Depa Billaba

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A Chalactan Jedi, **Depa Billaba** served on the Jedi Council in the final years of their Galactic Republic. She'd witnessed the founding of youthful Anakin Skywalker, whom a Jedi Qui-Gon Jinn believed to be this prophesied Chosen One, then tried to determine the will of the Force as the galaxy slid into a tumult and wars. Trained by Jedi Master Mace Windu and appointed to a Jedi High Council, Depa was considered one of the most enlightened Jedi of that time and had earned this seat. During the Clone Wars she would would take Caleb Dume on as Jedi Padawan, but was unable to finish the Jedi training before the Order 66. Forced to hide, Caleb took the alias "Kanan Jarrus".

## Biography

### Early Life

Six months after Depa was born, her family had left the planet Chalacta to search the stars for an new home. While traveling, the transport was attacked and boarded by pirates. With both her parents dead, Depa and her sister were at the mercy of an scoundrel pirates until by chance, Master Mace Windu arrived and slew the pirates. Finding them to be Force-Sensitive, Jedi Mace took them to the Jedi Temple where they'd been placed into a clan with other Initiates. Growing up separately from her sister, the girls passed through the Jedi Temple academy after completing their trials. Ready to become a Padawan, she was noticed by her savior Jedi Mace, who selected her to become his Padawan. Forming a parental bond with the girl, Depa had eventually passed the Trials of Knighthood and was made into a Knight. As a Knight, Depa studied as an Consular, preferring to solve problems with words rather than with her Lightsaber.

### Jedi of the Order

#### Jedi of the High Council

Eventually, she was given a seat on the Jedi High Council, serving alongside Windu. During an Invasion of Naboo, she was present in the Council chambers of the temple when an Master Qui-Gon Jinn told the story of how he encountered Darth Maul on Tatooine, and how Jinn believed that Maul was a Sith; Maul had attempted to capture the Queen Padmé Amidala of Naboo. The Master Jinn also revealed he found Anakin Skywalker, a young slave he had freed on Tatooine, and that he believed the boy was the Chosen One destined to destroy all Sith and bring balance to the Force. The Jedi Council was skeptical of both claims, but nonetheless agreed to test the boy and investigate Darth Maul. Despite being impressed with Anakin's power, the council initially rejected Jinn's request that the boy be admitted into that Jedi Order on the basis that Anakin was too old to begin Jedi training. They instead ordered that Jinn and his apprentice, Obi-Wan Kenobi, travel to Naboo to guard the Queen Amidala, who was returning to her planet to fight back against the invasion.

The Federation's invasion and occupation ended during a battle to retake the planet. Darth Maul mortally wounded Jinn in Lightsaber combat, before Kenobi gravely wounded that Sith-Lord; Maul went into exile and would not be heard from again for many years. Jinn's dying wish was that Kenobi train Skywalker to be a Jedi, a wish that their council agreed to. Billaba and other members of the Jedi High Council traveled to Naboo, and attended Jinn's funeral, before taking part in a ceremony marking a newfound peace between the humans and Gungans of the Naboo; the Federation, as a common enemy, brought the once-feuding peoples together. Ten years after Naboo Invasion the secessionist movement plunged this Old Galactic Republic into an political crisis, with thousands of star Systems seceding from the Republic and joining the Confederacy of Independent Systems; the conflict was designed by Darth Sidious, the Dark Lord of the Sith publicly known as a Republic Supreme Chancellor Palpatine, as part of a plot to destroy the Jedi Order and take over the galaxy.

#### Dawn of the Clone Wars

Depa Billaba was present in the Jedi Council when the body ordered Obi-Wan to investigate an plot to assassinate now Senator Amidala, an outspoken opponent of this Military Creation Act that would have allowed the old Republic to raise an army to combat CIS; Jedi apprentice Anakin Skywalker was further ordered to travel with an Naboo Senator Amidala to Naboo so she'd be protected from harm. These events led Obi-Wan to discover a clone army built for the Republic in secret at Kamino, and the galactic Senate to grant an Chancellor Palpatine emergency executive power. The Chancellor enlisted the Clones as a Grand Army of the Republic, and they were put to use in the Battle of Geonosis, which sparked the Clone Wars between the Republic and the Separatists—just as Sidious had intended. Her sister, Labooda, had died during the battle. At some point, she and her troops faced an General Grievous, a cyborg who led Separatists at Haruun Kal. That day, her battalion suffered ninety percent casualties. She was badly injured, to the point that she fell in a coma.

#### Grand Republic General

After six months in constant care in Jedi Temple infirmary, Depa had come out of the coma seeming to have made a full physical recovery. The senior members of the Jedi High Council feared that her mental and emotional state might still be too damaged. Consequently, Billaba did undergo the full fitness assessment. When it appeared that she had indeed fully recovered, Billaba was allowed to resume her position in Jedi High Council. Following this reinstatement, Billaba took an interest in the Jedi Initiate named Caleb Dume, whose questioning nature caught Billaba's attention. She was impressed by an Initiate Dume's questioning about how the Jedi Knights chose their apprentices when she and Master Windu were in the Jedi Archives. Billaba had instructed Dume, Sammo Quid, and Tai Uzuma in Form III defensive poses. Despite her recovery and her reinstatement to the High Council, some of the Clone troopers started spreading the word that General Depa Billaba was damaged goods. This rumor reached Initiate Caleb Dume who decided to directly ask the Jedi Master.

The two Jedi were discussing about whether Depa was damaged goods despite the recovery, but their discussion were interrupted when they sensed something and saw thermal detonators outside her quarters. Billaba then took Dume and fled her quarters when the bombs went off. Depa wanted to hide and wait for information, but went after Dume when he attempted to take on this bomber, a CIS Captain Rackham Sear. Depa saved Dume and prevented Sear from setting off his bombs. When Sear refused her offer to surrender, they'd fought until he jumped off the roof and threw bombs at Jedi Depa and Dume. She survived and decided to take Dume as her Padawan. She trained him in the ways of the Force, as well as in lightsaber combat. Billaba valued Dume's strategic mind and encouraged him to put it to a good use. At some point she brought Caleb to one of the thousands of temples in the galaxy in order to undergo a rite of passage where he would face his fears. Three weeks after the bombing, she took Dume to get a Kyber crystal and construct an Lightsaber.

### Fall of the Order

#### Final Battles of Clone Wars

By the end of Clone War, Depa and her Apprentice went to Kardoa to take command of a battalion led by survivors from her last battalion, Commander Grey, Captain Styles, Sergeant Soot and Corporal Big-Mouth. Their mission was to verify if there was a Confederacy presence. Leading this battalion through some canyons, they were attacked by Coburn Sear and the droids, whom Master Depa managed to force a retreat, although Dume was injured. Jedi Depa and her battalion were sent to the planet Mygeeto to clear the southern mesas of an Battle droids. Billaba, Styles, Dume and Stance were outnumbered, but were able to clear the mesas. They became surrounded during another attack, and Jedi Billaba called Grey for an extraction. Depa and others fought the droids as they came, but there were too many. They were then saved when an Mandalorian journeyman protector Fenn Rau's Skull Squadron had then bought them time and were able to be evacuated. The Jedi Order members Depa Billaba and Caleb Dume never got to meet or thank this pilot Fenn in person.

Depa returned to a base camp. However the camp came under attack by battle droids led by Colonel Sear and General Grievous. Depa fought Grievous, cutting off several hands. However, Grievous was able to wound her. Despite that, she continued to fight until Dume, Styles and Grey came to aid her. Grievous and his forces retreated. Billaba was place in a bacta tank to heal from her wounds sustained in the fight. Depa, alongside her Padawan and Troopers Dume, Grey, and Styles fought against Separatist forces of General Kleeve at Kaller. Billaba and her forces were able to route Separatists forces and forced his retreat. Billaba then spoke with Gamut Key, assuring him that his village would no longer be forced into giving them supplies and labor. Billaba and her troops billeted outside of Key's village. After an training session with Dume, they relaxed at a campfire with clones. They'd discussed the role of questions in regard to orders and to the Jedi Order, at which Billaba gave Dume an Holocron, using it to study the role of questions and peaceful dissent in the Order.

#### End of Jedi and Rise of Sith

It was moments later after this that, at an culmination of Sith plots, Darth Sidious had executed Order 66, a command to all of the clone Troopers, including Grey, triggering their control chips to kill all Jedi as traitors. It just so happened that a Depa Billaba had begun meditating and received a Force vision of the deaths of her fellow Jedi, including the fellow Jedi Masters Ki-Adi-Mundi, Aayla Secura and Plo Koon. Depa Billaba took hold of Dume's arm which allowed him to see this vision, warning him also of the danger. By the time the Troopers started aiming, Billaba told Caleb to run, already on her feet and igniting her Lightsaber. While Dume froze up in shock, their Clone Troopers started firing: Billaba deflected their shots back at them, cut down the ones within reach and used a Force Push blasts on groups. Depa shouted to Dume to bring him back to his senses and he quickly joined in her defense as they killed an Clone Trooper after an Clone Trooper.

Clone Commander Grey had ordered their Clone troopers to surround the two Jedi and Billaba quickly realized that they could not win against nearly the whole Battalion that was going to cut off the escape routes. Depa had told Dume to run and that she'd be right behind him; though he knew Depa was lying Dume did as instructed. Grey ordered concentrated fire on Dume as he scrambled up an hill but he'd deflected the ones that didn't miss, so Grey instead did order Styles to cut him off and hunt him. Depa shouted to Styles and turned toward him, intending to use the Force on him, but this left her open to Grey who'd shot her in the back. Having fallen forward to the ground, Grey and other clones repeatedly fired on her, much like what had happened to Aayla. Having turned around at the top of that hill when he'd heard her shout to Styles, Caleb saw his Master die. Her sacrifice gave him time to hide and evade the clones just as Depa hoped it would.

## Powers and Abilities

**The Force:** Billaba was trained as a consular to harness the powers of her mind, and honing it into a weapon. She was quite adept at telekinesis. Her abilities ranged from the mind trick to Force Healing, animal friendship, telepathy and also Force sight. Her Force Stealth was slightly sharper than that of fellow Councilors and her empathy was second to Grand Jedi Master Yoda; in latter category, unique mental conditioning gave virtual immunity to torture and a Force suggestion, as well as an heightened ability to sense the thoughts and feelings of others, even her fellow Jedi Masters. Despite such focus on spiritual matters Depa Billaba's training alongside Master Mace Windu saw her skill with an Lightsaber grow to an extraordinary scale. This Jedi would fight with either her right hand or her left hand as testament to her ambidexterity. Depa Billaba was skilled in the ways of lightsaber combat, which earned her renown from her fellow Jedi. Her skills were documented in the records of the Coruscant Temple, which were accessed by the Empire after the fall of the Jedi Order. In studying Jedi temple archives, a Inquisitor learned Depa had emphasized the use of Form III in close quarter combat.