Great Cause (Shadowspawn)

The Great Cause as dubbed by Lord Shadowspawn, was an effort to bring Luke Skywalker into the position of Emperor six months after Palpatine's death at the Battle of Endor. Shadowspawn had created a holothriller called Luke Skywalker and the Jedi's Revenge, in the holothriller, Palpatine claimed he wished Luke to be his successor, but once Vader killed Palpatine, Luke returned to the Rebellion after killing Vader, feeling only grief and guilt at failing to save the Emperor, feeling that he was no better than the Rebels, thinking that he deserved no better to be just another outlaw among thieves, pirates and murderers like the Rebels. Shadowspawn showed the holothriller to worlds still sympathetic to the Empire, and convinced them that Luke was the rightful heir to the Emperor's throne. Even recounting the story to others who were members of remains of the Empire, such as Klick, who found the story inspiring. The plan, according to Shadowspawn, was to lure Luke to Mindor, so he may be healed and take on his rightful position as Emperor.

In reality, the Great Cause was a background Shadowspawn, in reality Lord Cronal, created to keep his power when he took over Luke Skywalker's body. So he could forward his true goal of existing until the end of the universe to ensure that everything in the universe would eventually perish and die out. He desired a new, younger, stronger, more handsome body rather than a clone of his current body, as his current body was old, and never was strong. It was already failing him as he couldn't stand, feed himself, or breathe without a life-support chamber.

Though he was successful in luring Luke to Mindor, he was continually disturbed and wasn't able to plant his mind into the meltmassif nerves he created in Luke's body, and eventually Luke was freed by Nick Rostu. The Great Cause winded up backfiring on Cronal, as when Group Captain Klick and other shadow stormtroopers saw Luke and Nick, they assumed Luke had been healed and was the new Emperor and began to obey his every command. Luckily for Cronal, this didn't do massive damage to his plans, and still almost succeeded in being the sole survivor of the Battle of Mindor, having hoped to instead take over Leia's body, and when he failed at that, fled the Taspan system, leaving Mindor behind. However, Luke was able to kill Cronal by controlling the meltmassif surrounding Cronal, and eventually the New Republic escaped the Taspan system just before the solar flares would've burned them.

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