#inoni writes

“No one is coming to save you, Jedi. You will die here fighting me.”

_

I had vaguely hoped to complete Sahuldeem by May the 4th, but things came up, as they do, and I didn’t want to force (heh) it to happen. Instead, enjoy this screenshot from my phone of a certain familiar scene (and you can see how it’s actually formatted when I write vs how it is posted on AO3; neat!)~

"Hello, Grievous. Can you hear me?"

_

“You lack the necessary...sensitivity.”

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“Master!” exclaimed EV-A4-D. “Why have you left your stasis pod? You weren’t in there for very long at all.”

Despite his exasperation, Grievous did not give into his desire to lash out at the droid, but he brushed him aside with a light shove as he crossed the room to retrieve his cloak. “How long have I been in stasis?” he growled.

“A mere eight hours. You—”

“Eight!” He whirled back, claws clenching ragged once-white cloth. “Eight hours?!”

“You could stand to stay in there a little longer, if you want my professional opinion, but of course you don’t.” The medical droid toddled after Grievous, griping as was his wont. “Anyway, you were the one who came home complaining about your head. You were the one who insisted on going into stasis. You ordered me to monitor your brain activity for signs of irregularities.”

Grievous couldn’t remember any of this, but the droid had nothing to gain by lying. Most droids he’d known couldn’t lie, anyway. “Fine,” he grunted, fastening his cape into place around his shoulders. “Report your findings, doctor.”

“There’s nothing to report. Your brain activity was well within normal range during stasis.”

An aggravated, incoherent noise escaped the cyborg’s vocabulator. “Then there is no reason for me to remain in stasis, you stupid droid!”

“I am not a stupid droid,” EV-A4-D replied, miffed. “I was programmed with a great deal of intelligence. I am certainly more intelligent than you are.”

“Whoever chose to program you with your insolent personality should be made to suffer as I do now!”

—

Chapter 12 of Part Six - Grievous of the Sahuldeem series is up!

“At any rate, General—” the emphasis caught Grievous’ attention, his mask lifting, his audioreceptors angling to attention “—you’ll be pleased to hear that you are to be deployed immediately upon the arrival of your new fleet, which is on its way this very moment and should be in Vassek 3’s orbit within 30 standard hours. There is a planet that the CIS hopes to remove from Republic control as soon as possible; you will be responsible for its capture.”

“I’m ready to serve you, my lord,” said Grievous eagerly. “What miserable world am I to crush?”

Dooku seemed to be treading delicately, a quiet tension seizing his bearing from his posture to his sonorous voice. The cyborg was far too invested in the promise of conquest to notice the manner in which the mission was delivered, leaning forward, hanging on the Count’s every word. “It is in Wild Space—a world rich in mineral deposits, currently occupied by an aggressive race of relatively primitive insectoids.” Dooku let that final word linger, watching Grievous intently for a flinch of recognition. When nothing came, he took the plunge. “The planet is known as Tovarskl.”

A long pause met this pronouncement, followed by a rumbling growl and the sound of metallic fingers clicking into fists. “Tovarskl,” Grievous’ husky voice repeated, the word grating through his vocabulator like a vibroblade over stone. “I know this planet. A colony world of the Yam’rii.” The word emerged with no more venom than he ever spat the word “Jedi”, but certainly no less. “I have fought them before.”

“As I understand it, there is already a small Republic force on the planet to safeguard it and its inhabitants. The Jedi are likely with them.”

This, as expected, elicited a more dramatic response. Grievous flung his cape back and brandished both fists with a snarl. “Jedi! I will slay them myself on the fire-grass plains! They will not humiliate me in front of my warriors again!”

And then, finally, it happened: a slight hitch, a confused twitch of the eye, a brief freezing of limbs.

—

Chapter 11 of Part Six - Grievous of the Sahuldeem series is up!

“What if I told you that there was a way for you to fight again?”

_

Hey, remember how I posted two previous snippets because writing has been hard this year and I felt like sharing excerpts from the various unfinished Sahuldeem spin-off stories I've poked at over the past few years? (the good news is that I am working on the newest chapter of Sahuldeem again; it's just slow-going) This next spin-off fic can best be described as: "Obi-Wan and an injured, brain-damaged Grievous crash land on an uninhabited moon after a battle and must survive until rescue comes from either side." Just a little one-off that theoretically could happen without disrupting the canon timeline. No romance, to be clear. It was inspired by the moment Dr. Zorryx was fretting about Grievous' implants and wondering, "What if Grievous should sustain massive cranial trauma in the midst of battle, far away from Zorryx’s expertise?"

This short snippet is the first bit I wrote to establish the premise for myself. Enjoy~