaxed and slowly faded away into the gentle waves and currents of the larger movements of the Force across the entire galaxy. Across the universe. Merging with it once more over time as things should be.

  Before the Force’s attention fully dispersed back to its natural state of wide vigilance and grand movements across the universe, it forcefully shifted its attention and felt the currents rippling across the galaxy. The Chosen One was dead. It had only taken a few short years waiting to verify that the Chosen One was truly dead. How had the Chosen One died? The Force wasn’t quite sure. But it was undeniable. The Chosen one had died, and not brought the balance to its gifts in the galaxy as the Force had planned.

  The Chosen One had been oddly resistant to the Force’s helpful nudges to the broader fabric of the universe and its denizens to help him to accept the Internal side of its gift. To stir up conflict and war to provide the cauldron that would create the one that would finally bring balance. Perhaps the parasite’s host had done something to interfere with the Chosen One’s path in some way? That could explain the unexplained deviations that the being known as the Force had observed in the Chosen One’s strange ability to complete the Internal side of its gift in an instant. The strangeness that had caused it to focus channeling the Internal towards the tenuous and wavering link to the Chosen One. So thin that all the Force could do was vaguely push through its with just a fraction of additional power more than normal when it focused intensely on doing so.

  It hadn’t discovered the free floating and untethered parasite just yet. But it was only a matter of time now before it was found. The Force had inspected the area of the destroyed star system as carefully as it could from its perch at the Apex, and it was sure that the host must be dead after that level of destruction. The Force did regret being compelled to such lengths to catch the parasite… But it could only focus so much from up here at the Apex, track down the squirmy little destroyer so much. It didn’t want to risk the parasite escaping. The parasite had been slippery so far, and this was the best chance to destroy it early before the Force had to to start using any more truly drastic measures to contain it.

  Yet turning to other matters, there was still no balance within those using its gifts in the galaxy. The Internal side was still suppressed. Even more than before, now that the strong incarnation of the Internal side of the Force that the Force had used as a vessel for the destruction was dead. Unfortunately. It might have held itself back if it had realized that it was the incarnation of the Internal that had been present, and not the incarnation of the External as it had originally assumed. Now things were even more out of balance in the galaxy than they had been before. But things would be corrected soon.

  The Internal and the External were still not balanced as they should be. A new Chosen one must be created. One that could bring balance to the Force without the interruption of the parasite to interfere and derail things this time.

  It searched the galaxy for an appropriate being to house the new Chosen One through its broad and tangled web of connections. The faintest strands of spiderweb dancing and swirling in a complex pattern throughout the universe. The Force considered trillions of these strands carefully before choosing a desperate woman deep in the depths of the lower levels Coruscant. Her strand amidst the grand pattern showed the greatest promise for the Force's goals for their child.

  That life would provide the Chosen One plenty of opportunities for hatred and use of the Internal. The Chosen One’s mighty power granted by the Force to them upon conception would ensure their might in the Internal would spread to the others and drive the galaxy back towards balance once more. And Coruscant and the Republic were chaotic enough that smaller nudges could have a larger effect when it came to helping the new Chosen One achieve their purpose. The Force would be much less subtle this time in its efforts to make the Chosen One accept the Internal. Perhaps it had been too subtle in its efforts in the last generation? Yes, perhaps so. The new Chosen One's place in the pattern was in a much more aggressive position, and the Force would be more diligent this time in making sure that the new Chosen stayed properly on track to accept the Internal fully. And bring balance to the two aspects of Force's gift at long last.

  The Force generated the fertile embryo of the Chosen One through a pulse of its power rippling through the single gossamer strand connecting it and the woman far below. The woman gasped and put a hand to her belly in surprise as the imprint of the full weight of the Force brushed through her mind for a single instant as it spread its influence down from the Apex to work its magic to form and implant the embryo properly.

  In nine months the Chosen One would be born anew, one that could accomplish their mission successfully this time.

  Satisfied in a job well done, the Force relaxed and let its clenched singular focus disperse and relax once more. With the death of its host, the Parasite was likely hiding somewhere in a spiritual form of some kind. It was time to employ a focus of a different kind in its hunt.

  The Force had felt the parasite’s connection out of this universe to its true body. If it attempted to break the connection or draw back the fragment inside of the Force’s universe to itself, then the Force would know. And be able to pursue the link to the true body.

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  All the Force had to do was wait. When the parasite went to flee, even as a spiritual fragment floating around the Force’s universe unbound, then the Force would turn the tables on it and follow the connection back to the true body and return all of the energy that the parasite had stolen from it and more.

  And take revenge on the thief who had wronged it. And the universe that it protected and called home.

  The Force let its thoughts drift as its intense focus relaxed and it allowed itself to let its attention return to its more natural state of idle observation from the Apex. But still keeping watch for when the parasite made a reappearance…

  When the parasite made its move the Force would be ready to act and leap on the opportunity to punish the thief at a moment’s notice.

  — — —

  The being known as Draeth floated in the void between universes. But it was not floating freely. No, it had been much stupider than that. Like a mosquito sticking its little proboscis in the skin of a human and sucking out the blood, so he had his little connection poking into the universe below him, ending with his little fragment that Skywalker knew and loved, sucking out the energy of the Force and its universe. The universe itself looked like a massive shimmering bubble floating in blackness. Well not blackness but unreality, but... They were pretty much the same thing since beings with eyes usually went mad and lost their sight when they saw this place anyway.

  So to people with eyeballs this place was black either way. So it didn't actually matter too much what it actually looked like.

  Mosquito was really an uncharitable way to describe Draeth, but Draeth was sure that if the Force was around to squash it then it might have some harsher words to describe it.

  Talk about overreaction. Draeth had only heard tales of this universe or others like it before. The universes of endless bounty, if you could just sneak under the nose of its guardian or guardians to get your due. They were so rare compared to the universes less well defended but so starved of energy that even draining them dry was practically pointless in increasing your energy levels, since you had to navigate through the void and spend that energy to get to them safely.

  Those kind of energy poor universes were the kind that you could encounter in droves normally just floating through the void between the scattered bubbles of the myriad of universes. Common as stardust. And nearly as useless.

  What kind of luck did he have, that the universe that he ended up finding practically by accident that was bursting with so much rich energy was claimed by a being so absurdly powerful? Maybe he should have known that something was wrong when the pickings were so good after he first entered that universe. He'd just thought that he'd been lucky at first, and then he'd been greedy and ignored the risks once he'd discovered the truth...

  Like Draeth could blow up a few galaxies easily with his healthily plump single galaxy massed body. But that was him! He was awesome!

  But could he blow up even a single planet from the Apex of the universe? Especially one as well developed as this one? He could tell that the Force hadn’t even descended slightly down from its big perch and had just done all of that by channeling its power through that random guy that it had forced to suicide bomb himself. Heh. What a sucker, thought he was top of the world until the Force just made him go boom to take out Draeth's host.

  So could Draeth have done literally anything from the Apex to the main universe? Uhhhh…. Yeah, definitely not. Not even close. What the hell was something this powerful doing, squatting in an ordinary little universe like this anyway? He wasn’t even sure if the elders of his race would be able to take on the Force directly, if it was this powerful even when reaching down from the Apex. The Force guarding this universe. It was like a massive army sitting around to guard a henhouse for a farmer.

  Well, the chickens were very well protected. Stupid birds.

  And unfortunately Draeth was the fox in this analogy, about to get stabbed for his troubles. Or caught in those metal traps with jaws. Whatever farmers were up to these days to keep predators from eating their birds.

  What rotten luck. He’d heard about cases like this before from his elders, maybe he should have investigated this place some more before just diving right in as soon as he arrived. He'd always been impulsive, even he could admit that.

  He did like to think that he was rather clever, so maybe that wasn’t all bad though, being a fox in the analogy. Hmmm…

  Anyway. Getting distracted again. Back to what he was up to now.

  He was just done with this place. Time to bail. If he could.

  Unfortunately that was proving much more difficult than he’d initially thought that it would be.

  He wasn’t stupid enough to actually open up a portal. Right now he was a little spec floating outside the universe. The massive shimmering surface in front of him representing the universe controlled by the Force was huge, and there was little chance the Force could find him. If it even bothered to look with how pointless a task searching the outer surface would be.

  Unless he was stupid enough to open a portal wide enough that he could retract that little portion of himself in that universe, Draeth was safe. For now. That connection was also keeping him floating here, anchored to this stupid universe. This stupid, way too powerful, ridiculously profitable universe.

  Failure. He couldn’t break the connection or even do all that much else but observe through the little fragment of himself inside the Force’s universe.

  Bah, he was stuck. No matter how much he wiggled the connection or tried to pull himself away without a portal, he was stuck.

  This whole venture was very profitable, even if Draeth’s stress had been through the roof from all the hard work he’d had to do to get it so far…

  Yeah, he was stuck anyway. May as well make the most of it.

  And fuck the Force. Why did it have to be so greedy and extreme? Bully innocent little tourists like him so much? All he was doing was taking a little sip of the universe’s energy for himself. Really nothing at all when you thought about it.

  If he was going to be greedy, then may as well go all in.

  He’d bleed this universe dry then float away laughing before the Force managed to catch him.

  If he didn’t get squashed flat under its big heavy boot first, that is.