Post by Cain on Feb 9, 2010 22:09:21 GMT -5
Name: Jack Makura (Makura is Jack's surname and Sith name)
Race: Human
Age: 28
Height: 5'9"
Weight: 145lbs
Appearance:
Pale and slightly built, Jack is not an imposing figure by any stretch of the imagination. Despite an intensely meticulous nature, Jack seems to pay little attention to his appearence. Jack’s long, dark hair is rarely maintained, instead falling haphazardly over dark, sunken eyes. His face bears the scars of a tumultuous descent to the dark side, his eyes surrounded by deeply etched, black bruises caused primarily by years of insomnia. Naturally Jack’s eyes are dark brown, though upon losing his temper they turn to a hue like molten durasteel. Jack’s flesh too has a story to tell of his brutal training on Nar Shaddaa. His chest is a maze of crisscrossing scars, self-inflicted blade wounds intended to test his pain threshold and push his self-preservation abilities with the Force to their limits.
Jack’s standard choice of attire comes in mostly black, including most notably a leather duster worn with the collar popped up. Beneath this, a form fitting black shirt and a heavily taped and bandaged midriff with a pair of black slacks and worn out boots. Jack tends to dress simply. On Nar Shaddaa there were few advantages to standing out in a crowd. Even Jack’s lightsaber is about as simple as they come. The hilt was crudely constructed from spare parts and is little more than a frame holding together the essential components; just enough for the weapon to function. Flashy Jack is not.
Personality: Above all else, Jack values knowledge. From a very early age Jack understood the potential advantages to be had in out thinking an opponent. Knowledge could achieve victories that mere physical strength never could. Jack is an exceptionally brilliant, if not incredibly self-absorbed individual. Perhaps the only thing more fragile than his body is his pride. Jack is quick to anger at any perceived slight to his ego or intelligence.
Usually, though, Jack is cool, calm and collected. Due to the voices in his head, Jack has found himself unable to achieve a full night's sleep in many years. He rests himself largely through meditation, though it often is nowhere near enough. As a result Jack appears, and often acts, exhausted all the time. The only remedy for the voices Jack has found thus far has been his cigarettes. Smoking helps Jack calm his thoughts and goes some way towards allowing him to regain control of his mind, if for only a very short period of time. Although outwardly Jack appears apathetic and unobservant, nothing could be farther from the truth. Despite his lazy appearance Jack is always thinking, calculating and manipulating.
Birth place: Corellia
Faction: Sith Order
Rank: Knight
Previous Faction: The Hutts/ Dark Jedi
Previous Rank: Assassin/ Prophet
Bio:
Jack was born on Corellia, the son of a junkie and ruthless mercenary for hire. Darros Makura was a notorious hit man whose loyalties lay in deep pockets. His life was spent in the shadows, on the run. A child was the last thing he needed or had time for. He was held down already having to watch after a pregnant wife who had become quite a liability. Darros was wanted by the Hutts, a bounty had been placed on his head for thousands of credits worth of gambling debts. Darros had considered what would happen if the Hutts had gotten their hands on Akira... it might have been more merciful if he simply killed her himself. It would be quick and painless. But alas, Darros didn't have the fortitude for that. He knew it. Even as the Hutt's assassins tracked them down to Corellia and slowly moved in... he knew it.
They had found him, it was only a matter of time. Darros' mind was on the twenty or so figures closing in on his position, even as Akira coddled their newborn son. In the back of his mind he could see them bursting in, it was a gift he'd had since he was a child. Darros could see things before they happened, it was a large part of what made him such a successful mercenary. He could see... they would take Akira out first, a clean shot through the chest. If she was lucky it would hit her heart and she'd never have known what hit her. Then they would move on him.
Even as Darros was still foreseeing the events unfolding, suddenly the door to their 11th story apartment on Corellia was blasted apart by a grenade. Immediately afterward, from the dust of the explosion, a single blaster bolt flew into the room and struck the new mother right in the chest. She cried out as she fell and dropped the baby. Darros cringed at the sound of her voice, it hadn't struck her heart. Ten or so men in all black then poured into the room after the blaster bolt, each pointing their rifles at Darros.
Darros' eyes then shot open and his hand jerked upward, blocking the arm of the assassin that had moved in behind him just in time to prevent the cold steel of his blade from ripping across Darros' neck. Gripping the assassin's wrist tightly, Darros swung his would be assailant around in front of him, between himself and the rifles of the other assassins. Never taking their rifles off him, another blaster bolt rang out, striking Darros' hostage through the heart and hitting his right shoulder. Darros fell backward, gripping his wounded shoulder as the assassins moved in. Lifting up one of their rifles they struck Darros in the face with the gun's butt end.
Taking a step back Lynn pulled away the black mask that concealed her face, revealing a beautiful young woman with long bleach blond, almost white hair and tan skin. She raised her arm to signal to the others who hurried in and gathered up the unconscious Darros along with his wife and haul them off. Lynn was about to leave when something caught her attention... the child that lay on the ground would surely die if she left it behind. Usually this sort of thing wouldn't cause Lynn to so much as bat an eyelash, but something was different, something was gnawing at the back of her mind. It was a moment in time, a fault in the Force that only those extremely sensitive to it could perceive. Compelled by the Force, Lynn gathered up the child and took him with his father back to Nar Shaddaa...
Darros was taken to the Smuggler's Moon and brought before Lagra the Hutt. The slug demanded that Darros' debts be paid, otherwise he would be cast down with the others who had failed to give the Hutt his cut. Lagra's Labyrinth they called it. There were whispers here and there on Nar Shaddaa of the horrors and torture that await within Lagra's personal dungeon. Though none of these rumors could be verified as no one who entered the Labyrnith ever returned.
Darros pleaded with Lagra, but there was nothing he could offer the Hutt slug... nothing besides his wife and son. Pleased, maybe just by the anguish such an offer caused Darros, Lagra agreed to the terms, setting Darros loose and keeping his family behind.
It wasn't revealed until after Darros had disappeared again that the shot which had hit Akira had severed her spinal cord, paralyzing her from the waist down. Lagra had little use for a slave who couldn't walk and simply had her put down. It was bitter-sweet, but the deal was not a complete and total loss...
A Deal with the Devil
Lynn was the top assassin employed by Lagra the Hutt to work as his personal guards and muscle. But before she had come to be allied with the Hutts, Lynn Akunin was a Jedi at the academy on Coruscant. Her master was an old Rattataki named Maha Rishi. Though Lynn was an eager and promising student, Master Maha felt her ambition moved quicker than her ability to progress. He constantly stressed to Lynn the importance of patience and control, lessons Lynn interpreted as Maha holding her back. Lynn's older brother, who was also a Jedi, had died when she was very young. After that event she began to question the wisdom of the Jedi Masters who had been unable to save him, Maha in particular...
Despite her doubts, Lynn eventually became a Jedi Knight and continued to team with Master Maha on many of his missions. In an effort to wrestle control of Nar Shaddaa away from the gangsters and the Exchange, the Republic assigned Jedi to protect several diplomats sent to the moon to restore order. Lynn and Master Maha were among them. Their assignment was a Bith senator called Rom Qota, a very high profile assignment considering the bounty the Exchange had on his head. During their mission Lynn was eager to meet the Exchange bosses head on, but Maha insisted that they wait for the attackers to reveal themselves. It made no sense to Lynn to just sit back and wait for the enemy to come and strike the first blow, Maha was going to get them all killed.
Not about to get herself killed for a worthless senator or due to Maha's head games, Lynn went out to find the Exchange on her own. Her search led her to Lagra's Labyrinth, a dizzying maze of tunnels beneath the streets of Nar Shaddaa littered with all sorts of vicious beasts, torture devices and booby traps like something right out of an Indiana Jones film. The rumor that none had ever entered the Labyrinth and lived to tell about it was not entirely accurate. There was only one, Lynn Akunin. Her exploits had thoroughly impressed Lagra who offered her a deal. A promise of even greater powers if she would join with him. Lynn was skeptical at first that a Hutt could teach her anything useful, but once he explained how he would grant her the power, she greedily accepted.
Lynn gave the position of Senator Qota and Master Maha to the Hutts in exchange for the Holocron of a Dark Jedi Lagra had come across quite some time ago. Thanks to the wisdom and power of Master Maha, the attack on the Senator had failed, but Lynn had made her deal with the devil.
The Brutal Tutelage of Lynn Akunin (Age 0 - 12)
Lynn took it upon herself to look after Darros' young son, giving him the name "Jack" after her own fallen brother. The Force was strong with Jack, there was no question about it. Lynn had felt it from the first day she'd met him. But the presence of the Force alone did not guarantee Jack any power. The Force was a powerful ally, but its potential was held down by the weaknesses of it's practitioners.
"Remember, the Force's limits are your limits because the Force... has no limits." These words were taken from Lynn's Holocron and passed down to young Jack. The boy was a quick learner. While not much of a fighter, what Jack lacked in physical strength he more then made up for in intelligence. The child thirsted for knowledge, absorbing anything and everything his teacher told him. Even as a child he was able to grasp the meaning behind Lynn's words. The Force was a powerful thing, but not all could wield such power. Some were stronger, some were weaker. This weakness was not with the Force, but with the individuals. By shedding yourself of weakness you allow the true power of the Force to shine through, the power of the dark side.
Lynn spent many many long hours explaining each of these perceived weaknesses that Jack would have to rid himself of. Lessons would often carry well into the night as Jack almost always had questions, picking at every idea from all paths of logic. A weakness such as compassion for example... Lynn explained that attachments to others who were weaker than yourself would pull you down, force you to divvy your strength among them in a fruitless effort to protect them. Jack countered, noting that Lynn herself was teaching someone who was weak. Lynn explained that there was no "attachment" between the two of them. Her time with Jack was an investment and that when their partnership no longer was needed one would have to cast the other aside. Being so young Jack had naturally become attached to his master. Though he nodded in agreement, he did not truly believe a time would ever come where Lynn would cast him aside, he could not conceive of it at the time.
Lynn reinforced her lessons on weakness through harsh treatment. Forcing the eight year old Jack to find his own way from place to place on the Smuggler's Moon of Nar Shaddaa, forcing him to rely on his own survival instincts to get by. It was during one of his treks through the refugee sector that Jack was first introduced to the game of chess. A pair of vagrants had stumbled across a discarded lightsaber. It didn't work anymore, but it could probably be sold for a high price in any case. Jack knew his master would be very pleased if he could somehow bring the saber back to her, but the bums were fully grown men more then twice his size. Rather then simply killing the fools and making off with his prize, Jack would have to use his wits to get what he wanted.
Aside from their unkempt clothing the vagrants had very few possessions, one being a simple chess game. Noticing it, Jack approached the men with a proposition. He claimed that he knew how to fix the lightsaber, which would make its price on the black market go up considerably. However, he would only offer the service if the men would be willing to make a little wager. Not being strangers to games of chance, the men agreed to the boy's offer. He would challenge them to their chess game, if he won he would get the lightsaber. If they won he would repair it for them. Of course Jack had no idea how to repair the lightsaber, but even though he had never played chess before, he had no intention of losing.
The vagrants explained the rules of the game to Jack. As he thought about all the possible move combination's instantly his mind rejoiced at the possibilities, it appealed strongly to Jack's meticulous nature. The game didn't last long, Jack won handily. Though the bum wasn't ready to admit defeat quite yet and Jack could see this as a weakness in his victim. He offered to play again, this time with the man's chess game at stake. Even though he clearly had no chance, the man could not refuse the offer. In the end Jack had humiliated the man who then refused to hold up his end of the bargain. Using his limited ability at the time in the Force, Jack tried to affect the bum's mind, succeeding in a gentle push of persuasion that caused the man to grudgingly relinquish Jack's winnings.
Jack presented the broken lightsaber to Lynn, but kept the chess board for himself. Studying it in private, he would simulate games against himself, memorizing hundreds of strategic sequences. The way the pieces worked together, the logic and cunning involved, Jack saw parallels between the game and the nature of war and the Force. He would also find that the game would translate well into his blade training. Jack was not very physically imposing, but still Lynn attempted to teach him the basics of lightsaber combat. Using a short katana to train with, Jack practiced to master the basics of Shii-Cho. His strength and speed were sub par, but Jack knew how to make the most of the skills he had. Jack spent his time practicing sequences of blade movement, doing drills day after day after day to work the movements into his muscle memory. This would give the illusion that he was able to move and react quicker then he actually could, though if his opponent were able to engage him for a long period of time the repetitiveness of his movements might cost him the fight. Still, blade to blade combat was the last thing Jack considered when taking on a foe but this solution would at least make it an option.
The Assassination of Senator Qota (Age 13)
When Jack's blade skills had finally begun to take shape and his ability to use the Force progressed far enough, he was at last ready to accompany Lynn on one of her missions. As fate would conspire, the subject of this particular mission was the Bith Senator and Jedi Master who had eluded the Hutt's some thirteen years earlier. Though the Republic's efforts to quell the Exchange had largely failed, Senator Qota was still one of the loudest voices in the Senate calling for the Republic to continue its efforts against the criminal organization. The powers that be on Nar Shaddaa deemed it was at last time to silence the Senator and Lagra's assassins were those selected to carry out the job.
They would travel to Coruscant disguised as refugees. Once there they would make their way into the Senators apartment, garbed in black from head to toe. Unbeknown to the assassins, Master Maha had foreseen the danger that the Senator might have been attracting to himself and had insisted that he and his new Padawan stay and watch over him. Maha's new apprentice was a pretty young girl named Kaylin, only slightly older than Jack.
Lynn had used the Force to help hide the presence of the assassins as they slowly moved in. Jack gripped the hilt of his katana tightly as they approached. Lynn ignited her green lightsaber and used it to cut through the locking mechanism on the Senator's door. The inside of the apartment was dark and with his black mask it was impossible for Jack to see much of anything. He instead let the Force stretch out around him and probe the apartment, rolling over the walls and furniture. The Senator was asleep with Master Maha sitting in silent meditation at the foot of his bed. Outside of the room the young Padawan sat slumped over in a chair, she had fallen asleep as well. As Jack approached her a twinge of doubt rippled over him. He had been taught and thus memorized that such feelings were weakness, but Jack found in actual practice ridding oneself from such vices was quite difficult.
Focused on the girl, Jack couldn't help but pity her. She was so innocent, so pure. What had she done to deserve such a fate? Did he truly have the right to extinguish her life? Through his indecision Jack had failed to notice Master Maha who had been able to sense the clumsily projected feelings of the boy at Qota's bedroom door. Maha stealthily maneuvered himself through the apartment and behind Jack, his blue blade halted only by a green one igniting just behind Jack's neck. Startled, Jack fell forward to find his master's lightsaber locked with that of Maha Rishi. The commotion had awoken Kaylin who ignited a purple lightsaber of her own.
Jack's simple katana was no match for a lightsaber. Instead he took advantage of his opponent's confusion, using the Force to grab her ankles and sweep them out from under her. After she fell Jack moved in quickly, he was no longer thinking, instead allowing the emotion and adrenaline of the situation guide his actions. The fear of Kaylin's lightsaber had succeeded in eroding Jack's prior hesitation. Without a second thought Jack brought his weight down upon his victim and in a panic, ripped his katana from its sheathe and plunged the blade down into the girl's chest. It wasn't until the spatter of blood hit his face that the reality of what he'd done finally dawned on him. Up until then the whole experienced seemed like a movie working in slow motion, beyond his control. Slowly he pulled the blade from her chest. The girl let out a weak cough before falling silent.
With shaky hands Jack gripped his blade and picked himself up. With Maha distracted by Lynn, the other assassins had dispatched the Senator and all moved in on the Jedi Master. Jack watched with quiet awe as the Jedi skillfully held off all of Lagra's assassins, but even he was not immune to the effects of fatigue. Eventually one of the assassin's blades landed a hit. With the Jedi's defenses down almost instantly all of their blades plunged forward and pierced Maha's flesh. Though they had accomplished their mission, Lynn was extremely disappointed in Jack's performance. His indecision had not only cost him a quick kill, but had tipped off the enemy to their presence. Though through the mistake Jack had learned first hand the importance of ridding himself of these weaknesses... and also experienced his first true taste of the dark side.
Learning to Master the Force (Age 13 - 22)
In the wake of Qota's assassination the only voice for the Republic's continued intervention on Nar Shaddaa was stamped out. With the Republic's withdraw Lagra took a strangle hold on the Smuggler's Moon. All ships entering and leaving the system were now forced to pay a tax to the Hutts. It was an unpopular policy, but all ships refusing to pay were confiscated by the Hutts along with their cargo. There were few who dared to argue.
Meanwhile Jack's training in the Force continued. He was proficient in the use of Telekinesis and even studied some of the Jedi teachings on healing. Lynn had pointed out that the Force itself was neither light nor dark during one of their training sessions...
"Dark... Light. Good... Evil. These are just words, labels used by the ignorant to rationalize that which they do not understand. The Force is above the ignorance of sentient beings. It does not have labels nor does it require them. The Jedi however are very keen on the use of words to pervade their weakness down upon others and the result is suffocating. They tell you to beware of the "dark side" and to follow the "light". Calling your rules light and mine dark is a shrewd tactic, but in reality its only weight is with the weak mindedness of those who choose to indulge it."
Jack saw some truth in these words. Could a Jedi not use a technique like Lightning in order to protect or defend? Even if it meant harming would it not be used in much the same way they would use a lightsaber? And by the same token, could a Sith not use his passion to heal and repair his own body? The dark side, after all, was at its very core the preservation of the self above all else. With this in mind Jack began his study of the process of Force Healing. It demanded a great deal of meditation, clearly not something that would be practical for use in the midst of combat, but this certainly did not make it useless. The heightened regeneration, even at basic levels, could mean enhanced endurance which alone could prove useful for Jack. Especially after witnessing the skills of Maha Rishi who was struck down by simple fatigue.
Lynn made certain that Jack would practice this power only through the methods of the dark side. Pain was power. By enduring pain and defeat one could make themselves stronger. Jack was instructed by Lynn to use his katana blade to slice his chest open, only a small amount at first. Then he would spend hours in deep meditation, not permitted to take any food or drink until he was able to heal his wound completely. It was a torturous practice, but Jack came to find the pain of the blade and of his own hunger helped spark the passions within him. The dark side of the Force came to his aid and fueled his abilities. As time passed the gashes and wounds were made worse and worse, adding the threat of potentially bleeding to death if he was unable to heal in time. With practice the ability came more easily, but it was still in a very primitive form.
Jack also focused his attention on an ability that he considered even more important then healing. Protection. Jack's skill was in the Force, not with the blade. If he was going to make the Force a truly formidable weapon he would have to learn to use it for both offense and defense. In theory a Force barrier was a very simple power to employ; simply moving and molding the Force's energy into a sheet to create a wall between one's self and an attacker. This had many potential applications in combat, something that greatly appealed to Jack.
Jack practiced molding the Force as often as he could find time. Most frequently he would head to the industrial sector of Nar Shaddaa, down to where the industrial sewage emptied from a pipe into a drain below. Standing beneath the relentlessly draining waste, Jack would create a barrier above his head and attempt to hold it together as long as he could to keep himself dry. This was an exercise to increase the strength and endurance of his barriers, holding them together sometimes for hours beneath the sewage drain.
The second exercise was based on shape. While a straight barrier was not overly complex, wrapping it around an object was far more difficult. Jack started small, focusing on his katana and attempting to maneuver it by wrapping the Force's energy around it. It proved very tedious work to accomplish something that could otherwise be done with Telekinesis, but there would be greater use for it if Jack were to ever master it.
Jack's training was progressing well, though above all else his focus was on the use of the dark side and its use on the mind in particular. Lynn had shown Jack how harness the power of Force Lightning, letting the Force's energy flow through your body and out your finger tips, raining it down relentlessly on some hapless victim. It struck Jack as a terribly vulgar and not entirely useful application of the Force. As most abilities had potential to be expanded upon and used in different ways, Lightning seemed simplistic to Jack. But still he supposed it had its uses... a pawns movements, while simplistic, were not meant by any means to take the king but instead to scout the foe for weaknesses. Jack supposed that viewing Lightning in the same way would make its use forgivable.
Jack saw much more potential in the Force's use on the mind. The ability to sway and manipulate others without even drawing a blade was an undeniable advantage. Jack had shown some natural proficiency in this even as a young child. He had been able to subtly manipulate the mind of a vagrant for his chess board, and while he could access the power he couldn't figure out how to make it stronger. Despite Jack's attempts his ability to use Telepathy seemed to be impotent. Lynn was little help on the matter and Jack began to grow suspicious of her motives. Recently she had become less and less willing to share information with Jack. Perhaps she had begun to realize that his power was growing to fast for her to control. Perhaps she intended to make good on what she had told Jack a long time ago, "There is no attachment between us. My time with you is an investment and when our partnership no longer is useful it will be time for one of us to cast the other aside."
Jack wasn't able to conceive of such a thing at the time but now it seemed a very real possibility. Jack would take his master's own words to heart, if she would not teach him everything than she was no longer useful to him. The thought of killing still brought a hint of fear to Jack. The experience he had during the mission to assassinate Senator Qota had left some doubt in his mind as to how he might perform if confronted with the same situation a second time, but this didn't dissuade him. Jack knew what he had to do.
Despite Lynn's limited instruction, Jack worked hard to improve his powers of Telepathy. On Nar Shaddaa one could sit anywhere, simply quiet their mind and listen. The mass of life made the Force sound like nothing more than white noise at first. It was difficult to sense much of anything on the moon as all the voices mingled together. Though over time Jack honed his abilities, being able to pick out individuals among the crowd. He would silence all other distractions and focus the whole of his energy on a single target. He could hear the thoughts that his targets had on the surface. Simple things that ofter carelessly ran through their heads. Jack knew there was more to be had... to be able to dig to the very core of one's mind, Jack's voracious appetite for knowledge made the possibility of such a power more appealing then anything else. It was possible... through the Force anything was possible. He just needed to learn how to shed the weakness in himself that was holding him back. Once he had this power he would be ready to cast his master aside...
Jack's research into the Force's effect on the mind had yielded a possible solution to his problem. The Jedi were often known to use the Force to share strength among each other, it was a technique called "Force Meld". But what was more, it was said that the meld could even be used to the point where all the participants consciousness would meld into one as well. Essentially they could share knowledge. After giving it much thought Jack reasoned that if one could share knowledge, could the opposite not also be possible? Could one take knowledge away using the same premise? It would be risky, but in theory it should work.
Jack would have to spend time researching and practicing the Force Meld in preparation for testing his theory. At first just projecting simple emotions on his targets during his "listening time". Most of those on Nar Shaddaa were already stressed near the breaking point. It didn't take much coaxing to push them over the edge. Next he would attempt to influence the actual thoughts of others, a far more difficult task. The Force stretched out like an avenue between Jack and those he targeted. By sending his own thoughts along these pathways into the minds of others, most couldn't tell them apart. However this would never work against a more shrewd mind that could tell the difference.
The final step was actually moving the Force. Moving it from himself to another wasn't something Jack ever saw himself needing to do, but if Drain Knowledge proved possible, reversing this process would also become useful. To experiment with this Jack picked out a refugee huddled at the side of the street. The man was ill and near death. In order to pull off the technique Jack had to become perfectly still and center himself. He carefully moved the Force from around himself to the man lying on the street. It didn't take long for the man to take notice, though as soon as Jack began to feel himself growing exhausted he cut the power off. It would need more polish if Jack was going to be able to use it as efficiently as he hoped. Force Meld wouldn't be mastered over night, but when the time came to use it Jack would be ready.
Constructing a Lightsaber (Age 21)
During one of Jack's meditations Lynn approached him and requested he drop what he was doing. Jack didn't like being interrupted but he complied without complaint. Lynn explained that it was time Jack constructed his own lightsaber. She presented him with the broken saber he had brought to her eight years earlier. It was still in the same sorry condition it had been when he'd won it from the bum in the refugee sector. There was no crystals, no lens and a useless power cell. About all the saber had that Jack could use was its casing. He would have to find the three other components on his own.
Jack was given Lynn's Aurek tactical strikefighter to use for his mission. Lynn had only provided the names of planets where Jack might find the parts he needed, after that it was up to him. The first world on the list was Tatooine. Jack's fighter landed in Anchorhead and from there he began his search.
Not really having any idea where to start, Jack wandered into the local cantina for a drink. A woman on the other side of the cantina caught his attention. She was seated across from a Duros with a chess board in between them. The pieces on the board where holoprojections, modeled after Jedi it seemed. After the woman input her move there was a pause before the Duros stood up, angrily slamming his fists down on the board before pulling out a blaster pistol. Jack didn't speak Durese but he could tell the Duros had though the woman cheated.
Jack approached the table, placing his hand on the Duros' shoulder, "It was a fair game. I'd best cut my losses and leave now," Jack's mind trick accompanied by the calm emotion Jack let pour into the Duros caused him to lower his weapon and simply walk out. The woman raised an eyebrow, she was impressed with Jack's abilities. She introduced herself as "Cele" and Jack sat down at the table. Evidently Cele had been at the chess game all day, swindling drunken patrons out of their hard earned credits. She was good, there was no doubt. Observing the arrangement of the pieces from her last game Jack couldn't help but admire the beauty of her strategy. He was eager to challenger her himself.
As the game began Jack started with his knight. Cele countered with a pawn, placing it in a position where his knight could easily take it on the next turn. However, doing so would allow the queen to take his knight. Jack attempted to listen to his opponent's thoughts, but they were strangely silent. Jack couldn't feel anything at all from this Cele. Was she somehow able to mask her presence in the Force at such a close range? Jack couldn't figure it out and nothing annoyed him more than not knowing.
Jack moved his pawn out diagonal to his opponents, tempting her to take it. She did not. Instead she drew out her bishop. The piece that resembled a bearded Jedi Consular moved out to its place and the board suddenly flashed "Checkmate". Jack was stunned. Two moves? Two moves! It was impossible, unfathomable. Jack found himself leaping up and slamming his hands down on the table. He accused her of using the Force to gain an unfair advantage. She only snickered at Jack, assuring him that he was the only one able to do such things. If that were true then Jack would call her bluff. He wrapped the force around Cele's neck and began to squeeze. To his surprise her flesh tore open to reveal... wires? She was a synthetic... a droid.
Taking advantage of Jack's distraction, Cele quickly drew her blaster pistol and squeezed off one round. Jack reacted to it just in time to dive out of the way and only take a glancing blow on his left shoulder. After the shot Cele leaped up and made a dash for the exit. Jack followed close behind her, chasing the droid through the streets of Anchorhead. She led him to an old droid repair shop. Inside Cele handed her winnings to an Ithorian as Jack burst in after her. Cele raised her pistol again but the Ithorian placed a hand on the blaster so that she'd lower it. Jack kept his hand on his katana sheathed at his hip. The Ithorian identified himself as Yarma Laka the master craftsmen. He had constructed Cele solely for the purpose of playing and winning at games such as Pazaak and Chess. Yarma recognized that Jack was not all to pleased with having been swindled and offered to pay him back his winnings. However, Jack had a better idea after noticing the forge and glass parts Yarma had all around his shop. Jack told him he could keep the money if he would make the lens he needed. Yarma agreed.
The Ithorian's work was excellent, the lens was a work of perfection. Though now that he had what he wanted, Jack felt the need for a little retribution. A droid's memory was contained on a simple chip, which fortunately was much easier to extract than an organic's memory. Once he had his lens Jack crushed the droid's body into scrap with the Force. When Yarma tried to reach for his blaster Jack turned and lit into the Ithorian with Force Lightning. Killing came much easier this time, but Jack still grimaced at the charred corpse of his victim. So uncivilized. Jack then cracked open the synthetic's skull and extracted its memory core before leaving.
Jack's next destination was Corellia. It was a world he'd not been to since he was a day old. Jack had no memory of Corellia or his real parents. As such the journey there seemed as unassuming as any other. However, as soon as Jack landed on the planet he could feel something was off. A wave of sadness washed over him as well as pain through his chest. As he moved about the planet the negative feelings grew stronger and stronger until finally the drew him to an apartment building. The building seemed to have been abandoned for quite some time. The rooms hadn't received any sort of maintenance in years. Most of the windows were shattered allowing the wind and rain to blow freely through the halls. Even so, the whole area felt colder than it should.
Exploring the structure Jack finally came to the eleventh floor. One of the apartment door frames was mangled and misshapen, as if it had been blown apart. Upon entering that room the pain in Jack's chest became searing. He gripped his sides and fell to his knees, gasping for breath. It was then that Jack heard the twin thud of a pair of heavy boots settling in the doorway behind him. He spun around to see an older man who wreaked of Corellian Ale holding a blaster rifle on him. Strangely, the man felt very familiar to Jack.
"I recognize that clothing. You're one of the Exchange's assassins aren't you? Lagra took my wife... Lynn took my boy. Now you want to take me too. Well that ain't gonna happen. Whatever mistakes I've made I've paid my debt and then some. I just want to be left in peace," The man's words startled Jack. He stood up slowly, telling the old man that he was not here for any bounty and demanded that he identify himself. The man said his name was Darros Makura. He went on to explain to Jack what had happened to him, how the Hutts had taken his family and left him with nothing. Jack could sense no deception in him. Lynn had never said much about where Jack had come from, but if the man's story was true... Jack was pretty sure he could piece it together.
Jack could feel the echoes of pain and death here. It was a pain that began to overwhelm him in the form of grief. Grief which turned to anger towards Lagra and Lynn. Anger towards this dead beat old man who had sold his family to save his own worthless life. Anger... became hatred. Like a flame the hatred slowly began to grow, filling every fiber of Jack's being until it was a raging inferno. As he glared at Darros the old man's very existence repulsed him. He could feel the Force flowing freely between the two of them and he couldn't stand it any longer. Jack focused all his hate on his father, his thoughts chanting almost audibly his desire for the old man's death. Concentrating his seething emotions on the Force connecting to Darros Jack shattered it under the weight of his emotion. Darros immediately gasped, grabbing at his chest and crumpling over. The old man's anguish was intoxicating. Jack eagerly drunk it in, feeling re energized by its power.
When Jack's assault was finished Darros was little more than a hollowed out corpse. Jack checked the man for anything useful. He didn't have much aside from a few weapons. One however was fitted with a lightsaber power cell. Had Lynn known he would find this man here? Perhaps she was more cunning than he had originally thought. He would have to be cautious moving forward.
Jack's final destination was the ancient Sith world of Korriban. Though there may have once been great power on Korriban, when Jack found it the planet was nothing more then a shadow of its former self. The tombs of the great Sith had long since been looted and left abandoned. There were no signs of life anywhere say for the Tukata that roamed the Valley of the Dark Lords at night. Jack knew however what it was he would need to find here. There was a cave not far from the Valley of the Dark Lords where it was said the Dark Lord Ludo Kressh had been buried. The dark side was faint inside, distant. Any power this place had once had was long since used up, but Jack pressed foward anyway.
The walls of the cavern were barren. Jack really didn't know where he'd find a crystal in a place like this, but he was certain they were here. Jack's search brought him to a large chamber within the cavern. A stagnant pool of water rippled lightly... there was absolutely no wind inside the cave, the ripples could only indicate that something else was present. Jack drew his sword and stretched out with the Force. Suddenly Jack was attacked from behind by a Hive Kinrath. Jack quickly rolled to the side, slicing off the Kinrath's stinger with his blade as he brought it across his body. The Kinrath let out a high pitched shriek that Jack swiftly silenced with a blast of Lightning.
Once the creature stopped moving Jack discovered what had made it act out so aggressively. There was an unhatched egg in the chamber, the Hive Kinrath was its mother. Jack stepped up to the egg and smashed it open with his blade. There wasn't much inside other then green goo. But among the organic muck was a red stone. It was a lightsaber crystal.
Having retrieved all three parts he needed, Jack returned to Nar Shaddaa. There Lynn instructed him piece the weapon together, focusing the Force on the crystal he'd found in order to increase its power. Jack did as instructed, using the Force to carefully assemble the pieces of his lightsaber and imbue his crystal with the dark side's power. He concentrated on the hatred he'd felt on Corellia, focusing it into his lightsaber's crystal before setting it into place. When the weapon was completed Jack turned it on. The blade flared to life with a crack and a low hum. The crimson light of the blade washing over him reminded Jack of the blood spattering across his face during his first kill.
Darkness Take You... (Age 22-24)
Jack's training was just about complete. Now was the time to finally end his partnership with Lynn and with the Hutts. The Hutt tax on ships moving in and out of Nar Shaddaa had turned into an all out blockade when several Onderonian ships refused to pay. In response the Republic had finally woken up and sent some of its own ships to assist the Onderonians. The result at the moment was a stalemate between the two sides. This was the opportunity Jack had been waiting for. During the stalemate, Lagra's guards had been stretched thin, most being used on board the Hutt slug's personal fleet of ships. There was only one left behind to watch over Lagra himself. This might have been sufficient to ward off any opportunistic bounty hunter, but Lagra did not expect his murderer to come from within.
Jack was able to enter Lagra's compound without trouble and even walk right into the room where the Hutt was lounging. The single guard was caught completely unprepared, Jack wrapped a Force Barrier around him and constricted it, slowly crushing his bones. Lagra tried to make a move for his alarm, but his tremendous girth impeded his progress. Jack used the Force to smash the Hutt's control panel before raining Lightning down on Lagra. With both hands he pumped the Force's power out, the bolts of electricity arcing and forking off several times before coursing through their victim's thick flab.
With the controls destroyed the communication between Lagra's fleet and their commander was severed. In the confusion one of the inexperienced admirals summized that the Republic had somehow gotten through and ordered his ship to open fire. The Republic returned fire and without any cohesive command it was only a matter of time before Lagra's fleet would be decimated.
After several hours of fighting Lynn saw that things were falling apart and quickly abandoned the fight to return to the surface. The Republic troops would land soon, she couldn't let them take her prized possession. Back on the moon Lynn hurried to her quarters only to find they had already been broken into. Inside was her ambitious apprentice Jack. She arrived just in time to find him crushing her Holocron.
Lynn's reaction to the Holocron's destruction was curious. She did not explode into rage as Jack had hoped. She was angry, though her emotions were measured with no hint of surprise. It was almost as if she'd expected to find Jack here. He had thought that finding him here stealing her most closely gaurded secrets about the Force would send Lynn over the edge. Unfortunately, Jack had been unable to figure out how to access the holocron, but Lynn didn't know that... did she? Irregardless, there would be only one way to get the information that was on that holocron now.
All of Jack's training had prepared him for this moment. The ability to drain a foe's knowledge by reversing the effects of a Force Meld was only a theory Jack had and one that he had never actually proven in practice... but it was now or never.
Jack followed the tendrils of the Force back to Lynn. Despite her demeanor, her mind seethed, but this was only what was on the surface. Jack needed to go deeper. Reversing the process that sent the Force out from his body Jack began to tug at the mind of his opponent. When that did not work he began to violently tear at it. Her resistance was strong and Lynn grabbed her head as she began to feel the strain of Jack's assault. Jack's head too throbbed with pain as if his skull would split in two. The tug of war between the two only took seconds, but it seemed like an eternity before at last the dam ruptured. Lynn's thoughts were savagely torn from her head, the sudden flood of information was more then Jack could have ever imagined. He let out a scream and fell to his knees as it was almost too much for him to bear.
When the ordeal had ended Jack was left shaking on the ground and Lynn was catatonic. Her body lay motionless, blankly staring up at the ceiling. Jack could not stop shaking, he could hear her in his head still cursing him. Without knowing how to control his power he had inadvertently taken too much.
Struggling to compose himself Jack fled to his Aurek tactical strikefighter. The ship was small enough to slip past the Republic blockade which allowed Jack to escape Nar Shaddaa.
From that day onward Jack would be relentlessly haunted by the thoughts of his former master. So much so that he had all but given up sleeping for fear of the torment that await him within his own head. Instead resting himself only through meditation. Jack's first attempt to drain someone's thoughts had been costly. For one most of what he'd received from Lynn was an overwhelming fog of thoughts. The information he'd sought was lost among a jumble of memories, emotions and information about his old master he certainly didn't need. It would take more time to perfect this technique and to make any sense of what he'd taken from Lynn... but time was what he had now.
Dead or Alive (Age 24 - 25)
Jack's exploits on Nar Shaddaa had earned him more than just his freedom. Lagra's brother and partner, Tagrenn the Hutt, had made certain that Jack Makura became one of the most wanted men in Hutt Space. With such a large purse on his head Jack found himself under seige from every cutthroat, junkie, and wannabe mercenary beyond the inner rim.
With the fringes of the galaxy gunning for him, Jack looked to the core worlds for refuge. During his time hopping from planet to planet Jack began attempting to repair the damage done when he had killed his old master. Though, with each passing day matters only grew worse for Jack. The disembodied voice of Lynn was a constant torment. Jack could do little to control or suppress it. Sleep had become nearly impossible. It was during this time that Jack's appearance began to deteriorate. Insomnia caused his eyes to grow sunken and bruised, and his flesh to become sickly pale.
Jack's powers had grown rapidly, but his ability was not yet able to match. He would need to learn more; more about the dark side than his Master had been able to teach him. Unfortunately for Jack, knowledge of the dark side wasn't something one found simply surfing the holonet. At the time there was only one place in the galaxy known to house such dangerous information. The Jedi Temple on Coruscant. It was no coincidence that Jack's path led him then to the Republic capital.
Jack fit in well with the dregs and spice junkies of the undercity, but not so much with the nobles and politicians above, and especially not with the Jedi. Jack had arrived on one of the most densly populated worlds in the galaxy, and the home of the Jedi Order wracked by the dark side with a small fortune on his head. Clearly he didn't have a plan.
Indeed, trying to keep a low profile in such a high profile place proved an impossible task. Among the many mercinaries and bounty hunters hired by Tagrenn the Hutt personally, Amon Darklighter was certainly the most infamous. Amon was an Anzat famous in Hutt Space for consuming the brains of his charges and returning them to his clients as drooling, catatonic trophies. He caught up with Jack in a dive bar on level 1170 beneath the streets of Coruscant.
Jack was never one for crowds, though anything to occupy his mind was preferable to solitude. As he often did, Jack brought the chess game he'd kept with him since he was boy and challenged all comers. He accepted bets in the form of credits or cigarettes. Jack found nicotine went some way toward helping quiet his mind and as such had become something of a chain smoker.
Amidst a cloud of smoke and a crowd of onlookers Amon found Jack, raking in a pile of credits after yet another checkmate. With the rest of the room shying away, Amon accepted Jack's challenge. The two had words during their game, and it soon became very apparent why the Anzat was really here. A fight broke out and Jack did all he could to escape in the confusion. He likely would have failed were it not for some unlikely assistance.
Auren Sol, a mercenary herself, though one of the few who wasn't interested in the bounty on Jack's head. Auren was more interested in revenge. Amon Darklighter had taken her entire family to Tagrenn the Hutt. He hadn't quite murdered them, no, instead they joined the others Amon brought to his most lucritive client, sadistic decorations in the Hutt's personal cantina. Auren wanted him dead, but she couldn't do this alone. She knew Jack had to have been strong in the Force to have killed Lagra and so many of his assassins. Auren sought him out on Coruscant hoping that he might teach her to fight like him.
After saving Jack from the bar, Auren whisked him offworld. Jack was reluctant to train her at first. Knowledge was a precious thing; the most precious thing, in fact. Jack was very careful of what he shared and with whom. Upon giving it some thought, an idea began to form in Jack's mind. He may have been too far tainted by the dark side to come within a mile of the Jedi Temple without arousing suspicion, but this girl was still a blank canvas. He would have to be careful of what he taught her, but if done correctly, she could become his eyes and ears inside the Jedi's stronghold. The odds of success were slim, but it was the only real option available. And if it were to fail, it would be Auren who would take the fall. Jack agreed to take Auren as an apprentice.
Jack and Auren retreated to Mygeeto, a remote, frozen world where he could train his new apprentice in secret. Progress was slow, and Jack struggled with how he might tap into the power of Auren's anger without her becoming too dark to eventually infiltrate the Jedi. He couldn't teach her to use the light side, in all honesty Jack knew very little of the nature of the light side, or certainly not enough to be useful. The girl's training was an enigma that he wrestled with in secret.
Auren was only a few months into her training when she received a message over the holonet from Nar Shaddaa. Tagrenn the Hutt was throwing a party to celebrate the public execution of a Republic SIS agent found to have infiltrated his inner circle. Every scum bag to have ever parked a frieghter on Tagrenn's moon was on the guest list. It was almost certain that Amon would be in attendance. Auren was eager to use this opportunity to test what she'd learned. Jack knew showing his face at such a gathering was tantamount to suicide. It did however present a unique chance to strike down a very large number of his enemies all in the same place. With Tagrenn dead, Jack might actually be able to show his face in a civilized system again.
The proposal was dangerous, and his apprentice was not ready. Logic would dictate that despite the gains, such an endeavor was foolhardy. However, Auren was adamant that she was prepared to face Darklighter. In a moment of weakness, Jack relented.
Tagrenn's savage gala was a spectical of opulence and hedonism. Jack and Auren attended disguised and under stolen identities. Following the execution, Jack struck out on his own to find Tagrenn in his personal chambers and end the bounty on his head. He had instructed his apprentice to wait for him in the ballroom. Auren was having none of it.
Jack followed Tagrenn to the Hutt's personal landing pad. There he found Amon waiting for him, holding a vibroknife to Auren's neck. Jack realized then that he'd allowed her too close to him. In listening to her plight and her life story during their time on Mygeeto, and having shared some of his own, Jack weakened himself. He'd been a fool to trust her, to care for even half a second. The price would be heavy, but Jack would not be the one to pay it. All he would lose was an apprentice.
Jack ignored the Anzat's threats and Auren's pleas. He extended both hands and blasted both with Force Ligthning. Auren took most of the punishment and was killed after several torturous seconds. Amon writhed and threw himself back. His hostage had taken a lethal dose of the onslaught for him, though he suffered hideous burns.
Stoked by rage, Amon threw himself at Jack. Physically Darklighter was every bit Jack's superior. A second attempt at lightning did little to slow Amon from wrestling Jack to the ground and wrapping his hand around Jack's throat. The Anzat's feelers emerged from his cheeks. He would use them to consume Jack's brain through his nostrils... a hell of a way to go. Unable to move, Jack needed to do something desperate. He had one more ace up his sleeve. Jack closed his eyes and began to draw from Amon's mind with the Force, much as he had with Lynn. It took Darklighter a moment to react, though once he realized what was happening Amon howled and recoiled, falling off Jack and clutching the sides of his head.
Jack cut off his attack, knowing better than to finish his foe by draining his knowledge a second time. Instead Jack stood over the stunned bounty hunter and drew his katana.
"Shh, don't fight it," Jack whispered, plunging his sword slowly down into Amon's gut. The Anzat coughed up and choked on his own blood before at last falling silent.
Jack drew his blade from his foe and wiped away the blood just in time to watch Tagrenn's ship lift away from the landing pad. The Hutt would have to wait for another day.
Hello darkness, my old friend... (Age 25 - 26)
After losing Auren and once again escaping Nar Shaddaa, Jack found himself perhaps even more lost than the last time he'd fled Hutt Space. This time, however, an intriguing new opportunity had revealed itself. The Sith, an ancient order of dark force users thougt long extinct had made their presence known. Whispers told of there homeworld, a planet shrouded by the dark side. If the rumors were true, the Sith were just what Jack needed to cure his rapid degeneration and control his power.
Jack's search led him to Korriban, a dusty tomb of a world. Jack's hopes were high upon arriving, he could feel the dark side here, however faint. In the months that followed he would join the ranks of the initiates, and what a sad rabble they were. Life on Korriban was less about learning and more of a 24/7 d**k measuring contest. Jack was content to watch the comings and goings on Korriban for his first months. He observed his peers jockey with one another like male bantha in a mating dance, attacking anything that dared to give them a sniff. The instructors divied out their time and attention only to the initiates most adept at ass kissing, while the rest were left climb over each other for so much as a second look.
Jack wasn't interested in the swimsuit competition for the instructors attention. Instead he busied himself exploring the temple and the valley of the dark lords near by. What he found was disappointing. The tombs in the valley had long since been emptied. The teachings of the great Lords of the Sith were lost to blowing sands and slow minds. Korriban may not hold what Jack needed after all. If it did, the only place it could be was with the Dark Council and the Dark Overlord himself. If the Overseers were difficult to get the attention of, the Dark Council was near impossible.
The Jedi Temple was clearly still the best repository of knowledge about the Force, dark and light, in the known galaxy. Even so, Jack was not ready to give up on Korriban and the Sith just yet. On a day like most others Jack found himself in the grand entrance hall of the Sith Temple, people watching as he often did. A conversation with another initiate, a Firrerreo called Nieraan, gave Jack an idea.
Jack wasn't about to play the game the others were, he'd get the attention of the Lord of the Sith in a much more direct manner. Jack stood up in the middle of the Sith Temple's entrance and blasted the nearest support pillar with lightning. The destruction startled the other initiates, and amused Nieraan. The display was less about posturing and more about waking the slumbering giants in the deep, dark recesses of the temple. To this end, Jack's actions could not have been more successful.
The Sith flocked to the scene of such a brazen act of defiance, among them, the Dark Overlord himself. Darth Iniquitous greeted Jack and Nieraan with a wave of power that tore through Jack's defenses and sent him sprawling. This was what Jack had been searching for.
After a good deal of lecturing, Iniquitous was intrigued enough by Jack to offer him an opportunity to become his apprentice. The catch was that he would have to fight for it. His opponent would be another initiate, Tesa Yarum. Sizing her up, Tesa reminded Jack quite a bit of Auren. Her abilities were more finely toned, granted she had been training with the Sith far longer than Auren had been Jack's apprentice. Though in her was the same fire... and perhaps the same weakness.
There was little time to think as Jack and Tesa's duel before the whole of the Sith Temple had begun. Tesa attacked cautiously, feeling Jack out for weaknesses without pressing the offensive. A wise approach, but exactly the wrong one to take against Jack. Without being pressured, there was little need for Jack to rely on his lackluster physical attributes. Jack channeled the Force and attacked Tesa's mind carefully, as he had to defeat Amon Darklighter on Nar Shaddaa. The approach wasn't as effective on a trained Sith. Tesa was able to clear her thoughts and thwart Jack's attack. It was a strategy Jack had not yet encountered. He might have been able to force the memories from Tesa, though that would mean pushing the ability and risk further damage to his own mind. Jack was not willing to take this risk.
Jack was surprised that Tesa had not tried to test him with a lightsaber yet, but her hesitence was his advantage. Jack attacked again, this time with raw dark side power in the form of Force Lightning. Tesa was not able to fend off this assault. Jack may have finished her then and there had Iniquitous not stopped the fight. In a strange decision, the Dark Overlord named both Jack and Tesa as his apprentices. Jack was now a Sith, and what's more he sat just beneath the Overlord himself. Unfortunately, that seat was a bit crowded.
Following the duel and his joining the Sith as an apprentice, Jack saw very little of Darth Iniquitous. The Overlord left his apprentices to do the work of the Sith Order on their own for the most part. Iniquitous had given Jack and Tesa orders to seek out recruits strong in the Force to swell the Sith's ranks. Jack agreed to the mission, though he had no intention of funneling more pawns to Iniquitous' side.
The Overlord's decision to make Tesa his apprentice despite her loss had urked Jack, but more so than that, Iniquitous' ideas about the Sith and the dark side did not sit well with Jack. Iniquitous considered the Sith a unit, a "family" if you will, and felt that strength would come through unity. Jack could not disagree more. The dark side's power was power of the individual, at the expense of others when necessary. Unity was weakness. He'd been close to Auren and it got her killed. There was no place for solidarity among the Sith. Jack would use his position to advance his own ends.
What Jack needed was a new pawn to help him gain access to the Jedi's Temple on Coruscant. Jack was convinced this was where the real answers would be found. Tesa was an intersting candidate, though she trusted him about as much as a toydarian used speeder salesmen. She would be difficult to crack. Instead Jack put out his feelers for other potentials, using their mission to find and recruit Force sensitives to the Sith as his cover. Tesa was suspicious of Jack's motives, but she had no idea what he was after.
The pair's search brought them to Ralltiir, where a Jedi Healer named Kyo Sartori had been sent to investigate a Force user attacking civilians on the planet. Disguised as a newly wed couple, Jack and Tesa gained access to the hospital holding the many injured. There they confronted the Jedi, and Jack used his gifts with telepathy and manipulation to lure the Jedi to his side. Kyo had come to Ralltiir suspecting the attacks were caused by his brother, a fallen Jedi. Once Jack found this out, it was blood in the water. He convinced Kyo that he would be able to help him find his brother and took the Jedi with him offworld.
From there Jack met up with his old friend Nieraan in a cantina on Metellos. Jack did not consider Nieraan useful in helping him infiltrate the Jedi. The Firrerreo was a Sith through and through. Nieraan would prove useful in other ways, however. Jack officially recruited Nieraan to his cause on Metellos, not giving any details of his exact endgame (he'd learned his lesson already about revealing too much), instead only suggesting that he intended to work for himself, and not the Sith as a whole.
All went to plan, though an unexpected guest would turn this meeting upside-down. Kyo's master had been a member of the Jedi High Council, Master Si Quan. The Jedi Master had discovered Kyo missing on Ralltiir and followed the evidence to Jack and his ship on Metellos. From there he discovered the two Sith in the cantina. Si Quan was an opponent at a level Jack had not yet encountered before, say perhaps for Darth Iniquitous, though the two of them never actually fought. Jack did not fully appreciate the power of a Jedi Master, or the light side for that matter. As Si Quan engaged Nieraan, Jack charged in with his katana and lept at the Jedi. Without even drawing his own weapon, Master Quan disarmed Jack with a quick defensive swipe of his forearm, and cracked his ribs with a rapid open palm strick to the side.
Jack clearly could not stand toe to toe with such an enemy... Nieraan proved far more adept at this. Wielding two lightsabers, Nieraan was able to hold his own against the Jedi Master. With the Jedi's attention on Nieraan, Jack found where he could be useful. Out of sight, Jack used the Force to attack Si Quan's mind. As a duo, Jack and Nieraan were a formidable pair, every bit a match for a High Council Member. This particular Jedi, however, was no stranger to telepathic manipulation. Si Quan was able to break Jack's assault and ultimately subdue Nieraan with an explosive display of telekinetic Force power. The fight destroyed the cantina, and the two Sith managed to barely escape their encounter with the Jedi Master.
No Rest for the Wicked (Age 26 - 27)
Jack returned to Korriban with a Jedi in tow. Kyo was promptly thrown to the jailors to hold until Jack could bend him into the tool he desired. In the mean time, Jack had some shaping up to do of his own.
Of all the hermits on Korriban, the Dark Overlord of the Sith was the most reclusive. Jack had only seen Iniquitous twice until this point, despite having been his 'apprentice'. When he was summoned to Iniquitous' chambers, Jack was more surprised than anything. The Dark Lord had finally deemed it time to give Jack some proper instruction in the ways of the Sith.
The philosophy was nothing new to Jack, it was really the physical aspects that needed work. Iniquitous' first session was dedicated to improving Jack's lightsaber skills. The pattern drills Lynn had taught him on Nar Shaddaa were outdated and predictable, and Jack was far too slow to compensate for these shortcomings.
Jack was trained as any Initiate or Youngling would be. Simple though it may have been Jack still struggled. It was only after absorbing many a blast from the remote droid and becoming intimately familiar with the training room floor before Jack's blade finally began to catch up to the blaster bolts.
The first week of training was humiliating, without a doubt. A twenty-six year old Sith flailing at a remote droid while teenagers and children all around him expertly knock aside every bolt. With each fall Jack quietly reassured himself that he could kill every one of them before they would even think to reach for their weapons.
With time Jack mastered the remote. Not an incredible feat, but it was far more then he'd ever managed on Nar Shaddaa. With his basic lightsaber training shaping up, Iniquitous began to teach Jack something even more useful. Jack had shared his troubles with controlling the power of his Drain Knowledge ability with Iniquitous. The Dark Lord admitted freely that he was no expert in telepathy, but did have a potential solution that might enable Jack to at least control his voices.
Jack's most glaring weakness, Iniquitous observed, was his short temper. Emotion was a great source of power, however, if not properly controlled it could also prove a great liability. Iniquitous speculated that the voices Jack hears may be taking advantage of this. He suggested meditation techniques that would help channel his emotion and use it more practically.
It wasn't too long ago that Jack would avoid solitude. He would search for large crowds to drown himself in the white noise of the Force. Now Jack retreated to the roof of the Sith Temple, to sit alone with nothing but his mind and the dark hum of Korriban. Here he would put the techniques Iniquitous had taught him to use, retreating within himself in an attempt to flesh out his demons.
Jack's mind was busy with voices and traces of all the minds he'd attacked with his drain knowledge ability. Most were only just that; traces. Amon Darklighter, Si Quan, Tesa... they were easy to cull and subdue once Jack was able to make sense of the noise. Lynn, however, remained elusive. Like a cancer; everywhere and nowhere.
Days turned to months as Jack fought his most persistant demon. His routine had become quite single minded until one day one of the jailors rushed up to the temple rooftop with urgent news. Kyo Sartori had escaped. The Jedi's cell was empty and there was no trace to suggest where or how he had gone.
After calmly crushing the jailor's neck, Jack decided it was time to get serious. Jack was tinkled... but he could use this. He retreated to meditate again, this time making no attempt to conceal or control his emotions at first. Like a Gamorrean to the slop, Lynn could not resist. After luring his master out, Jack slowly ratched his emotions back, channeling them for a final strike that at last neutralized his old master.
With Lynn under his power, Jack was finally able to understand some of the information he'd adsorbed the day he'd killed her. One memory stood out to Jack among the rest. Lynn removing the crystal matrix from her old holocron and hiding it away beneath a false tile in the floor of her chambers.
So much of what had happened that day now made sense to Jack. When he'd broken into Lynn's room he had found the holocron with little trouble. His master had kept it on the nightstand, displayed plainly. When Jack attempted to activate it, nothing he did evoked any response. When Lynn entered and caught him struggling with the device, he'd destroyed it without much thought. Jack hadn't had time to inspect the holocron. He hadn't even noticed it was only a shell, missing its most important piece.
This new information gave rise to an intriguing possibility. The crystal matrix, and all the knowledge within, could still be hidden beneath the floors of what was now Tagrenn's Palace. Retrieving it, however, would mean another trip into the belly of the beast on the Smuggler's moon.
Makura (Age 27 - 28)
On Nar Shaddaa once more, Jack couldn't very well show his face on the streets. His plan was to instead infiltrate the palace from below, through the sewers. The stink and filth was the least of Jack's problems here, as Tagrenn's many beasts roamed free in the labyrinth of tunnels below the palace. Jack's endeavor led him into Tagrenn's throne room via the beast pit and the trap door used to drop victims below. Fortunately Tagrenn and his gang were nowhere in sight.
It had been nearly four years, though Jack still knew the layout of the palace like the back of his hand. Lynn's chambers it seemed had been repurposed into an armory, with warstaffs, vibroblades and blasters hung over all the walls. The false tile Jack had seen in his vision was hidden beneath a massive gun rack placed in the center of the chamber. As carefully as he could, Jack slid the rack aside with the Force. His gentle touch still did nothing to quiet the screech of the metal grinding over the marble floor tiles. The noise did not seem to have attracted any attention. Jack removed the false tile and at last, there it was.
Using the Force, Jack suspended the naked crystal lattice in the air just above his upturned palm. Once it was touched by the dark side again, the long dormant crystals came back to life. The projection of the gatekeeper appeared in front of Jack. He was a tall, barrel chested man with long silver hair tied back into a pony-tail. Jack recognized the man from Lynn's memories. Alex Drake was once a Jedi High Council Member and one of the most powerful telepaths of his time. However, an affair with a fellow council member began Drake's fall from grace. A slow decent into madness led Master Drake to murder his lover and flee from the Jedi. The exact circumstances of his demise were not known to Lynn, save for that he was likely killed by the Jedi.
The fallen Jedi gatekeeper was most uncooperative to begin with, regarding Jack as a fool child who'd injured himself trying to "play dark side games". Before, such taunts might have been enough to irk Jack. This time, however, Jack kept his calm. He explained what he knew about Master Drake's life, and how he'd obtained that information through ripping it from the mind of Drake's last student. Once Jack explained how he'd come to teach himself to drain the knowledge of others, Master Drake became more receptive, if not still condescending.
Alex told Jack that, while certainly demonstrating an impressive ingenuity in being able to formulate such a technique himself, the flaw with his drain knoweldge was in fact it's original concept. The Jedi Mind Meld shared knowledge between individuals. Opening one's mind to another as an act of aggresion was dangerous. When used with the light side, there was a level of trust between the practitioners, and never would the mind meld be used with an enemy. Jack's mistake was to wage a war using his own mind as the battle ground. The key to perfecting drain knowledge, Drake explained, was not to absorb the minds of others and try to make sense of the mess left behind. Rather, the trick was to occupy the minds of others and attack their memories from there. What Jack was doing was more akin to a dark side power known as Force Drain, where the user would absorb another's vitality refresh their own reserves of the Force, taking simply energy and leaving the foe's identity in tact.
Drake's lesson was abruptly interrupted as a pair of Gamorrean gaurds burst into the armory. Jack quickly deactivated the holocron by cutting the flow of the Force through it, taking the weave of crystals in his hand. The gaurds turned to run and tell their master only to have Jack sweep their feet out from under them with the Force. The first Gamorrean stumbled getting to his feet, grabbing at the heavy axe he wore on his belt. Jack approached calmly, summoning his lightsaber from his duster's breast pocket and halting the pig's offense before it began by swiping off his hand with the weapon's red blade. Another quick spin releaved him of his head as well.
The second gaurd was a tad bit more nimble than his comrade. He sprung to his feet and continued to flee, making it around the corner before Jack could turn his attention to him. Reinforcements would be arriving soon, Jack decided to escape the way he came, slipping out of the palace via the sewers.
Breaking in to Tagrenn's palace only inflated the bounty on Jack's head, but this was the least of his concerns for the moment. With his prize in hand, Jack returned to Korriban and constructed a casing for the crystal lattice he'd retrieved from Nar Shaddaa. Jack was careful to hide the holocrons existence from his fellow Sith, going so far as to hike out into the barren Valley of the Dark Lords and retreat into the empty tombs to continue his lessons with Master Drake.
The gatekeeper picked up where they'd left off, teaching Jack how to expand his presence and invade the minds of others before sapping them of their memories. In addition, Drake taught Jack how to use the power he already had to simply drain the Force from an enemy while not exposing his mind to attack. Alex suggested another Jedi power that would help Jack truly master his telepathy. The skill was called Battle Meditation, and it would allow Jack to not simply affect the mind of one enemy, but entire armies of friends and foes alike. Master Drake had never perfected the ability himself, though he knew the Jedi archives were rife with information and the personal acconts of Jedi who'd mastered the technique.
Without this Battle Meditation and no victims to practice on, Jack's progress was slow. The Force sensitive beasts that haunted the tombs made good fodder for Jack's Force Drain, but not so much draining knowledge. What was more, as Jack's power grew so too did the strength of the voices Jack had previously surpressed. Purging Jack of these entities was beyond Alex's knowledge. To accomplish such a thing would require a powerful healing technique. All Master Drake could offer in this regard was a name. Levin Caelum. He was a young up-and-coming Jedi during Drake's time, known to be more than just a healer of flesh, but of the Force as well. If he were still alive, he would likely be one of the few beings that had an answer for Jack's affliction.
Battle Meditation... and Levin Caelum. Jack's need to access the Jedi Temple on Coruscant was now more evident than ever before. To this end, Master Drake actually did have a solution to share. Alex had hid his affair and his practicing of dark arts from the Jedi Council using an ability known as Force Camouflage. The power was similar to a Jedi's mind trick, though far more subtle, thus allowing it to be used to much greater effect even on Drake's fellow council members. Force Camouflage confused the insight of others using powerful telepathy which could allow the user to hide themselves even while in plain sight. Though Jack could not surpress the power of the dark side within him, with Camouflage he could essentially erase his presence from the perceptions of others, making him seem just another inconspicuous face in the crowd.
Drake taught Jack the gentle touch required to affect another's mind without their notice. Jack could practice this in the tombs, affecting the simple minds of beasts to walk among them without so much as a snarl. Using it on the initiates on Korriban was far more challenging, though at this point in his life Jack was quick to adapt and learn. The real trick would be using the power successfully against the most powerful Force users the Jedi had to offer. There was no practice for that.
During his down time, Jack would return to the Temple and train with Darth Iniquitous. The Overlords ever-present mask made any thoughts of trying out Camouflage impossible. Instead, Jack was careful not to show any hint of the progress he'd gained in the tombs, explaining his trips into the valley as meditations into the dark side. Jack's growth in power could just as easily been attributed to his training with the Dark Overlord as anything else. Besides, in the minds of the overseers, what else could it have been?
Jack spent over a year back on Korriban before he was finally approached about becoming a Sith in full. As a member of the Sith Order, Jack was told he would have to pick a new name, one that would accurately represent the darkness he'd come to find within himself. Jack could think of no better name for this than the one he already had.
Jack rarely used his last name, in fact no one ever called him by it except maybe Nieraan. Makura was his father's name. It was less a name and more an inheritance. It was a relic of a past Jack had no part in and a life Jack would never know. Darros was dead. Jack's mother was dead. Makura was the 24 years of slavery and subservience that had molded Jack into the man he'd become. Makura belonged to him. It was his father's name no longer. There was no more fitting name in Jack's mind. The name would be remade, just as Jack had been, as Sith.
Equipment:
Lightsaber: Single Blade, Singe Phase.
Color: Red
Shoto Katana with sheathe/harness: The blade is approx. 2 ft in length. The sheathe is worn on Jack's back and concealed beneath his duster jacket.
Cigarettes: BRAND: Bloodstripes. Corellia's finest.
Stats:
Strength: Average
Intelligence: Superior
Agility: Below Average
Charisma: Below Average
Force Stats:
Telekinetic: Novice
Telepathic: Master
Body: Novice
Sense: Adept
Protection: Adept
Healing: Apprentice
Destruction: Expert
Lightsaber Training:
Shii-Cho - Adept
Combat Training:
Shoto Katana - Expert
Other Training:
Chess - Master
Force Training:
Drain Knowledge - Master
Force Camouflage - Adept
RP Sample:
As Lynn entered the room Jack was still. He could feel her despair upon seeing him there with her Holocron. Nothing would have given him more satisfaction than to have been able to drink it in longer, but there was little time for such indulgence. Wrapping the Force around the tiny pyramid it only took a tiny twitch to crush it into powder. Lynn let out an unintelligible roar with anger which finally drew Jack's gaze. His yellow eyes shot to his left and stuck on his old master as she all but tore her lightsaber from her belt and ignited its blade.
"What's the matter, master? Are you not pleased to see me?" Jack asked in a calm voice. Though his tone was subdued there was still an air of arrogance about his words that only fueled Lynn's ire.
"Traitor!" She called back at her apprentice, "You would sacrifice us all for your own fool ambition?"
Jack smiled. His master's anger had clearly clouded her thought process, "You forget yourself, teacher. Emotion is a tool that we wield. It should not wield us. You forget your own lessons. Once something is no longer useful it becomes one's duty to cast that thing aside, lest they be weighed down by its weakness. Isn't that right?" Lynn scowled at Jack, gritting her teeth. It was true she had let her rage spill over onto the surface, but who was he to lecture her on such things?
Lynn hesitated no longer, taking her saber in hand she took a Djem So stance before charging in at Jack. Closing his eyes lightly, Jack let out an almost inaudible chuckle as he raised his open palm up towards his master. Crossing blades with Lynn would be foolish. As Jack had learned during his match with Cele, it is always best to play your own game. Allowing your opponent to dictate the flow of the conflict is the quickest way to meet a humiliating end. Jack's strength was in the use of the Force and it was through this that he would achieve victory.
He had done it so many times before it almost became second nature. The Force's energy was everywhere, and as Jack called to it, it obeyed his command. The Force was packed together densely forming into a Barrier between Jack and his master. Jack then urged it forward. As Lynn collided with the Barrier it took all of his concentration to hold it together against the blow, but once it had it became a simple matter of continuing to force it forward in order to shove Lynn away.
Lynn finally used her own Force power to shatter the Barrier once she realized what had hit her, causing her to drop to the floor before Jack good run her into the wall. It was no matter, however. He had put enough distance between himself and his opponent in order to execute his next move.
Race: Human
Age: 28
Height: 5'9"
Weight: 145lbs
Appearance:
Pale and slightly built, Jack is not an imposing figure by any stretch of the imagination. Despite an intensely meticulous nature, Jack seems to pay little attention to his appearence. Jack’s long, dark hair is rarely maintained, instead falling haphazardly over dark, sunken eyes. His face bears the scars of a tumultuous descent to the dark side, his eyes surrounded by deeply etched, black bruises caused primarily by years of insomnia. Naturally Jack’s eyes are dark brown, though upon losing his temper they turn to a hue like molten durasteel. Jack’s flesh too has a story to tell of his brutal training on Nar Shaddaa. His chest is a maze of crisscrossing scars, self-inflicted blade wounds intended to test his pain threshold and push his self-preservation abilities with the Force to their limits.
Jack’s standard choice of attire comes in mostly black, including most notably a leather duster worn with the collar popped up. Beneath this, a form fitting black shirt and a heavily taped and bandaged midriff with a pair of black slacks and worn out boots. Jack tends to dress simply. On Nar Shaddaa there were few advantages to standing out in a crowd. Even Jack’s lightsaber is about as simple as they come. The hilt was crudely constructed from spare parts and is little more than a frame holding together the essential components; just enough for the weapon to function. Flashy Jack is not.
Personality: Above all else, Jack values knowledge. From a very early age Jack understood the potential advantages to be had in out thinking an opponent. Knowledge could achieve victories that mere physical strength never could. Jack is an exceptionally brilliant, if not incredibly self-absorbed individual. Perhaps the only thing more fragile than his body is his pride. Jack is quick to anger at any perceived slight to his ego or intelligence.
Usually, though, Jack is cool, calm and collected. Due to the voices in his head, Jack has found himself unable to achieve a full night's sleep in many years. He rests himself largely through meditation, though it often is nowhere near enough. As a result Jack appears, and often acts, exhausted all the time. The only remedy for the voices Jack has found thus far has been his cigarettes. Smoking helps Jack calm his thoughts and goes some way towards allowing him to regain control of his mind, if for only a very short period of time. Although outwardly Jack appears apathetic and unobservant, nothing could be farther from the truth. Despite his lazy appearance Jack is always thinking, calculating and manipulating.
Birth place: Corellia
Faction: Sith Order
Rank: Knight
Previous Faction: The Hutts/ Dark Jedi
Previous Rank: Assassin/ Prophet
Bio:
Jack was born on Corellia, the son of a junkie and ruthless mercenary for hire. Darros Makura was a notorious hit man whose loyalties lay in deep pockets. His life was spent in the shadows, on the run. A child was the last thing he needed or had time for. He was held down already having to watch after a pregnant wife who had become quite a liability. Darros was wanted by the Hutts, a bounty had been placed on his head for thousands of credits worth of gambling debts. Darros had considered what would happen if the Hutts had gotten their hands on Akira... it might have been more merciful if he simply killed her himself. It would be quick and painless. But alas, Darros didn't have the fortitude for that. He knew it. Even as the Hutt's assassins tracked them down to Corellia and slowly moved in... he knew it.
They had found him, it was only a matter of time. Darros' mind was on the twenty or so figures closing in on his position, even as Akira coddled their newborn son. In the back of his mind he could see them bursting in, it was a gift he'd had since he was a child. Darros could see things before they happened, it was a large part of what made him such a successful mercenary. He could see... they would take Akira out first, a clean shot through the chest. If she was lucky it would hit her heart and she'd never have known what hit her. Then they would move on him.
Even as Darros was still foreseeing the events unfolding, suddenly the door to their 11th story apartment on Corellia was blasted apart by a grenade. Immediately afterward, from the dust of the explosion, a single blaster bolt flew into the room and struck the new mother right in the chest. She cried out as she fell and dropped the baby. Darros cringed at the sound of her voice, it hadn't struck her heart. Ten or so men in all black then poured into the room after the blaster bolt, each pointing their rifles at Darros.
Darros' eyes then shot open and his hand jerked upward, blocking the arm of the assassin that had moved in behind him just in time to prevent the cold steel of his blade from ripping across Darros' neck. Gripping the assassin's wrist tightly, Darros swung his would be assailant around in front of him, between himself and the rifles of the other assassins. Never taking their rifles off him, another blaster bolt rang out, striking Darros' hostage through the heart and hitting his right shoulder. Darros fell backward, gripping his wounded shoulder as the assassins moved in. Lifting up one of their rifles they struck Darros in the face with the gun's butt end.
Taking a step back Lynn pulled away the black mask that concealed her face, revealing a beautiful young woman with long bleach blond, almost white hair and tan skin. She raised her arm to signal to the others who hurried in and gathered up the unconscious Darros along with his wife and haul them off. Lynn was about to leave when something caught her attention... the child that lay on the ground would surely die if she left it behind. Usually this sort of thing wouldn't cause Lynn to so much as bat an eyelash, but something was different, something was gnawing at the back of her mind. It was a moment in time, a fault in the Force that only those extremely sensitive to it could perceive. Compelled by the Force, Lynn gathered up the child and took him with his father back to Nar Shaddaa...
Darros was taken to the Smuggler's Moon and brought before Lagra the Hutt. The slug demanded that Darros' debts be paid, otherwise he would be cast down with the others who had failed to give the Hutt his cut. Lagra's Labyrinth they called it. There were whispers here and there on Nar Shaddaa of the horrors and torture that await within Lagra's personal dungeon. Though none of these rumors could be verified as no one who entered the Labyrnith ever returned.
Darros pleaded with Lagra, but there was nothing he could offer the Hutt slug... nothing besides his wife and son. Pleased, maybe just by the anguish such an offer caused Darros, Lagra agreed to the terms, setting Darros loose and keeping his family behind.
It wasn't revealed until after Darros had disappeared again that the shot which had hit Akira had severed her spinal cord, paralyzing her from the waist down. Lagra had little use for a slave who couldn't walk and simply had her put down. It was bitter-sweet, but the deal was not a complete and total loss...
A Deal with the Devil
Lynn was the top assassin employed by Lagra the Hutt to work as his personal guards and muscle. But before she had come to be allied with the Hutts, Lynn Akunin was a Jedi at the academy on Coruscant. Her master was an old Rattataki named Maha Rishi. Though Lynn was an eager and promising student, Master Maha felt her ambition moved quicker than her ability to progress. He constantly stressed to Lynn the importance of patience and control, lessons Lynn interpreted as Maha holding her back. Lynn's older brother, who was also a Jedi, had died when she was very young. After that event she began to question the wisdom of the Jedi Masters who had been unable to save him, Maha in particular...
Despite her doubts, Lynn eventually became a Jedi Knight and continued to team with Master Maha on many of his missions. In an effort to wrestle control of Nar Shaddaa away from the gangsters and the Exchange, the Republic assigned Jedi to protect several diplomats sent to the moon to restore order. Lynn and Master Maha were among them. Their assignment was a Bith senator called Rom Qota, a very high profile assignment considering the bounty the Exchange had on his head. During their mission Lynn was eager to meet the Exchange bosses head on, but Maha insisted that they wait for the attackers to reveal themselves. It made no sense to Lynn to just sit back and wait for the enemy to come and strike the first blow, Maha was going to get them all killed.
Not about to get herself killed for a worthless senator or due to Maha's head games, Lynn went out to find the Exchange on her own. Her search led her to Lagra's Labyrinth, a dizzying maze of tunnels beneath the streets of Nar Shaddaa littered with all sorts of vicious beasts, torture devices and booby traps like something right out of an Indiana Jones film. The rumor that none had ever entered the Labyrinth and lived to tell about it was not entirely accurate. There was only one, Lynn Akunin. Her exploits had thoroughly impressed Lagra who offered her a deal. A promise of even greater powers if she would join with him. Lynn was skeptical at first that a Hutt could teach her anything useful, but once he explained how he would grant her the power, she greedily accepted.
Lynn gave the position of Senator Qota and Master Maha to the Hutts in exchange for the Holocron of a Dark Jedi Lagra had come across quite some time ago. Thanks to the wisdom and power of Master Maha, the attack on the Senator had failed, but Lynn had made her deal with the devil.
The Brutal Tutelage of Lynn Akunin (Age 0 - 12)
Lynn took it upon herself to look after Darros' young son, giving him the name "Jack" after her own fallen brother. The Force was strong with Jack, there was no question about it. Lynn had felt it from the first day she'd met him. But the presence of the Force alone did not guarantee Jack any power. The Force was a powerful ally, but its potential was held down by the weaknesses of it's practitioners.
"Remember, the Force's limits are your limits because the Force... has no limits." These words were taken from Lynn's Holocron and passed down to young Jack. The boy was a quick learner. While not much of a fighter, what Jack lacked in physical strength he more then made up for in intelligence. The child thirsted for knowledge, absorbing anything and everything his teacher told him. Even as a child he was able to grasp the meaning behind Lynn's words. The Force was a powerful thing, but not all could wield such power. Some were stronger, some were weaker. This weakness was not with the Force, but with the individuals. By shedding yourself of weakness you allow the true power of the Force to shine through, the power of the dark side.
Lynn spent many many long hours explaining each of these perceived weaknesses that Jack would have to rid himself of. Lessons would often carry well into the night as Jack almost always had questions, picking at every idea from all paths of logic. A weakness such as compassion for example... Lynn explained that attachments to others who were weaker than yourself would pull you down, force you to divvy your strength among them in a fruitless effort to protect them. Jack countered, noting that Lynn herself was teaching someone who was weak. Lynn explained that there was no "attachment" between the two of them. Her time with Jack was an investment and that when their partnership no longer was needed one would have to cast the other aside. Being so young Jack had naturally become attached to his master. Though he nodded in agreement, he did not truly believe a time would ever come where Lynn would cast him aside, he could not conceive of it at the time.
Lynn reinforced her lessons on weakness through harsh treatment. Forcing the eight year old Jack to find his own way from place to place on the Smuggler's Moon of Nar Shaddaa, forcing him to rely on his own survival instincts to get by. It was during one of his treks through the refugee sector that Jack was first introduced to the game of chess. A pair of vagrants had stumbled across a discarded lightsaber. It didn't work anymore, but it could probably be sold for a high price in any case. Jack knew his master would be very pleased if he could somehow bring the saber back to her, but the bums were fully grown men more then twice his size. Rather then simply killing the fools and making off with his prize, Jack would have to use his wits to get what he wanted.
Aside from their unkempt clothing the vagrants had very few possessions, one being a simple chess game. Noticing it, Jack approached the men with a proposition. He claimed that he knew how to fix the lightsaber, which would make its price on the black market go up considerably. However, he would only offer the service if the men would be willing to make a little wager. Not being strangers to games of chance, the men agreed to the boy's offer. He would challenge them to their chess game, if he won he would get the lightsaber. If they won he would repair it for them. Of course Jack had no idea how to repair the lightsaber, but even though he had never played chess before, he had no intention of losing.
The vagrants explained the rules of the game to Jack. As he thought about all the possible move combination's instantly his mind rejoiced at the possibilities, it appealed strongly to Jack's meticulous nature. The game didn't last long, Jack won handily. Though the bum wasn't ready to admit defeat quite yet and Jack could see this as a weakness in his victim. He offered to play again, this time with the man's chess game at stake. Even though he clearly had no chance, the man could not refuse the offer. In the end Jack had humiliated the man who then refused to hold up his end of the bargain. Using his limited ability at the time in the Force, Jack tried to affect the bum's mind, succeeding in a gentle push of persuasion that caused the man to grudgingly relinquish Jack's winnings.
Jack presented the broken lightsaber to Lynn, but kept the chess board for himself. Studying it in private, he would simulate games against himself, memorizing hundreds of strategic sequences. The way the pieces worked together, the logic and cunning involved, Jack saw parallels between the game and the nature of war and the Force. He would also find that the game would translate well into his blade training. Jack was not very physically imposing, but still Lynn attempted to teach him the basics of lightsaber combat. Using a short katana to train with, Jack practiced to master the basics of Shii-Cho. His strength and speed were sub par, but Jack knew how to make the most of the skills he had. Jack spent his time practicing sequences of blade movement, doing drills day after day after day to work the movements into his muscle memory. This would give the illusion that he was able to move and react quicker then he actually could, though if his opponent were able to engage him for a long period of time the repetitiveness of his movements might cost him the fight. Still, blade to blade combat was the last thing Jack considered when taking on a foe but this solution would at least make it an option.
The Assassination of Senator Qota (Age 13)
When Jack's blade skills had finally begun to take shape and his ability to use the Force progressed far enough, he was at last ready to accompany Lynn on one of her missions. As fate would conspire, the subject of this particular mission was the Bith Senator and Jedi Master who had eluded the Hutt's some thirteen years earlier. Though the Republic's efforts to quell the Exchange had largely failed, Senator Qota was still one of the loudest voices in the Senate calling for the Republic to continue its efforts against the criminal organization. The powers that be on Nar Shaddaa deemed it was at last time to silence the Senator and Lagra's assassins were those selected to carry out the job.
They would travel to Coruscant disguised as refugees. Once there they would make their way into the Senators apartment, garbed in black from head to toe. Unbeknown to the assassins, Master Maha had foreseen the danger that the Senator might have been attracting to himself and had insisted that he and his new Padawan stay and watch over him. Maha's new apprentice was a pretty young girl named Kaylin, only slightly older than Jack.
Lynn had used the Force to help hide the presence of the assassins as they slowly moved in. Jack gripped the hilt of his katana tightly as they approached. Lynn ignited her green lightsaber and used it to cut through the locking mechanism on the Senator's door. The inside of the apartment was dark and with his black mask it was impossible for Jack to see much of anything. He instead let the Force stretch out around him and probe the apartment, rolling over the walls and furniture. The Senator was asleep with Master Maha sitting in silent meditation at the foot of his bed. Outside of the room the young Padawan sat slumped over in a chair, she had fallen asleep as well. As Jack approached her a twinge of doubt rippled over him. He had been taught and thus memorized that such feelings were weakness, but Jack found in actual practice ridding oneself from such vices was quite difficult.
Focused on the girl, Jack couldn't help but pity her. She was so innocent, so pure. What had she done to deserve such a fate? Did he truly have the right to extinguish her life? Through his indecision Jack had failed to notice Master Maha who had been able to sense the clumsily projected feelings of the boy at Qota's bedroom door. Maha stealthily maneuvered himself through the apartment and behind Jack, his blue blade halted only by a green one igniting just behind Jack's neck. Startled, Jack fell forward to find his master's lightsaber locked with that of Maha Rishi. The commotion had awoken Kaylin who ignited a purple lightsaber of her own.
Jack's simple katana was no match for a lightsaber. Instead he took advantage of his opponent's confusion, using the Force to grab her ankles and sweep them out from under her. After she fell Jack moved in quickly, he was no longer thinking, instead allowing the emotion and adrenaline of the situation guide his actions. The fear of Kaylin's lightsaber had succeeded in eroding Jack's prior hesitation. Without a second thought Jack brought his weight down upon his victim and in a panic, ripped his katana from its sheathe and plunged the blade down into the girl's chest. It wasn't until the spatter of blood hit his face that the reality of what he'd done finally dawned on him. Up until then the whole experienced seemed like a movie working in slow motion, beyond his control. Slowly he pulled the blade from her chest. The girl let out a weak cough before falling silent.
With shaky hands Jack gripped his blade and picked himself up. With Maha distracted by Lynn, the other assassins had dispatched the Senator and all moved in on the Jedi Master. Jack watched with quiet awe as the Jedi skillfully held off all of Lagra's assassins, but even he was not immune to the effects of fatigue. Eventually one of the assassin's blades landed a hit. With the Jedi's defenses down almost instantly all of their blades plunged forward and pierced Maha's flesh. Though they had accomplished their mission, Lynn was extremely disappointed in Jack's performance. His indecision had not only cost him a quick kill, but had tipped off the enemy to their presence. Though through the mistake Jack had learned first hand the importance of ridding himself of these weaknesses... and also experienced his first true taste of the dark side.
Learning to Master the Force (Age 13 - 22)
In the wake of Qota's assassination the only voice for the Republic's continued intervention on Nar Shaddaa was stamped out. With the Republic's withdraw Lagra took a strangle hold on the Smuggler's Moon. All ships entering and leaving the system were now forced to pay a tax to the Hutts. It was an unpopular policy, but all ships refusing to pay were confiscated by the Hutts along with their cargo. There were few who dared to argue.
Meanwhile Jack's training in the Force continued. He was proficient in the use of Telekinesis and even studied some of the Jedi teachings on healing. Lynn had pointed out that the Force itself was neither light nor dark during one of their training sessions...
"Dark... Light. Good... Evil. These are just words, labels used by the ignorant to rationalize that which they do not understand. The Force is above the ignorance of sentient beings. It does not have labels nor does it require them. The Jedi however are very keen on the use of words to pervade their weakness down upon others and the result is suffocating. They tell you to beware of the "dark side" and to follow the "light". Calling your rules light and mine dark is a shrewd tactic, but in reality its only weight is with the weak mindedness of those who choose to indulge it."
Jack saw some truth in these words. Could a Jedi not use a technique like Lightning in order to protect or defend? Even if it meant harming would it not be used in much the same way they would use a lightsaber? And by the same token, could a Sith not use his passion to heal and repair his own body? The dark side, after all, was at its very core the preservation of the self above all else. With this in mind Jack began his study of the process of Force Healing. It demanded a great deal of meditation, clearly not something that would be practical for use in the midst of combat, but this certainly did not make it useless. The heightened regeneration, even at basic levels, could mean enhanced endurance which alone could prove useful for Jack. Especially after witnessing the skills of Maha Rishi who was struck down by simple fatigue.
Lynn made certain that Jack would practice this power only through the methods of the dark side. Pain was power. By enduring pain and defeat one could make themselves stronger. Jack was instructed by Lynn to use his katana blade to slice his chest open, only a small amount at first. Then he would spend hours in deep meditation, not permitted to take any food or drink until he was able to heal his wound completely. It was a torturous practice, but Jack came to find the pain of the blade and of his own hunger helped spark the passions within him. The dark side of the Force came to his aid and fueled his abilities. As time passed the gashes and wounds were made worse and worse, adding the threat of potentially bleeding to death if he was unable to heal in time. With practice the ability came more easily, but it was still in a very primitive form.
Jack also focused his attention on an ability that he considered even more important then healing. Protection. Jack's skill was in the Force, not with the blade. If he was going to make the Force a truly formidable weapon he would have to learn to use it for both offense and defense. In theory a Force barrier was a very simple power to employ; simply moving and molding the Force's energy into a sheet to create a wall between one's self and an attacker. This had many potential applications in combat, something that greatly appealed to Jack.
Jack practiced molding the Force as often as he could find time. Most frequently he would head to the industrial sector of Nar Shaddaa, down to where the industrial sewage emptied from a pipe into a drain below. Standing beneath the relentlessly draining waste, Jack would create a barrier above his head and attempt to hold it together as long as he could to keep himself dry. This was an exercise to increase the strength and endurance of his barriers, holding them together sometimes for hours beneath the sewage drain.
The second exercise was based on shape. While a straight barrier was not overly complex, wrapping it around an object was far more difficult. Jack started small, focusing on his katana and attempting to maneuver it by wrapping the Force's energy around it. It proved very tedious work to accomplish something that could otherwise be done with Telekinesis, but there would be greater use for it if Jack were to ever master it.
Jack's training was progressing well, though above all else his focus was on the use of the dark side and its use on the mind in particular. Lynn had shown Jack how harness the power of Force Lightning, letting the Force's energy flow through your body and out your finger tips, raining it down relentlessly on some hapless victim. It struck Jack as a terribly vulgar and not entirely useful application of the Force. As most abilities had potential to be expanded upon and used in different ways, Lightning seemed simplistic to Jack. But still he supposed it had its uses... a pawns movements, while simplistic, were not meant by any means to take the king but instead to scout the foe for weaknesses. Jack supposed that viewing Lightning in the same way would make its use forgivable.
Jack saw much more potential in the Force's use on the mind. The ability to sway and manipulate others without even drawing a blade was an undeniable advantage. Jack had shown some natural proficiency in this even as a young child. He had been able to subtly manipulate the mind of a vagrant for his chess board, and while he could access the power he couldn't figure out how to make it stronger. Despite Jack's attempts his ability to use Telepathy seemed to be impotent. Lynn was little help on the matter and Jack began to grow suspicious of her motives. Recently she had become less and less willing to share information with Jack. Perhaps she had begun to realize that his power was growing to fast for her to control. Perhaps she intended to make good on what she had told Jack a long time ago, "There is no attachment between us. My time with you is an investment and when our partnership no longer is useful it will be time for one of us to cast the other aside."
Jack wasn't able to conceive of such a thing at the time but now it seemed a very real possibility. Jack would take his master's own words to heart, if she would not teach him everything than she was no longer useful to him. The thought of killing still brought a hint of fear to Jack. The experience he had during the mission to assassinate Senator Qota had left some doubt in his mind as to how he might perform if confronted with the same situation a second time, but this didn't dissuade him. Jack knew what he had to do.
Despite Lynn's limited instruction, Jack worked hard to improve his powers of Telepathy. On Nar Shaddaa one could sit anywhere, simply quiet their mind and listen. The mass of life made the Force sound like nothing more than white noise at first. It was difficult to sense much of anything on the moon as all the voices mingled together. Though over time Jack honed his abilities, being able to pick out individuals among the crowd. He would silence all other distractions and focus the whole of his energy on a single target. He could hear the thoughts that his targets had on the surface. Simple things that ofter carelessly ran through their heads. Jack knew there was more to be had... to be able to dig to the very core of one's mind, Jack's voracious appetite for knowledge made the possibility of such a power more appealing then anything else. It was possible... through the Force anything was possible. He just needed to learn how to shed the weakness in himself that was holding him back. Once he had this power he would be ready to cast his master aside...
Jack's research into the Force's effect on the mind had yielded a possible solution to his problem. The Jedi were often known to use the Force to share strength among each other, it was a technique called "Force Meld". But what was more, it was said that the meld could even be used to the point where all the participants consciousness would meld into one as well. Essentially they could share knowledge. After giving it much thought Jack reasoned that if one could share knowledge, could the opposite not also be possible? Could one take knowledge away using the same premise? It would be risky, but in theory it should work.
Jack would have to spend time researching and practicing the Force Meld in preparation for testing his theory. At first just projecting simple emotions on his targets during his "listening time". Most of those on Nar Shaddaa were already stressed near the breaking point. It didn't take much coaxing to push them over the edge. Next he would attempt to influence the actual thoughts of others, a far more difficult task. The Force stretched out like an avenue between Jack and those he targeted. By sending his own thoughts along these pathways into the minds of others, most couldn't tell them apart. However this would never work against a more shrewd mind that could tell the difference.
The final step was actually moving the Force. Moving it from himself to another wasn't something Jack ever saw himself needing to do, but if Drain Knowledge proved possible, reversing this process would also become useful. To experiment with this Jack picked out a refugee huddled at the side of the street. The man was ill and near death. In order to pull off the technique Jack had to become perfectly still and center himself. He carefully moved the Force from around himself to the man lying on the street. It didn't take long for the man to take notice, though as soon as Jack began to feel himself growing exhausted he cut the power off. It would need more polish if Jack was going to be able to use it as efficiently as he hoped. Force Meld wouldn't be mastered over night, but when the time came to use it Jack would be ready.
Constructing a Lightsaber (Age 21)
During one of Jack's meditations Lynn approached him and requested he drop what he was doing. Jack didn't like being interrupted but he complied without complaint. Lynn explained that it was time Jack constructed his own lightsaber. She presented him with the broken saber he had brought to her eight years earlier. It was still in the same sorry condition it had been when he'd won it from the bum in the refugee sector. There was no crystals, no lens and a useless power cell. About all the saber had that Jack could use was its casing. He would have to find the three other components on his own.
Jack was given Lynn's Aurek tactical strikefighter to use for his mission. Lynn had only provided the names of planets where Jack might find the parts he needed, after that it was up to him. The first world on the list was Tatooine. Jack's fighter landed in Anchorhead and from there he began his search.
Not really having any idea where to start, Jack wandered into the local cantina for a drink. A woman on the other side of the cantina caught his attention. She was seated across from a Duros with a chess board in between them. The pieces on the board where holoprojections, modeled after Jedi it seemed. After the woman input her move there was a pause before the Duros stood up, angrily slamming his fists down on the board before pulling out a blaster pistol. Jack didn't speak Durese but he could tell the Duros had though the woman cheated.
Jack approached the table, placing his hand on the Duros' shoulder, "It was a fair game. I'd best cut my losses and leave now," Jack's mind trick accompanied by the calm emotion Jack let pour into the Duros caused him to lower his weapon and simply walk out. The woman raised an eyebrow, she was impressed with Jack's abilities. She introduced herself as "Cele" and Jack sat down at the table. Evidently Cele had been at the chess game all day, swindling drunken patrons out of their hard earned credits. She was good, there was no doubt. Observing the arrangement of the pieces from her last game Jack couldn't help but admire the beauty of her strategy. He was eager to challenger her himself.
As the game began Jack started with his knight. Cele countered with a pawn, placing it in a position where his knight could easily take it on the next turn. However, doing so would allow the queen to take his knight. Jack attempted to listen to his opponent's thoughts, but they were strangely silent. Jack couldn't feel anything at all from this Cele. Was she somehow able to mask her presence in the Force at such a close range? Jack couldn't figure it out and nothing annoyed him more than not knowing.
Jack moved his pawn out diagonal to his opponents, tempting her to take it. She did not. Instead she drew out her bishop. The piece that resembled a bearded Jedi Consular moved out to its place and the board suddenly flashed "Checkmate". Jack was stunned. Two moves? Two moves! It was impossible, unfathomable. Jack found himself leaping up and slamming his hands down on the table. He accused her of using the Force to gain an unfair advantage. She only snickered at Jack, assuring him that he was the only one able to do such things. If that were true then Jack would call her bluff. He wrapped the force around Cele's neck and began to squeeze. To his surprise her flesh tore open to reveal... wires? She was a synthetic... a droid.
Taking advantage of Jack's distraction, Cele quickly drew her blaster pistol and squeezed off one round. Jack reacted to it just in time to dive out of the way and only take a glancing blow on his left shoulder. After the shot Cele leaped up and made a dash for the exit. Jack followed close behind her, chasing the droid through the streets of Anchorhead. She led him to an old droid repair shop. Inside Cele handed her winnings to an Ithorian as Jack burst in after her. Cele raised her pistol again but the Ithorian placed a hand on the blaster so that she'd lower it. Jack kept his hand on his katana sheathed at his hip. The Ithorian identified himself as Yarma Laka the master craftsmen. He had constructed Cele solely for the purpose of playing and winning at games such as Pazaak and Chess. Yarma recognized that Jack was not all to pleased with having been swindled and offered to pay him back his winnings. However, Jack had a better idea after noticing the forge and glass parts Yarma had all around his shop. Jack told him he could keep the money if he would make the lens he needed. Yarma agreed.
The Ithorian's work was excellent, the lens was a work of perfection. Though now that he had what he wanted, Jack felt the need for a little retribution. A droid's memory was contained on a simple chip, which fortunately was much easier to extract than an organic's memory. Once he had his lens Jack crushed the droid's body into scrap with the Force. When Yarma tried to reach for his blaster Jack turned and lit into the Ithorian with Force Lightning. Killing came much easier this time, but Jack still grimaced at the charred corpse of his victim. So uncivilized. Jack then cracked open the synthetic's skull and extracted its memory core before leaving.
Jack's next destination was Corellia. It was a world he'd not been to since he was a day old. Jack had no memory of Corellia or his real parents. As such the journey there seemed as unassuming as any other. However, as soon as Jack landed on the planet he could feel something was off. A wave of sadness washed over him as well as pain through his chest. As he moved about the planet the negative feelings grew stronger and stronger until finally the drew him to an apartment building. The building seemed to have been abandoned for quite some time. The rooms hadn't received any sort of maintenance in years. Most of the windows were shattered allowing the wind and rain to blow freely through the halls. Even so, the whole area felt colder than it should.
Exploring the structure Jack finally came to the eleventh floor. One of the apartment door frames was mangled and misshapen, as if it had been blown apart. Upon entering that room the pain in Jack's chest became searing. He gripped his sides and fell to his knees, gasping for breath. It was then that Jack heard the twin thud of a pair of heavy boots settling in the doorway behind him. He spun around to see an older man who wreaked of Corellian Ale holding a blaster rifle on him. Strangely, the man felt very familiar to Jack.
"I recognize that clothing. You're one of the Exchange's assassins aren't you? Lagra took my wife... Lynn took my boy. Now you want to take me too. Well that ain't gonna happen. Whatever mistakes I've made I've paid my debt and then some. I just want to be left in peace," The man's words startled Jack. He stood up slowly, telling the old man that he was not here for any bounty and demanded that he identify himself. The man said his name was Darros Makura. He went on to explain to Jack what had happened to him, how the Hutts had taken his family and left him with nothing. Jack could sense no deception in him. Lynn had never said much about where Jack had come from, but if the man's story was true... Jack was pretty sure he could piece it together.
Jack could feel the echoes of pain and death here. It was a pain that began to overwhelm him in the form of grief. Grief which turned to anger towards Lagra and Lynn. Anger towards this dead beat old man who had sold his family to save his own worthless life. Anger... became hatred. Like a flame the hatred slowly began to grow, filling every fiber of Jack's being until it was a raging inferno. As he glared at Darros the old man's very existence repulsed him. He could feel the Force flowing freely between the two of them and he couldn't stand it any longer. Jack focused all his hate on his father, his thoughts chanting almost audibly his desire for the old man's death. Concentrating his seething emotions on the Force connecting to Darros Jack shattered it under the weight of his emotion. Darros immediately gasped, grabbing at his chest and crumpling over. The old man's anguish was intoxicating. Jack eagerly drunk it in, feeling re energized by its power.
When Jack's assault was finished Darros was little more than a hollowed out corpse. Jack checked the man for anything useful. He didn't have much aside from a few weapons. One however was fitted with a lightsaber power cell. Had Lynn known he would find this man here? Perhaps she was more cunning than he had originally thought. He would have to be cautious moving forward.
Jack's final destination was the ancient Sith world of Korriban. Though there may have once been great power on Korriban, when Jack found it the planet was nothing more then a shadow of its former self. The tombs of the great Sith had long since been looted and left abandoned. There were no signs of life anywhere say for the Tukata that roamed the Valley of the Dark Lords at night. Jack knew however what it was he would need to find here. There was a cave not far from the Valley of the Dark Lords where it was said the Dark Lord Ludo Kressh had been buried. The dark side was faint inside, distant. Any power this place had once had was long since used up, but Jack pressed foward anyway.
The walls of the cavern were barren. Jack really didn't know where he'd find a crystal in a place like this, but he was certain they were here. Jack's search brought him to a large chamber within the cavern. A stagnant pool of water rippled lightly... there was absolutely no wind inside the cave, the ripples could only indicate that something else was present. Jack drew his sword and stretched out with the Force. Suddenly Jack was attacked from behind by a Hive Kinrath. Jack quickly rolled to the side, slicing off the Kinrath's stinger with his blade as he brought it across his body. The Kinrath let out a high pitched shriek that Jack swiftly silenced with a blast of Lightning.
Once the creature stopped moving Jack discovered what had made it act out so aggressively. There was an unhatched egg in the chamber, the Hive Kinrath was its mother. Jack stepped up to the egg and smashed it open with his blade. There wasn't much inside other then green goo. But among the organic muck was a red stone. It was a lightsaber crystal.
Having retrieved all three parts he needed, Jack returned to Nar Shaddaa. There Lynn instructed him piece the weapon together, focusing the Force on the crystal he'd found in order to increase its power. Jack did as instructed, using the Force to carefully assemble the pieces of his lightsaber and imbue his crystal with the dark side's power. He concentrated on the hatred he'd felt on Corellia, focusing it into his lightsaber's crystal before setting it into place. When the weapon was completed Jack turned it on. The blade flared to life with a crack and a low hum. The crimson light of the blade washing over him reminded Jack of the blood spattering across his face during his first kill.
Darkness Take You... (Age 22-24)
Jack's training was just about complete. Now was the time to finally end his partnership with Lynn and with the Hutts. The Hutt tax on ships moving in and out of Nar Shaddaa had turned into an all out blockade when several Onderonian ships refused to pay. In response the Republic had finally woken up and sent some of its own ships to assist the Onderonians. The result at the moment was a stalemate between the two sides. This was the opportunity Jack had been waiting for. During the stalemate, Lagra's guards had been stretched thin, most being used on board the Hutt slug's personal fleet of ships. There was only one left behind to watch over Lagra himself. This might have been sufficient to ward off any opportunistic bounty hunter, but Lagra did not expect his murderer to come from within.
Jack was able to enter Lagra's compound without trouble and even walk right into the room where the Hutt was lounging. The single guard was caught completely unprepared, Jack wrapped a Force Barrier around him and constricted it, slowly crushing his bones. Lagra tried to make a move for his alarm, but his tremendous girth impeded his progress. Jack used the Force to smash the Hutt's control panel before raining Lightning down on Lagra. With both hands he pumped the Force's power out, the bolts of electricity arcing and forking off several times before coursing through their victim's thick flab.
With the controls destroyed the communication between Lagra's fleet and their commander was severed. In the confusion one of the inexperienced admirals summized that the Republic had somehow gotten through and ordered his ship to open fire. The Republic returned fire and without any cohesive command it was only a matter of time before Lagra's fleet would be decimated.
After several hours of fighting Lynn saw that things were falling apart and quickly abandoned the fight to return to the surface. The Republic troops would land soon, she couldn't let them take her prized possession. Back on the moon Lynn hurried to her quarters only to find they had already been broken into. Inside was her ambitious apprentice Jack. She arrived just in time to find him crushing her Holocron.
Lynn's reaction to the Holocron's destruction was curious. She did not explode into rage as Jack had hoped. She was angry, though her emotions were measured with no hint of surprise. It was almost as if she'd expected to find Jack here. He had thought that finding him here stealing her most closely gaurded secrets about the Force would send Lynn over the edge. Unfortunately, Jack had been unable to figure out how to access the holocron, but Lynn didn't know that... did she? Irregardless, there would be only one way to get the information that was on that holocron now.
All of Jack's training had prepared him for this moment. The ability to drain a foe's knowledge by reversing the effects of a Force Meld was only a theory Jack had and one that he had never actually proven in practice... but it was now or never.
Jack followed the tendrils of the Force back to Lynn. Despite her demeanor, her mind seethed, but this was only what was on the surface. Jack needed to go deeper. Reversing the process that sent the Force out from his body Jack began to tug at the mind of his opponent. When that did not work he began to violently tear at it. Her resistance was strong and Lynn grabbed her head as she began to feel the strain of Jack's assault. Jack's head too throbbed with pain as if his skull would split in two. The tug of war between the two only took seconds, but it seemed like an eternity before at last the dam ruptured. Lynn's thoughts were savagely torn from her head, the sudden flood of information was more then Jack could have ever imagined. He let out a scream and fell to his knees as it was almost too much for him to bear.
When the ordeal had ended Jack was left shaking on the ground and Lynn was catatonic. Her body lay motionless, blankly staring up at the ceiling. Jack could not stop shaking, he could hear her in his head still cursing him. Without knowing how to control his power he had inadvertently taken too much.
Struggling to compose himself Jack fled to his Aurek tactical strikefighter. The ship was small enough to slip past the Republic blockade which allowed Jack to escape Nar Shaddaa.
From that day onward Jack would be relentlessly haunted by the thoughts of his former master. So much so that he had all but given up sleeping for fear of the torment that await him within his own head. Instead resting himself only through meditation. Jack's first attempt to drain someone's thoughts had been costly. For one most of what he'd received from Lynn was an overwhelming fog of thoughts. The information he'd sought was lost among a jumble of memories, emotions and information about his old master he certainly didn't need. It would take more time to perfect this technique and to make any sense of what he'd taken from Lynn... but time was what he had now.
Dead or Alive (Age 24 - 25)
Jack's exploits on Nar Shaddaa had earned him more than just his freedom. Lagra's brother and partner, Tagrenn the Hutt, had made certain that Jack Makura became one of the most wanted men in Hutt Space. With such a large purse on his head Jack found himself under seige from every cutthroat, junkie, and wannabe mercenary beyond the inner rim.
With the fringes of the galaxy gunning for him, Jack looked to the core worlds for refuge. During his time hopping from planet to planet Jack began attempting to repair the damage done when he had killed his old master. Though, with each passing day matters only grew worse for Jack. The disembodied voice of Lynn was a constant torment. Jack could do little to control or suppress it. Sleep had become nearly impossible. It was during this time that Jack's appearance began to deteriorate. Insomnia caused his eyes to grow sunken and bruised, and his flesh to become sickly pale.
Jack's powers had grown rapidly, but his ability was not yet able to match. He would need to learn more; more about the dark side than his Master had been able to teach him. Unfortunately for Jack, knowledge of the dark side wasn't something one found simply surfing the holonet. At the time there was only one place in the galaxy known to house such dangerous information. The Jedi Temple on Coruscant. It was no coincidence that Jack's path led him then to the Republic capital.
Jack fit in well with the dregs and spice junkies of the undercity, but not so much with the nobles and politicians above, and especially not with the Jedi. Jack had arrived on one of the most densly populated worlds in the galaxy, and the home of the Jedi Order wracked by the dark side with a small fortune on his head. Clearly he didn't have a plan.
Indeed, trying to keep a low profile in such a high profile place proved an impossible task. Among the many mercinaries and bounty hunters hired by Tagrenn the Hutt personally, Amon Darklighter was certainly the most infamous. Amon was an Anzat famous in Hutt Space for consuming the brains of his charges and returning them to his clients as drooling, catatonic trophies. He caught up with Jack in a dive bar on level 1170 beneath the streets of Coruscant.
Jack was never one for crowds, though anything to occupy his mind was preferable to solitude. As he often did, Jack brought the chess game he'd kept with him since he was boy and challenged all comers. He accepted bets in the form of credits or cigarettes. Jack found nicotine went some way toward helping quiet his mind and as such had become something of a chain smoker.
Amidst a cloud of smoke and a crowd of onlookers Amon found Jack, raking in a pile of credits after yet another checkmate. With the rest of the room shying away, Amon accepted Jack's challenge. The two had words during their game, and it soon became very apparent why the Anzat was really here. A fight broke out and Jack did all he could to escape in the confusion. He likely would have failed were it not for some unlikely assistance.
Auren Sol, a mercenary herself, though one of the few who wasn't interested in the bounty on Jack's head. Auren was more interested in revenge. Amon Darklighter had taken her entire family to Tagrenn the Hutt. He hadn't quite murdered them, no, instead they joined the others Amon brought to his most lucritive client, sadistic decorations in the Hutt's personal cantina. Auren wanted him dead, but she couldn't do this alone. She knew Jack had to have been strong in the Force to have killed Lagra and so many of his assassins. Auren sought him out on Coruscant hoping that he might teach her to fight like him.
After saving Jack from the bar, Auren whisked him offworld. Jack was reluctant to train her at first. Knowledge was a precious thing; the most precious thing, in fact. Jack was very careful of what he shared and with whom. Upon giving it some thought, an idea began to form in Jack's mind. He may have been too far tainted by the dark side to come within a mile of the Jedi Temple without arousing suspicion, but this girl was still a blank canvas. He would have to be careful of what he taught her, but if done correctly, she could become his eyes and ears inside the Jedi's stronghold. The odds of success were slim, but it was the only real option available. And if it were to fail, it would be Auren who would take the fall. Jack agreed to take Auren as an apprentice.
Jack and Auren retreated to Mygeeto, a remote, frozen world where he could train his new apprentice in secret. Progress was slow, and Jack struggled with how he might tap into the power of Auren's anger without her becoming too dark to eventually infiltrate the Jedi. He couldn't teach her to use the light side, in all honesty Jack knew very little of the nature of the light side, or certainly not enough to be useful. The girl's training was an enigma that he wrestled with in secret.
Auren was only a few months into her training when she received a message over the holonet from Nar Shaddaa. Tagrenn the Hutt was throwing a party to celebrate the public execution of a Republic SIS agent found to have infiltrated his inner circle. Every scum bag to have ever parked a frieghter on Tagrenn's moon was on the guest list. It was almost certain that Amon would be in attendance. Auren was eager to use this opportunity to test what she'd learned. Jack knew showing his face at such a gathering was tantamount to suicide. It did however present a unique chance to strike down a very large number of his enemies all in the same place. With Tagrenn dead, Jack might actually be able to show his face in a civilized system again.
The proposal was dangerous, and his apprentice was not ready. Logic would dictate that despite the gains, such an endeavor was foolhardy. However, Auren was adamant that she was prepared to face Darklighter. In a moment of weakness, Jack relented.
Tagrenn's savage gala was a spectical of opulence and hedonism. Jack and Auren attended disguised and under stolen identities. Following the execution, Jack struck out on his own to find Tagrenn in his personal chambers and end the bounty on his head. He had instructed his apprentice to wait for him in the ballroom. Auren was having none of it.
Jack followed Tagrenn to the Hutt's personal landing pad. There he found Amon waiting for him, holding a vibroknife to Auren's neck. Jack realized then that he'd allowed her too close to him. In listening to her plight and her life story during their time on Mygeeto, and having shared some of his own, Jack weakened himself. He'd been a fool to trust her, to care for even half a second. The price would be heavy, but Jack would not be the one to pay it. All he would lose was an apprentice.
Jack ignored the Anzat's threats and Auren's pleas. He extended both hands and blasted both with Force Ligthning. Auren took most of the punishment and was killed after several torturous seconds. Amon writhed and threw himself back. His hostage had taken a lethal dose of the onslaught for him, though he suffered hideous burns.
Stoked by rage, Amon threw himself at Jack. Physically Darklighter was every bit Jack's superior. A second attempt at lightning did little to slow Amon from wrestling Jack to the ground and wrapping his hand around Jack's throat. The Anzat's feelers emerged from his cheeks. He would use them to consume Jack's brain through his nostrils... a hell of a way to go. Unable to move, Jack needed to do something desperate. He had one more ace up his sleeve. Jack closed his eyes and began to draw from Amon's mind with the Force, much as he had with Lynn. It took Darklighter a moment to react, though once he realized what was happening Amon howled and recoiled, falling off Jack and clutching the sides of his head.
Jack cut off his attack, knowing better than to finish his foe by draining his knowledge a second time. Instead Jack stood over the stunned bounty hunter and drew his katana.
"Shh, don't fight it," Jack whispered, plunging his sword slowly down into Amon's gut. The Anzat coughed up and choked on his own blood before at last falling silent.
Jack drew his blade from his foe and wiped away the blood just in time to watch Tagrenn's ship lift away from the landing pad. The Hutt would have to wait for another day.
Hello darkness, my old friend... (Age 25 - 26)
After losing Auren and once again escaping Nar Shaddaa, Jack found himself perhaps even more lost than the last time he'd fled Hutt Space. This time, however, an intriguing new opportunity had revealed itself. The Sith, an ancient order of dark force users thougt long extinct had made their presence known. Whispers told of there homeworld, a planet shrouded by the dark side. If the rumors were true, the Sith were just what Jack needed to cure his rapid degeneration and control his power.
Jack's search led him to Korriban, a dusty tomb of a world. Jack's hopes were high upon arriving, he could feel the dark side here, however faint. In the months that followed he would join the ranks of the initiates, and what a sad rabble they were. Life on Korriban was less about learning and more of a 24/7 d**k measuring contest. Jack was content to watch the comings and goings on Korriban for his first months. He observed his peers jockey with one another like male bantha in a mating dance, attacking anything that dared to give them a sniff. The instructors divied out their time and attention only to the initiates most adept at ass kissing, while the rest were left climb over each other for so much as a second look.
Jack wasn't interested in the swimsuit competition for the instructors attention. Instead he busied himself exploring the temple and the valley of the dark lords near by. What he found was disappointing. The tombs in the valley had long since been emptied. The teachings of the great Lords of the Sith were lost to blowing sands and slow minds. Korriban may not hold what Jack needed after all. If it did, the only place it could be was with the Dark Council and the Dark Overlord himself. If the Overseers were difficult to get the attention of, the Dark Council was near impossible.
The Jedi Temple was clearly still the best repository of knowledge about the Force, dark and light, in the known galaxy. Even so, Jack was not ready to give up on Korriban and the Sith just yet. On a day like most others Jack found himself in the grand entrance hall of the Sith Temple, people watching as he often did. A conversation with another initiate, a Firrerreo called Nieraan, gave Jack an idea.
Jack wasn't about to play the game the others were, he'd get the attention of the Lord of the Sith in a much more direct manner. Jack stood up in the middle of the Sith Temple's entrance and blasted the nearest support pillar with lightning. The destruction startled the other initiates, and amused Nieraan. The display was less about posturing and more about waking the slumbering giants in the deep, dark recesses of the temple. To this end, Jack's actions could not have been more successful.
The Sith flocked to the scene of such a brazen act of defiance, among them, the Dark Overlord himself. Darth Iniquitous greeted Jack and Nieraan with a wave of power that tore through Jack's defenses and sent him sprawling. This was what Jack had been searching for.
After a good deal of lecturing, Iniquitous was intrigued enough by Jack to offer him an opportunity to become his apprentice. The catch was that he would have to fight for it. His opponent would be another initiate, Tesa Yarum. Sizing her up, Tesa reminded Jack quite a bit of Auren. Her abilities were more finely toned, granted she had been training with the Sith far longer than Auren had been Jack's apprentice. Though in her was the same fire... and perhaps the same weakness.
There was little time to think as Jack and Tesa's duel before the whole of the Sith Temple had begun. Tesa attacked cautiously, feeling Jack out for weaknesses without pressing the offensive. A wise approach, but exactly the wrong one to take against Jack. Without being pressured, there was little need for Jack to rely on his lackluster physical attributes. Jack channeled the Force and attacked Tesa's mind carefully, as he had to defeat Amon Darklighter on Nar Shaddaa. The approach wasn't as effective on a trained Sith. Tesa was able to clear her thoughts and thwart Jack's attack. It was a strategy Jack had not yet encountered. He might have been able to force the memories from Tesa, though that would mean pushing the ability and risk further damage to his own mind. Jack was not willing to take this risk.
Jack was surprised that Tesa had not tried to test him with a lightsaber yet, but her hesitence was his advantage. Jack attacked again, this time with raw dark side power in the form of Force Lightning. Tesa was not able to fend off this assault. Jack may have finished her then and there had Iniquitous not stopped the fight. In a strange decision, the Dark Overlord named both Jack and Tesa as his apprentices. Jack was now a Sith, and what's more he sat just beneath the Overlord himself. Unfortunately, that seat was a bit crowded.
Following the duel and his joining the Sith as an apprentice, Jack saw very little of Darth Iniquitous. The Overlord left his apprentices to do the work of the Sith Order on their own for the most part. Iniquitous had given Jack and Tesa orders to seek out recruits strong in the Force to swell the Sith's ranks. Jack agreed to the mission, though he had no intention of funneling more pawns to Iniquitous' side.
The Overlord's decision to make Tesa his apprentice despite her loss had urked Jack, but more so than that, Iniquitous' ideas about the Sith and the dark side did not sit well with Jack. Iniquitous considered the Sith a unit, a "family" if you will, and felt that strength would come through unity. Jack could not disagree more. The dark side's power was power of the individual, at the expense of others when necessary. Unity was weakness. He'd been close to Auren and it got her killed. There was no place for solidarity among the Sith. Jack would use his position to advance his own ends.
What Jack needed was a new pawn to help him gain access to the Jedi's Temple on Coruscant. Jack was convinced this was where the real answers would be found. Tesa was an intersting candidate, though she trusted him about as much as a toydarian used speeder salesmen. She would be difficult to crack. Instead Jack put out his feelers for other potentials, using their mission to find and recruit Force sensitives to the Sith as his cover. Tesa was suspicious of Jack's motives, but she had no idea what he was after.
The pair's search brought them to Ralltiir, where a Jedi Healer named Kyo Sartori had been sent to investigate a Force user attacking civilians on the planet. Disguised as a newly wed couple, Jack and Tesa gained access to the hospital holding the many injured. There they confronted the Jedi, and Jack used his gifts with telepathy and manipulation to lure the Jedi to his side. Kyo had come to Ralltiir suspecting the attacks were caused by his brother, a fallen Jedi. Once Jack found this out, it was blood in the water. He convinced Kyo that he would be able to help him find his brother and took the Jedi with him offworld.
From there Jack met up with his old friend Nieraan in a cantina on Metellos. Jack did not consider Nieraan useful in helping him infiltrate the Jedi. The Firrerreo was a Sith through and through. Nieraan would prove useful in other ways, however. Jack officially recruited Nieraan to his cause on Metellos, not giving any details of his exact endgame (he'd learned his lesson already about revealing too much), instead only suggesting that he intended to work for himself, and not the Sith as a whole.
All went to plan, though an unexpected guest would turn this meeting upside-down. Kyo's master had been a member of the Jedi High Council, Master Si Quan. The Jedi Master had discovered Kyo missing on Ralltiir and followed the evidence to Jack and his ship on Metellos. From there he discovered the two Sith in the cantina. Si Quan was an opponent at a level Jack had not yet encountered before, say perhaps for Darth Iniquitous, though the two of them never actually fought. Jack did not fully appreciate the power of a Jedi Master, or the light side for that matter. As Si Quan engaged Nieraan, Jack charged in with his katana and lept at the Jedi. Without even drawing his own weapon, Master Quan disarmed Jack with a quick defensive swipe of his forearm, and cracked his ribs with a rapid open palm strick to the side.
Jack clearly could not stand toe to toe with such an enemy... Nieraan proved far more adept at this. Wielding two lightsabers, Nieraan was able to hold his own against the Jedi Master. With the Jedi's attention on Nieraan, Jack found where he could be useful. Out of sight, Jack used the Force to attack Si Quan's mind. As a duo, Jack and Nieraan were a formidable pair, every bit a match for a High Council Member. This particular Jedi, however, was no stranger to telepathic manipulation. Si Quan was able to break Jack's assault and ultimately subdue Nieraan with an explosive display of telekinetic Force power. The fight destroyed the cantina, and the two Sith managed to barely escape their encounter with the Jedi Master.
No Rest for the Wicked (Age 26 - 27)
Jack returned to Korriban with a Jedi in tow. Kyo was promptly thrown to the jailors to hold until Jack could bend him into the tool he desired. In the mean time, Jack had some shaping up to do of his own.
Of all the hermits on Korriban, the Dark Overlord of the Sith was the most reclusive. Jack had only seen Iniquitous twice until this point, despite having been his 'apprentice'. When he was summoned to Iniquitous' chambers, Jack was more surprised than anything. The Dark Lord had finally deemed it time to give Jack some proper instruction in the ways of the Sith.
The philosophy was nothing new to Jack, it was really the physical aspects that needed work. Iniquitous' first session was dedicated to improving Jack's lightsaber skills. The pattern drills Lynn had taught him on Nar Shaddaa were outdated and predictable, and Jack was far too slow to compensate for these shortcomings.
Jack was trained as any Initiate or Youngling would be. Simple though it may have been Jack still struggled. It was only after absorbing many a blast from the remote droid and becoming intimately familiar with the training room floor before Jack's blade finally began to catch up to the blaster bolts.
The first week of training was humiliating, without a doubt. A twenty-six year old Sith flailing at a remote droid while teenagers and children all around him expertly knock aside every bolt. With each fall Jack quietly reassured himself that he could kill every one of them before they would even think to reach for their weapons.
With time Jack mastered the remote. Not an incredible feat, but it was far more then he'd ever managed on Nar Shaddaa. With his basic lightsaber training shaping up, Iniquitous began to teach Jack something even more useful. Jack had shared his troubles with controlling the power of his Drain Knowledge ability with Iniquitous. The Dark Lord admitted freely that he was no expert in telepathy, but did have a potential solution that might enable Jack to at least control his voices.
Jack's most glaring weakness, Iniquitous observed, was his short temper. Emotion was a great source of power, however, if not properly controlled it could also prove a great liability. Iniquitous speculated that the voices Jack hears may be taking advantage of this. He suggested meditation techniques that would help channel his emotion and use it more practically.
It wasn't too long ago that Jack would avoid solitude. He would search for large crowds to drown himself in the white noise of the Force. Now Jack retreated to the roof of the Sith Temple, to sit alone with nothing but his mind and the dark hum of Korriban. Here he would put the techniques Iniquitous had taught him to use, retreating within himself in an attempt to flesh out his demons.
Jack's mind was busy with voices and traces of all the minds he'd attacked with his drain knowledge ability. Most were only just that; traces. Amon Darklighter, Si Quan, Tesa... they were easy to cull and subdue once Jack was able to make sense of the noise. Lynn, however, remained elusive. Like a cancer; everywhere and nowhere.
Days turned to months as Jack fought his most persistant demon. His routine had become quite single minded until one day one of the jailors rushed up to the temple rooftop with urgent news. Kyo Sartori had escaped. The Jedi's cell was empty and there was no trace to suggest where or how he had gone.
After calmly crushing the jailor's neck, Jack decided it was time to get serious. Jack was tinkled... but he could use this. He retreated to meditate again, this time making no attempt to conceal or control his emotions at first. Like a Gamorrean to the slop, Lynn could not resist. After luring his master out, Jack slowly ratched his emotions back, channeling them for a final strike that at last neutralized his old master.
With Lynn under his power, Jack was finally able to understand some of the information he'd adsorbed the day he'd killed her. One memory stood out to Jack among the rest. Lynn removing the crystal matrix from her old holocron and hiding it away beneath a false tile in the floor of her chambers.
So much of what had happened that day now made sense to Jack. When he'd broken into Lynn's room he had found the holocron with little trouble. His master had kept it on the nightstand, displayed plainly. When Jack attempted to activate it, nothing he did evoked any response. When Lynn entered and caught him struggling with the device, he'd destroyed it without much thought. Jack hadn't had time to inspect the holocron. He hadn't even noticed it was only a shell, missing its most important piece.
This new information gave rise to an intriguing possibility. The crystal matrix, and all the knowledge within, could still be hidden beneath the floors of what was now Tagrenn's Palace. Retrieving it, however, would mean another trip into the belly of the beast on the Smuggler's moon.
Makura (Age 27 - 28)
On Nar Shaddaa once more, Jack couldn't very well show his face on the streets. His plan was to instead infiltrate the palace from below, through the sewers. The stink and filth was the least of Jack's problems here, as Tagrenn's many beasts roamed free in the labyrinth of tunnels below the palace. Jack's endeavor led him into Tagrenn's throne room via the beast pit and the trap door used to drop victims below. Fortunately Tagrenn and his gang were nowhere in sight.
It had been nearly four years, though Jack still knew the layout of the palace like the back of his hand. Lynn's chambers it seemed had been repurposed into an armory, with warstaffs, vibroblades and blasters hung over all the walls. The false tile Jack had seen in his vision was hidden beneath a massive gun rack placed in the center of the chamber. As carefully as he could, Jack slid the rack aside with the Force. His gentle touch still did nothing to quiet the screech of the metal grinding over the marble floor tiles. The noise did not seem to have attracted any attention. Jack removed the false tile and at last, there it was.
Using the Force, Jack suspended the naked crystal lattice in the air just above his upturned palm. Once it was touched by the dark side again, the long dormant crystals came back to life. The projection of the gatekeeper appeared in front of Jack. He was a tall, barrel chested man with long silver hair tied back into a pony-tail. Jack recognized the man from Lynn's memories. Alex Drake was once a Jedi High Council Member and one of the most powerful telepaths of his time. However, an affair with a fellow council member began Drake's fall from grace. A slow decent into madness led Master Drake to murder his lover and flee from the Jedi. The exact circumstances of his demise were not known to Lynn, save for that he was likely killed by the Jedi.
The fallen Jedi gatekeeper was most uncooperative to begin with, regarding Jack as a fool child who'd injured himself trying to "play dark side games". Before, such taunts might have been enough to irk Jack. This time, however, Jack kept his calm. He explained what he knew about Master Drake's life, and how he'd obtained that information through ripping it from the mind of Drake's last student. Once Jack explained how he'd come to teach himself to drain the knowledge of others, Master Drake became more receptive, if not still condescending.
Alex told Jack that, while certainly demonstrating an impressive ingenuity in being able to formulate such a technique himself, the flaw with his drain knoweldge was in fact it's original concept. The Jedi Mind Meld shared knowledge between individuals. Opening one's mind to another as an act of aggresion was dangerous. When used with the light side, there was a level of trust between the practitioners, and never would the mind meld be used with an enemy. Jack's mistake was to wage a war using his own mind as the battle ground. The key to perfecting drain knowledge, Drake explained, was not to absorb the minds of others and try to make sense of the mess left behind. Rather, the trick was to occupy the minds of others and attack their memories from there. What Jack was doing was more akin to a dark side power known as Force Drain, where the user would absorb another's vitality refresh their own reserves of the Force, taking simply energy and leaving the foe's identity in tact.
Drake's lesson was abruptly interrupted as a pair of Gamorrean gaurds burst into the armory. Jack quickly deactivated the holocron by cutting the flow of the Force through it, taking the weave of crystals in his hand. The gaurds turned to run and tell their master only to have Jack sweep their feet out from under them with the Force. The first Gamorrean stumbled getting to his feet, grabbing at the heavy axe he wore on his belt. Jack approached calmly, summoning his lightsaber from his duster's breast pocket and halting the pig's offense before it began by swiping off his hand with the weapon's red blade. Another quick spin releaved him of his head as well.
The second gaurd was a tad bit more nimble than his comrade. He sprung to his feet and continued to flee, making it around the corner before Jack could turn his attention to him. Reinforcements would be arriving soon, Jack decided to escape the way he came, slipping out of the palace via the sewers.
Breaking in to Tagrenn's palace only inflated the bounty on Jack's head, but this was the least of his concerns for the moment. With his prize in hand, Jack returned to Korriban and constructed a casing for the crystal lattice he'd retrieved from Nar Shaddaa. Jack was careful to hide the holocrons existence from his fellow Sith, going so far as to hike out into the barren Valley of the Dark Lords and retreat into the empty tombs to continue his lessons with Master Drake.
The gatekeeper picked up where they'd left off, teaching Jack how to expand his presence and invade the minds of others before sapping them of their memories. In addition, Drake taught Jack how to use the power he already had to simply drain the Force from an enemy while not exposing his mind to attack. Alex suggested another Jedi power that would help Jack truly master his telepathy. The skill was called Battle Meditation, and it would allow Jack to not simply affect the mind of one enemy, but entire armies of friends and foes alike. Master Drake had never perfected the ability himself, though he knew the Jedi archives were rife with information and the personal acconts of Jedi who'd mastered the technique.
Without this Battle Meditation and no victims to practice on, Jack's progress was slow. The Force sensitive beasts that haunted the tombs made good fodder for Jack's Force Drain, but not so much draining knowledge. What was more, as Jack's power grew so too did the strength of the voices Jack had previously surpressed. Purging Jack of these entities was beyond Alex's knowledge. To accomplish such a thing would require a powerful healing technique. All Master Drake could offer in this regard was a name. Levin Caelum. He was a young up-and-coming Jedi during Drake's time, known to be more than just a healer of flesh, but of the Force as well. If he were still alive, he would likely be one of the few beings that had an answer for Jack's affliction.
Battle Meditation... and Levin Caelum. Jack's need to access the Jedi Temple on Coruscant was now more evident than ever before. To this end, Master Drake actually did have a solution to share. Alex had hid his affair and his practicing of dark arts from the Jedi Council using an ability known as Force Camouflage. The power was similar to a Jedi's mind trick, though far more subtle, thus allowing it to be used to much greater effect even on Drake's fellow council members. Force Camouflage confused the insight of others using powerful telepathy which could allow the user to hide themselves even while in plain sight. Though Jack could not surpress the power of the dark side within him, with Camouflage he could essentially erase his presence from the perceptions of others, making him seem just another inconspicuous face in the crowd.
Drake taught Jack the gentle touch required to affect another's mind without their notice. Jack could practice this in the tombs, affecting the simple minds of beasts to walk among them without so much as a snarl. Using it on the initiates on Korriban was far more challenging, though at this point in his life Jack was quick to adapt and learn. The real trick would be using the power successfully against the most powerful Force users the Jedi had to offer. There was no practice for that.
During his down time, Jack would return to the Temple and train with Darth Iniquitous. The Overlords ever-present mask made any thoughts of trying out Camouflage impossible. Instead, Jack was careful not to show any hint of the progress he'd gained in the tombs, explaining his trips into the valley as meditations into the dark side. Jack's growth in power could just as easily been attributed to his training with the Dark Overlord as anything else. Besides, in the minds of the overseers, what else could it have been?
Jack spent over a year back on Korriban before he was finally approached about becoming a Sith in full. As a member of the Sith Order, Jack was told he would have to pick a new name, one that would accurately represent the darkness he'd come to find within himself. Jack could think of no better name for this than the one he already had.
Jack rarely used his last name, in fact no one ever called him by it except maybe Nieraan. Makura was his father's name. It was less a name and more an inheritance. It was a relic of a past Jack had no part in and a life Jack would never know. Darros was dead. Jack's mother was dead. Makura was the 24 years of slavery and subservience that had molded Jack into the man he'd become. Makura belonged to him. It was his father's name no longer. There was no more fitting name in Jack's mind. The name would be remade, just as Jack had been, as Sith.
Equipment:
Lightsaber: Single Blade, Singe Phase.
Color: Red
Shoto Katana with sheathe/harness: The blade is approx. 2 ft in length. The sheathe is worn on Jack's back and concealed beneath his duster jacket.
Cigarettes: BRAND: Bloodstripes. Corellia's finest.
Stats:
Strength: Average
Intelligence: Superior
Agility: Below Average
Charisma: Below Average
Force Stats:
Telekinetic: Novice
Telepathic: Master
Body: Novice
Sense: Adept
Protection: Adept
Healing: Apprentice
Destruction: Expert
Lightsaber Training:
Shii-Cho - Adept
Combat Training:
Shoto Katana - Expert
Other Training:
Chess - Master
Force Training:
Drain Knowledge - Master
Force Camouflage - Adept
RP Sample:
As Lynn entered the room Jack was still. He could feel her despair upon seeing him there with her Holocron. Nothing would have given him more satisfaction than to have been able to drink it in longer, but there was little time for such indulgence. Wrapping the Force around the tiny pyramid it only took a tiny twitch to crush it into powder. Lynn let out an unintelligible roar with anger which finally drew Jack's gaze. His yellow eyes shot to his left and stuck on his old master as she all but tore her lightsaber from her belt and ignited its blade.
"What's the matter, master? Are you not pleased to see me?" Jack asked in a calm voice. Though his tone was subdued there was still an air of arrogance about his words that only fueled Lynn's ire.
"Traitor!" She called back at her apprentice, "You would sacrifice us all for your own fool ambition?"
Jack smiled. His master's anger had clearly clouded her thought process, "You forget yourself, teacher. Emotion is a tool that we wield. It should not wield us. You forget your own lessons. Once something is no longer useful it becomes one's duty to cast that thing aside, lest they be weighed down by its weakness. Isn't that right?" Lynn scowled at Jack, gritting her teeth. It was true she had let her rage spill over onto the surface, but who was he to lecture her on such things?
Lynn hesitated no longer, taking her saber in hand she took a Djem So stance before charging in at Jack. Closing his eyes lightly, Jack let out an almost inaudible chuckle as he raised his open palm up towards his master. Crossing blades with Lynn would be foolish. As Jack had learned during his match with Cele, it is always best to play your own game. Allowing your opponent to dictate the flow of the conflict is the quickest way to meet a humiliating end. Jack's strength was in the use of the Force and it was through this that he would achieve victory.
He had done it so many times before it almost became second nature. The Force's energy was everywhere, and as Jack called to it, it obeyed his command. The Force was packed together densely forming into a Barrier between Jack and his master. Jack then urged it forward. As Lynn collided with the Barrier it took all of his concentration to hold it together against the blow, but once it had it became a simple matter of continuing to force it forward in order to shove Lynn away.
Lynn finally used her own Force power to shatter the Barrier once she realized what had hit her, causing her to drop to the floor before Jack good run her into the wall. It was no matter, however. He had put enough distance between himself and his opponent in order to execute his next move.
