Have no fear, Grubkiller is here.

This is a story that I've been wanting to do for a while.

It's a version of The Force Unleashed that I wanted to combine with Star Wars Rebels. I hope that you all enjoy it.

Disclaimer: I do not own Star Wars, and much of this material was inspired by George Lucus, Sean Williams, Dave Filoni, and people more talented than me. I just wanted to combine Force Unleashed and Star Wars rebels in some way. So Disney, please don't sue me.

Anyway, I hope that you all enjoy.

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Lord Vader's private chamber, Fortress Vader, Mustafar.

"You were weak when I found you."

The voice seemed to come from the far end of a long, deep tunnel

The Life of Darth Vader's secret student took a strange and deadly turn the day this day.

He'd had no warning that a moment of such significance was approaching. During his nightly meditation, kneeling on the metal floor of his chamber while construction droids and Imperial Stormtroopers expanded the palace grounds, unaware of his existence, he had seen no visions in the pure, angry red of the lightsaber that was being held like a burning brand in front of his eyes. Although he had stared until the world vanished and the dark side flowed through him in a bloody tide, the future had remained closed.

Nothing, therefore, prepared him for the sudden deviation from the day's punishing and unpredictable exercises. His Master was not a patient teacher; neither was he a talkative one. He preferred action to debate, just as he preferred recrimination to reward. Never once in all the days thy had sparred together, with lightsaber, telekinesis, or suggestion, had the Dark Lord offered a single word of encouragement. And that was as it should be, he knew. A teacher's job was not to drag a student along a single, well-worn path. Rather it was to let the student forge their own way through the forest, intervening only when the student was hopelessly lost and needed to be corrected.

Even on the wrong paths, he knew, lay some wisdom.

He knelt before his Master and prepared for the killing strike. He could feel the wrath radiating from the Dark Lord like heat. And for a moment that seemed to stretch for years, all he could hear was the regular, implacable respiration that kept the man inside the mask alive.

"You should never have survived my training."

He closed his eyes. He had heard these words before. They were the closest thing to a bedtime story he'd ever had as a child. The great moral he had taken each time was burned into his mind: Learn . . . or die.

The lightsaber drifted so close to his neck that he could smell his hair burning.

"But now, your hatred has become your strength." The saber retreated. With a hiss it deactivated. "At last, the dark side is your ally."

His Master's next words made his heart trip a beat.

"Rise, my apprentice."

Apprentice. So he had always been, in everything but name.

The Apprentice stood up, Vader's large black shape looming over him. His mask unreadable, limned with crimson from the light of the lava rivers below that were shining through the wide viewport. He kept his eyes up and his voice low.

"What is your will, my Master?"

"You have defeated many of my rivals. Your training is nearly complete. It is time now to face your first true test."

A roll call of past missions sped through the apprentice's mind. He had been sent out to dispatch many enemies of the Empire, including spies and thieves, and the occasional high-ranking traitor as well. But Vader wasn't talking about some filthy lowlife. He could sense it in his words, that there was only one foe worthy to fight him now.

"Your spies have located a Jedi?"

"Yes. Master Rahm Kota." Vader said as excitement began to fill the apprentice at the thought of killing a traditional enemy of the Sith. "He is attacking a critical Imperial shipyard above Nar Shadda. Destroy him and bring me his lightsaber."

"I shall leave at once, Master."

He had taken barely a step toward the door when Darth Vader's domineering voice stopped him. "The Emperor cannot discover you."

"As you wish, my master."

"Leave no witnesses. Kill everyone aboard that gets in your way, Imperials and insurgents alike."

The apprentice nodded, keeping his sudden uncertainty carefully clouded.

"Do not fail in this."

The lightsaber hanging back t his hip was a comforting, reassuring weight. "No, my lord," he said, back straight and voice firm.

Darth Vader turned away and gripped his hands behind his back. The red landscape painted his helmet with lava highlights. Thus dismissed, his secret apprentice hurried about his latest, darkest duty.

The Apprentice hurried through the warren connecting his Master's secret chambers to the secret hanger bay that had long been written out of the Fortress's blueprints, and would remain unknown to any future Imperial personnel.

The Emperor cannot discover you.

This was all apart of the masterplan that has been in the works for his entire life. What he has been brutally trained for since he was a mere child. The destruction of the Emperor, and rule the galaxy as Master and Apprentice.

But first, he had to survive the encounter with the Jedi. A few had survived the Great Jedi Purge at the end of the Clone Wars, when their undeserved privilege was rightfully stripped from them. But the Dark Side infiltrated every corner of the galaxy; nothing could remain hidden forever.

General Rahm Kota.

The name didn't quite ring a bell, but he would just do research on the way to Nar Shadda.

Entering the hanger bay, he wound his way through the familiar maze of crates, weapons racks, and star-fighter parts. The ambient lighting was dim, with shadows pooling in every corner. The air tasted of metal and ozone, both of which had become all too familiar to the apprentice, growing up in this very palace.

Leave no witnesses. Kill everyone aboard, Imperials and insurgents alike.

Even as he mulled over this new development, a familiar snap-hiss sounded to his right and glowing blue-white blade sprang into life in a dark corner of the hanger.

"Hello there."

A brown-robed figure ran forward, weapon raised.

Instantly in a fighting crouch, the apprentice brought his own blade up to block the blow, teeth bared in a delighted snarl.

He and his adversary held the pose for a bare second, lightsabers locked across their chests. The apprentice quickly sized up the being who had attacked him. Human male, fair-skinned and bearded, with calm, serious eyes and a firm set to his jaw. Anyone within living memory of the Clone Wars - or possessing free access to the Jedi archives - would have recognized him immediately as Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Member of the Jedi Council, High General of the GAR, and master of the Soresu form of lightsaber combat.

Obi-Wan slid his deadly blade down and to the right, ducking at the same time to avoid the inevitable counter-sweep. Sparks flew as the Apprentice Force leapt high into the air and landed with perfect agility on top of a stack of crates. He reached out with his cupped left hand and swept a metal tool kit across the hanger bay, toward his opponent's head. Kenobi ducked and leapt up after him, deflecting a flurry of blows that would have left an ordinary man in pieces, then responding with a sweep of his own that sent the Apprentice dodging backward jumping from one stack of crates to another in temporary retreat.

The duel proceeded for almost a minute, with Kenobi and the apprentice dancing like acrobatic Gados from stack to stack, lightsabers spinning and clashing, racks and tools turned into temporary weapons as the hurled themselves from one to the other. Then, Kenobi slashed a new rip in the sleeve of the apprentice's combat suit with a move that would have taken his arm off at the elbow had he not moved in time.

But the Jedi had overreached, allowing the apprentice to launch a well timed force push the sent Kenobi falling to the deck below. But before he could get back up, Starkiller jumped from the crate and plunged his blade straight into the chest of the Jedi, finishing the job.

But then, the old man's body began to spark and flicker like a hologram - which was actually the case. The arms, legs, torso, and face all dissolved, revealing the bipedal form of a droid beneath.

"Ah, master. Another excellent duel." The droid said.

"You caught me by surprise, PROXY," Starkiller said with an easy affection that belied his former ferocity. "I haven't fought that training program in years. I assumed you'd erased it."

The droid struggled to stand, but succeeded only losing his balance and almost falling again, before Starkiller caught him in time and helped straighten him.

"Easy, PROXY. You're malfunctioning."

"It's my fault, master," the droid said with an electronic sigh, looking down at the smoking hole in his chest. "I had hoped that using an older training module would catch you off guard and allow me to finally kill you. I'm sorry I failed you again."

A concerned smile flickered across Starkiller's face. I'm sure you'll keep trying."

"Of course, master. It is my primary programming."

The droid and master began moving through the maze of debris across the hanger. "Well, you won't be ambushing me again until we get your central stabilizer replaced - and that could take weeks, this far out from the Core . . ."

But then Starkiller stopped himself. He saw his ship, the Rogue Shadow, sitting in the hanger bay. But it wasn't the ship that caught his attention. It was the person working on it.

A woman specifically, with gorgeous blonde hair, a beautiful face, along with an attractive frame that went well with both. She was using her plasma torch to weld something onto the top of the ship. She didn't appear to notice the stunned apprentice, who then pulled his droid out of sight.

"PROXY..." Starkiller said as he pushed his droid against the container.

"Why are we whispering?" The confused droid asked.

"...who is that?" The apprentice asked, nodding in the direction of the girl.

"Ah, yes. Your new pilot has finally arrived, master."

"But who is she?"

"Accessing Imperial records . . ."

PROXY began to change form, and a new hologram formed over his metal body, to reveal the very blonde woman that was working on his ship. He became stunned by her features again before the droid began to speak in the woman's clipped voice.

"Captain Juno Eclipse," said the droid. "Born on Corulag, where she became the youngest student ever accepted into the Imperial Academy. Decorated combat pilot with over one hundred combat missions and commanding officer during the Bombing of Callos. Handpicked by Lord Vader to lead his Black Eight Squadron, but later reassigned to a top-secret project-".

"Is there a psychological profile in there, too?" Asked the same voice.

But it didn't come from PROXY's imitation. The pilot herself, with her arms crossed, and wearing a stern look. Her clothes were unkept, and dirty from the maintenance she performed on the ship. Her Imperial navy uniform was unzipped, revealing a form-fitting tank-top underneath, which hugged her frame quite nicely.

Starkiller and PROXY stared back at her. With a look of barely concealed embarrassment, a slightly flushed Starkiller let go of the droid and stepped away. PROXY wobbled on his feet, and then snapped to attention in a fair imitation of her - complete with neat blond hair, regulation uniform, and tricolored insignia. But he updated his image files to unzip her uniform, mess up her hair slightly, and form a smudge of grease on 'her' cheek.

"Actually, yes," PROXY told her, "but it's restricted." To Starkiller as an aside he added, "Oh, Master, I can tell you that she's going to be impossible to reprogram."

Starkiller could feel Juno's anger flare up slightly, suppressing an urge to take her welding tool and ram another hole through PROXY's chest.

He gestured to PROXY, who finally dropped his simulation and went back to being just a droid. "You know why you're here?" Starkiller asked her.

The girl uncrossed her arms and lowered the torch. Then she took a deep breath. "Lord Vader gave me my orders himself," she said. "I am to keep your ship running and fly you wherever your missions require."

Starkiller seemed neither pleased nor displeased. "PROXY," he instructed the droid, "get the Rogue Shadow ready to launch."

PROXY went aboard, while his master and Juno followed behind at a slower pace.

"Did Lord Vader tell you that he killed our last pilot?"

Juno studied him as closely as he was obviously studying her. His shredded combat uniform and the mess of scars on his arms told her that he has been through the wringer, which was a preview to what she was in for. "No. But I can only assume he gave Lord Vader good cause to do so." She paused, then added," I will not."

"We'll see. I'm sick of training new pilots." His eyes slid past her to where she had been working on the Rogue Shadow. His brows crinkled on seeing the new panels she had welded into place. "What have you done to my ship?"

"I have taken the liberty of upgrading the Rogue Shadow's sensor array. Now you will be able to spy on any suspect ships across an entire system." She waited for some sign of approval, but he only nodded. Her pride slightly stung, she said, "I assume that's part of your mission profile. You are one of Vader's spies?"

"You don't need to know anything about my missions except where I'm going."

"Where are we going?"

"To Nar Shadda. Can you handle that?"

Juno brushed past Starkiller, trying to suppress an angry retort, and walked up the ramp. "Of course."

Starkiller watched her walk inside the ship, his eyes drifting down to her hourglass frame, letting out an exhale. What was his master up to? He had never worked with a female before.

This had to be a test of some kind.

He then walked inside the ship, just as it took off, flying over the molten landscape of Mustafar.

It was time to hunt down the hated enemy of the Sith Order.

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Well folks, that was part 1 of this story.

Hope that you all enjoyed.

Part 2 will be Starkiller's mission to kill General Kota.

Until then, Grubkiller out.