Relics & Rivals

[Symm]

A lone freighter travelled through the silent void of hyperspace, sailing to a system long since forgotten by many. The ship, a small unarmed courier vessel, bore no markings - nothing to indicate its provenance or allegiances. It appeared to be an older model, the paint chipped and hull dinged from many small impacts it had sustained over the decades. The vessel appeared to be nothing more than an independent trader; to know any better, a keen observer would have to meet its sole crew member.

Inside, Kathar sat with his feet propped up on the control panel, the endless stream of starlight shooting past him out the viewport. He held in one hand a small data tablet, which he flicked through with the other. Over the speakers, Correllian synth-tunes played, the electronic melody punctuating the gentle hum of the ship. That was one of the secrets hidden by the starship - despite its outward appearance, pock-marked and scarred, the internal systems were exceptionally well maintained, so the Jedi Knight within could pay very little attention to it.

That gave Kathar time to read through history on the mission for the twentieth time since leaving Coruscant. His destination was Khar Delba - a system located ostensibly within Sith space but, for all intents and purposes, abandoned and unclaimed. Still, its nearness, in galactic terms, to Korriban prompted some subtlety on behalf of the Jedi; hence Kathar's choice of a neutral freighter that wouldn't attract attention. The location, however, was not Kathar's primary concern. Instead, he cared about its past inhabitants.

Khar Delba was uninhabited, but it hadn't always been that way. Over a millennia ago the planet had been key to the rise - and fall - of the Sith Lord Naga Sadow. It served as his base of operations from which he attempted to gain control over the Empire. History, told by the tales of the Daragon twins and stored in the Jedi archive, showed that Sadow failed, but very little mentioned anything about what happened to his base of operations. So, a thousand years later, Kathar travelled to investigate the ruins - to find and secure any artifacts that might be left behind. The Jedi Knight did not hold out much hope for finding anything of value - anything remaining would have surely been picked clean by the Sith. Still, it was a mission from the council, and he would do his best to fulfil it.

The music faded away, replaced by a constant hard to ignore beeping. Kathar slid the tablet into a pocket on the side of the pilot's chair and dropped his feet to the floor. He took up the instruments, reaching up to flick off the lock, and then along to various other controls to prepare for the drop out of hyperspace. The man was a competent enough pilot, though nowhere near the skill level of some of his fellow Jedi; he preferred feet on the ground to wings in space.

A few checks later and Kathar grabbed the hyperspace control, pulling it back to facilitate the drop back into real-space. The ship smoothly transitioned, not even a groan of protest - a testament to the work done by the Jedi mechanics. The light streaming past the viewport slowed, then stopped, revealing the Khar Delba system before him. Various bodies littered the place, but there were only two things he was interested in: Khar Delba itself, and its moon Khar Shian. The planet and the moon framed perfectly in his screen, the star just peeking around from behind the world. To Kathar, it looked like every other ice planet - but his research told him better.

A quick scan of the system revealed no other craft - to be expected. After all, given the size of the galaxy and the vast timescales involved, what would be the chances of someone else being here at the same time?

Kathar piloted the craft to the planet, with only slight turbulence to indicate that he entered the atmosphere. He circled the coordinates he'd pulled from the archives before his eyes picked out a landing site, which he guided the ship to carefully. After anchoring the vessel down, Kathar set about securing the freighter, then suited up. The temperature outside was below freezing, so he rugged up appropriately. At his side, he strapped a small blaster - really just something to throw someone off, if they spotted him, with his lightsaber concealed along his belt. He pulled on a backpack with some few supplies - prepared for a few days, just in case.

One last check of the systems before shutting the ship down revealed a storm front, likely to hit in a few hours, that would bring sleety rain, hail, snow, and lightning. Kathar smirked, amused at what fate brought.

He stepped outside of the ship and brought up a viewfinder to his eyes as the ramp ascended back into the vessel. Finding his destination, the Jedi, readjusting his backpack straps, began the trek to the ruins.

[Rugs]

Karn trudged along the snow-covered steps to the ancient citadel’s entrance. He flexed his four-fingered hands against the cold — even with warm, durable gloves on — as he walked. He’d arrived on Khar Delba a day prior, though late enough local time that he’d not had much opportunity to begin exploring Naga Sadow’s abandoned fortress. Especially with the howling blizzard that blew through as the pale, warmthless sun dipped below the horizon.

His ship — a small, Imperial vessel designed for solo operation — was tucked away under an overhang where the land dipped nearby. It was a bit further a walk than landing out in the open, but it protected the ship against the worst of the weather.

Not that Karn minded. It was cold, but the snow and ice and biting wind reminded him of Arkania, if nothing else about Khar Delba did. It was better than dry, dusty Korriban.

But what world wasn’t?

He stopped near the citadel’s primary entrance, hidden in the shadows the rest of the monolithic structure cast. Darth Viren sent him on the expedition, to this forgotten world a stone’s throw away from Korriban and Dromund Kaas, to investigate the ruins of Naga Sadow’s old citadel.

Sadow’s brief war against the Republic, some 1400-and-change years ago had been a spectacular failure, in Karn’s estimation. His multi-pronged attack was outrageously aggressive — which the Arkanian acolyte could certainly appreciate — but when it unraveled, it happened quickly, ruthlessly.

All that fighting and slaughter, and nothing gained from it beyond a calendar change. From the brink of eternal glory to the depths of failure, all in a flash. But his was a name that echoed through history, that had shaken the Republic to its core.

Despite his failures, Sadow’s abilities, if the legends were true, were nothing short of remarkable. It was not hard to grasp why Viren might take an interest in any long-forgotten secrets that may yet have lurked in the citadel.

From preliminary research before embarking on this journey, he’d learned of another citadel, supposedly hidden on the Khar Delba’s icy moon. That it existed was undebatable — Sadow used its position to launch an attack on his old rival Ludo Kressh in a battle that raged around the very citadel where he now stood. The histories made that much clear.

As for the secret citadel’s location on Khar Shian, or whether it still stood? Of that, the texts within the Order’s archives were frustratingly silent. He hoped to find an answer waiting within.

Karn strolled to the entrance and wiped away snow from the previous night’s storm that clung to some text carved into the wall. He recognized the language — glyphs carved in the ancient Sith language — but they were too old, too faded and broken for him to read.

Still, he opened the small sack he carried with him — stuffed with supplies, field analysis equipment, and a datapad — to take note of the inscriptions. A quick description would do.

As his datapad screen flickered to life, Karn paused. A ship rumbled overhead, settling down not too far from the citadel, on the opposite side from where his own sat under its overhang.

“Who is that?” he wondered aloud. “No one else should be coming here.” Another Sith? It seemed unlikely that Viren would send someone else without telling him, and a quick check of his comm confirmed he’d received no new word from his master since departing.

He reached out warily with his senses, straining to the edge of his ability. He could feel that there was someone coming, and the echo of the Force within them. At such distance, he lacked the skill to make out more than that.

Perhaps a representative of Mysteries, here to stick their nose in business they’d left abandoned until now. No, he thought, squinting as a figure emerged from the ship. I don’t know about that.

Whatever the case, Karn was suddenly very aware of the tracks he’d left in the snow up to the citadel entrance. Muttering to himself, he returned his datapad to his sack and set about finding a way to open the great stone doors barring the way in.

[Symm]

The cold crept in as the Jedi hiked the trail, yet he found it a comfort compared to the oppressive essence of the planet. The legacy of Naga Sadow and all the tyrant had done here cast a pall over the Force, forever marking this place as anathema to the light. To Kathar, it seemed that the shadows stretched longer, the wind carried sounds of sorrow, and the sun glowed just a little darker. Of course, there was nothing physically different about the world, but it was hard not to let his imagination run amok.

It wasn't a surprise, therefore, that the first he sensed of the Sith apprentice was not in the Force, but in the tracks left on the trail to the entrance. Kathar knelt in the snow drifts to peer at the footprints that led onwards, eyes tracking further and further. He stretched out his senses, endeavouring to pierce the shadow of the citadel and seek out the heretofore unknown presence. A moment later, Kathar took in a breath as he found the other in the Force, surprised and concerned.

Every living creature, big or small, had a presence in the Force; it didn't matter if they were sensitive to it or not. Most people were the dimmest glimmer, a part of the grand fabric but not able to weave it to their will. So the surprise came when Kathar found not merely a low burning candle, but a blazing bonfire. The other's presence whipped about furiously, occasionally breaking free of the will that held it back. When this happened, Kathar watched as it consumed all around it, poisoning what it touched and causing it to wither, a pox with no cure.

Kathar chastised himself for not picking it out sooner, too distracted by the citadel itself. The Jedi Knight stayed on the path for a few minutes, considering his options. Ultimately, upon confirming that this was the only presence he felt, Kathar stood and continued up the trail. The mission was too important to abort - especially if there was, as the man suspected, a Sith here; it was the most likely explanation, given the aura - but more importantly the proximity to Dromund Kaas and Korriban. If this person was here, there had to be something left, and he'd prefer to be blind to the Force before he let a Sith have unfettered access to potentially critical information.

So he steeled himself and continued trudging to the door. After a few more minutes, the Knight turned a corner and saw the door up ahead - and more importantly, the tall Arkanian standing before it. Kathar approached openly, his blaster hand coming up to push down the hood protecting him from the cold. "Hello?" He called out, "I wasn't expecting to find someone else out here." His other hand stayed at his waist, well away from any visible weapons; right now he wasn't attempting to appear as a threat.

[Rugs]

There was no immediately apparent way into the citadel. No keypads next to the huge, heavy stone doors that towered above Karn, uncaring of his sudden urge to get into the citadel before this stranger, whoever they were, arrived. No handles, no switches or devices that he could discern. Just stone and ice.

With some irritation, he turned to the Force. Perhaps he could brute force them open; even if they had once been powered, he suspected that whatever generators had once run the place had long since gone silent.

It was as Karn pressed against the doors with the Force that he discovered the locking mechanism. They shifted slightly at the power surging from his outstretched hand but stopped, held in place by something heavy within.

Karn glanced behind him. The figure was at the citadel’s base. Time grew short.

He turned back to the doors, drawing on the Force as heavily as he could. With all of his focus before him, he could sense them: three interlocking stone mechanisms that anchored the doors in place. With some strain — and thanks that his training under Darth Viren had already shown dividends in strengthening his ability in the Force — Karn dragged one, then the other and the other out of the way.

The last settled with a heavy, reverberating thud. Something began to rumble, shaking loose snow and ice from the rough stone surfaces around the citadel entrance. Yet nothing moved.

Karn turned to see his company cresting the top of stairs. He’d lost track of them with his focus given entirely to seeing the way opened. But now, only a few feet apart, he could feel the man’s presence well.

This was no Sith. His presence shone, a single light amidst the darkness that cloaked Khar Delba. Karn had felt presences in the Force like this only once before: from the Jedi he’d seen as the Empire and Republic fought together at Nar Shaddaa to repel the Archeri Chorus.

Karn narrowed his snow-white eyes at the newcomer as they spoke. The rumbling behind him grew louder, drawing his gaze briefly backward. A burst of stale air ruffled his hair under his hood and the white fur lining of his coat as the doors parted in the middle to allow entry to the citadel.

“And yet here I am,” he said, turning back to the newcomer. He was a bit shorter than Karn, and seemed heavier in build. Karn’s hand drifted near the long-hilted lightsaber hanging at his waist, but he did not grab it. Not yet. “And here you are.”

The doors stopped their movement with a heavy thud that shook the floor beneath them as they settled into a groove to keep their position. Karn’s stance shifted slightly, to prepare for violence, though he’d not yet decided whether it’d be of his own making or in defense. “Why are you here, in this place that is not yours, where you clearly do not belong?”

He did not speak the word “Jedi” but the added emphasis indicated that he knew one thing: either this man was a Jedi or some otherwise hapless do-gooder that had no business in this ancient Sith place.

[Symm]

The rumbling doors caught Kathar's attention, briefly shifting them away from the younger man to examine the dark entryway. A stench millennia in the making temporarily imposed itself upon Kathar's nose, only to be rapidly swept away by the increasingly powerful winds. He stretched his senses out beyond his physical form, a probe of light seeking to pierce the veil within the door; yet much like the two men outside with the gale approaching, it was buffeted by the darkness.

Kathar drew to a stop on the opposite side of the doorway to Karn. He brought his eyes, a continental world of green and browns, to meet the ice planet's peering back at him. The shift in stance on the Sith's behalf, a possible precursor to violence, caused his eyes to assess the man carefully before settling back to match his gaze.

Well, I was on a tour of all the sites of Sith failures. It's been a very long trip so far, and I'm not even halfway through my list, you see, so would you kindly skrog off.

The Jedi pushed away that uncharacteristic response, internally chastising himself for even thinking it. Kathar had never felt like that before, not even in the most stressful situations. It seems the planet, and whatever was inside the citadel, was having more of a deleterious effect on him than he'd thought. He would have to watch himself.

"I'm not here to fight, I can assure you of that," he claimed, pushing through the haze of ill-judgement. "I suspect, aside from that, I'm here for the same reasons you are. This citadel contains precious histories I am keen to explore." Kathar brought his gloved hand up to rest on the doorway, feeling over the scrawled surface. "And I don't know about you, but I didn't come all this way to stand outside and freeze to death. Come inside with me."

So he turned side-on to Karn, keenly away that as he started into the citadel that the young man could try to stab him in the back. He pulled his hip bag around to the front, reaching in - fingers passing over the lightsaber, but instead grabbing a torch. He flicked the light on - after knocking it against the wall to get the batteries aligned. Kathar held it aloft and panned it around the entry hall, punctuating the movements with an appreciative whistle. "Whoever built this place certainly didn't lack inspiration."

It was undoubtedly grand - the roof arched away to an apex at least thirty feet above their heads, engraved pillars growing up from the floor to support the structure. Kathar's voice echoed around the room, bouncing back at him and only surrendering to the chill winds brought in through the open door. Sconces on the walls contained lamps that hadn't cast light in 1400 years. Various doorways led off into the depths of the citadel. At the back of the room, a large carving of a man stared at the doorway, face permanently set in disappointment judgement of all who entered: Naga Sadow - not quite in the flesh.

For all it's grandeur, Kathar saw the practicality of the room. Various gaps in the wall at regular intervals around the room provided strategically important viewing positions - or murder holes. The doors, when opened, hid from view anyone standing beside them, and the pillars themselves were wide enough to obscure many combatants. So the room served dual purposes: to inspire awe, and to defend against assault.

There was one other thing that stuck out to Kathar, and he couldn't help but give voice to his confusion, "Huh. That's odd." No sign of dust. The room, aside from the snow tracked in, looked as though cleaning droids went through mere hours before.

[Rugs]

Tense silence hung in the air between Karn and the Jedi. His gaze, intense and unfaltering met the Jedi’s, which was likewise steadfast. A part of him wanted dearly to take his up his saber, ignite its crimson blade and cut the Jedi down. He stayed his hand, with considerable effort, until the Jedi spoke again.

At that, he snorted quietly, but the Jedi was already moving on into the Temple. Karn thought to stop him, to lunge at him and stick his lightsaber between the man’s ribs while his back was turned.

Yet he refrained. The Jedi was right — it was very cold, and even their heavy clothing could only hold out for so long. With a frown, Karn followed after the Jedi, into the citadel.

The darkness that pervaded Khar Delba thickened as he walked into the ancient fortress, much as the temples on Korriban and Dromund Kaas served as nexuses for the Dark Side presences cloaking their respective worlds. To Karn, it felt invigorating, like well of strength, comforting in its oppression.

He wondered how this felt to the Jedi. He kept a few steps behind him, never letting his attention wander so much that it left him.

Still, the citadel itself was a wonder, especially for such a barren, lifeless world. The Sith’s architecture had changed, over the millennia, but there was an imposing presence to the place that made Karn wonder if it’d been imposing on its own to Kressh’s forces when they turned against Sadow so long ago.

As they walked further into the grand entryway and the Jedi gave voice to his thoughts on the place, Karn retrieved a glowrod from his sack and tied it to his belt. It was a slender tube with a plasteel handle at one end and a small cap at the other. When he activated it, it threw bright light that did much to illuminate the hall.

Karn’s gaze immediately locked on the statue of Naga Sadow at the far end. It was, for all the years that’d passed by, in pristine condition. Now that he looked, that seemed true of the entire hall.

“It is.” Karn couldn’t deny the Jedi’s observation. He began to say more but a familiar rumbling cut him off.

He turned to see the great doors sliding slowly shut behind them. Their rumbling shook the floor and echoed like thunder within the cavernous hallway. As they slid shut, heavy clicks — much the same as the ones that accompanied Karn’s unlocking doors — signaled the ancient locking mechanisms reactivating.

Everything within was darker, with the pale daylight from outside cut off. Karn grit his teeth.

If only I’d made it in before he showed up.

There was nothing to be done for it now. As he sighed, looking around in irritation, he noticed some text carved into a stone plaque beneath Sadow’s station. With a sideways glance at the Jedi, Karn ventured forward.

“You must realize, whoever you are, that I can’t allow you to leave with anything from this place.” His voice echoed in the dark as he walked forward. “By all rights, I should have cut you down on the steps instead of allowing you to taint this place with your presence.”

He stopped before the statue, kneeling to get a better look at the glyphs carved in the stone. It, like the text outside, was carved in the Sith language. Unlike those others, however, this message was in pristine condition. Karn could speak and read the Sith language well, and easily read the text.

“To those who would come into this sacred place, beware. Guardians yet remain to purge the unworthy.”

Karn’s pale brows knit. Sacred place? That sounds suited to a temple than a citadel. Was this added at a later date? The plaque itself didn't seem to be connected to Sadow's statue, and even that may have been an addition after the Citadel's construction. And what guardians? He fished out his datapad to take notes and looked over his shoulder to the Jedi as its screen lit up. He’d not read the inscription aloud.

“Do the Jedi not have their own relics and mysteries for you to go searching for?” He smiled, cold as the wind blowing battering the citadel and obviously malicious. “I know several of your temples now reside in Sith hands, but surely there’s still plenty of your own history to stick your nose into in the holdings that remain?”

[Symm]

The howl of the wind, growing stronger with each passing moment, cut off as the doors shut solidly behind the two men. So absolute was the seal that what remained was an eerie silence punctuated only by the sounds of the two occupants breathing and movements. Kathar became distinctly aware of his heartbeat, fluttering despite his attempt at calm. It was not every day that you get trapped in an ancient Sith Citadel with another person who spoke openly of murdering you.

"You could have tried," Kathar said in response to the threat, "and there's a chance you would have succeeded. You're at a disadvantage, however." He turned slightly to look back at the doors - should he return to try to open them? Or was that a concern for later? "You don't know anything about me, whereas I know something about you." The Jedi twisted back and walked up to the statue, coming to stand next to Karn - though still at a distance that would require a lunging attack. "I know which hand you prefer to hold your saber, and I know it is a single blade. I saw your stance when you anticipated an attack. Every little detail provides an edge. You would do well to guard information better."

All of this may sound like arrogance, but Kathar was a duellist. He'd found early on that the more information he knew about his opponent, the better his chances were.

"Let me guess," Kathar gestured towards the plaque, "Something about trespassers beware? Old Sadow here doesn't strike me as a commemorative plate kind of guy." The Jedi slapped his hand against the statue's base, then turned to walk along the edges of the room.

The dark presence of the citadel sought to pervade Kathar's senses, so he pushed back. The Jedi flattened his aura and pressed it outwards, trying to create a bubble of sanctuary in this terrible place. It gave the Jedi less immediate protection - he would have to draw the Force back to himself - but at least it took the pressure off of his mind.

The mention of the occupied temples rankled, and he had to bite back a scathing reply. Instead, he focused on the first part of the question, "Oh, the Jedi have plenty of relics and tomes and tablets that more academically minded people could research; delving into a Sith reliquary? That requires a different skill set."

Kathar pulled the gloves from his hands and undid the straps of his cold-weather gear. It was beginning to warm up inside the citadel now that the door had closed. Still not comfortable, but at least it wasn't freezing anymore. He held one of those now bare hands ahead of him as he walked, eyes half-closing in concentration. Kathar passed by many of the various doors and hallways - but one gave him pause. He continued, testing each of the other entries, before returning to the one that piqued his interest. The Jedi felt something there, something that seemed like a warning and a welcome. A siren's song that wound it's way up through the labyrinthine walkways of the temple.

The man glanced back at Karn, "Tell me, do you wonder why your masters sent you here? Surely in millennia, someone from your order would have come here. The Sith are not quite that incompetent." He lowered his voice, letting one of the invasive thoughts out, "Almost, though."

He reached out with his hand and pushed against the stone facade - which slid open silently and with no difficulty. The other doors, however, all slammed shut with a resounding slam of stone on stone. Kathar turned and looked back at the foyer. "Well. I guess we're going this way."

He didn't even wait for a response. Kathar began to walk down the hallway, torch sending light down what seemed to be an endless corridor. "My name is Kathar, by the way. Now you know something about me." He called back to Karn, even as he walked away.

[Rugs]

“A different skill set, eh?” Karn looked at the Jedi from the corner of his eye as he took notes in his datapad. “So what you’re saying is, send an idiot in the stead of someone who might actually understand what it is they’re looking at?” Satisfied with his brief notes — he agreed with the Jedi that the plaque, and likely the statue, were surely late additions to the citadel — Karn snorted as he stood once more.

“After all, knowledge, wisdom, an understanding of your arch-enemy's histories and secrets — those are hard to replace if captured or killed, aren’t they? But a loudmouth Jedi who brings nothing to bear other than some brawn, well...” Karn smiled too-sweetly at the Jedi as he put his datapad back away in his sack. “Jedi Knights are a dime a dozen, aren’t they?”

Karn lowered his coat’s hood and pulled the cold-weather goggles from over his white eyes. There was no need for such extensive protection here, and though it was cool within the citadel, it wasn’t dangerously frigid, as it was in the howling winds outside.

Karn took a brief moment to study the red-haired Jedi as he ventured down the hall. Red hair and neatly-trimmed beard; he might have been handsome — for a Human, anyway — if he wasn’t so ceaselessly irritating. The blaster at his hip was an oddity, though he was hardly unacustomed to Force users with guns; Janse often sported one at his side. He could see no lightsaber — a minor irritation after the Jedi boasted of reading him, though that was of little consequence at the moment.

More interestingly, he felt the Jedi pressing his presence out, pushing against the darkness that smothered the ancient place. Karn smirked and shook his head, but said nothing. He was perfectly content to get the rest of this aggravation over in silence.

The Jedi, it seemed, had no such plans.

“We are competent enough that members of your Order flock to our cause,” Karn shot back at the Jedi’s quip about the Sith. “Competent enough that the Jedi were paralyzed in fear and left their beloved Republic to burn as the last war began.”

He bit his tongue — almost literally. Karn had no qualms about going back and forth with the Jedi if that was what the other man wanted, but he’d come to this faraway place for research, not to trade barbs. If the latter was what they were going to do, he'd rather ignite blades and get it over with. “I do not assume I am the first person, or the first Sith to set foot in this place in the 1,400 years since the end of the Great Hyperspace War, no,” he said slowly, as if speaking to a dullard. “As for what the Sith want, and why I was sent here, I’ll let you use your imagination. I can assure you we’ll put whatever we find to better use than you or your Jedi friends would.”

He’d followed along, until the Jedi pressed open a door and countless others slammed shut in its place. With a groan of irritation, Karn set after the Jedi — who named himself Kathar —more or less matching pace with him.

“I know you’re a Jedi who thinks himself far more clever than he is,” Karn muttered as the hallway stretched on and on. “And that for all your talking, this place makes you uneasy.”

A pause, and then he begrudgingly muttered, “I am Karn.”

They carried on for some while. Time slipped away in the pitch dark, broken only by their two lights. Karn removed his own gloves as he walked, stuffing them away in his pocket. His breath still misted the air as he walked, but it seemed to be growing steadily warmer as they progressed deeper into the citadel.

Eventually, the corridor walls gave away. They emerged into a round room of moderate size. The stone walls were neatly cut so that their surface appeared smooth and flawless like the rest of the citadel. The ceiling here was flat and low — just ten or so feet up. The room was barren, save a series of what looked to be projection knobs where the far wall met the ceiling.

Karn could feel something beyond, but no cracks, no breakages that would indicate doorways were apparent in the smooth stone wall.

“You who have come to this place, beware,” a hologram flickered to life, lit by the knobs inserted along the wall. A hooded man, face hidden within a deep cowl but with a pair of tattooed lekku hanging out in front of his shoulders, flickered to life opposite the Sith and Jedi. A dark fluid dripped from one of his hands. The hologram was blue, its color washed out, but Karn suspected it was blood.

“If you have come alone, turn back. If your mind is too weak for the terrible weight here, turn back. If your will would break at the dangers that lurk beyond, turn back. If you would hear this warning and still consider yourself worthy, step forward.” With the grating of stone on stone, a small, round panel in the middle of the room slid back, revealing a pad of some sort. “This lift will take you to that which you seek. Know this: only the worthy may leave this wretched place. If you prove yourself unworthy, join the countless souls — my soul — trapped here forever.”

The hologram faded away, leaving Karn and Kathar in silence. Karn watched the Jedi for reaction, then grunted. “I haven’t come all this way to turn around.” Even if it meant putting up with Kathar further, and especially if the Jedi planned to press onward anyway. Karn stepped forward. “Let’s go.”

[Symm]

He almost took the bait. Almost. Karn flung insult after insult at the Jedi, and with each barb, Kathar's ire rose. A riposte came within moments of execution as he turned to look at Karn.

Throughout his training, the Jedi instilled into Kathar the dark side was an alluring aspect of the force; of course, he hadn't expected the attraction to be quite so literal. In Kathar's mind, the Sith were supposed to be ugly, faces and bodies warped from the evil energies they channelled every day. So Kathar found it challenging to hide the look of surprise that crossed his face as Karn revealed his. Yes, this Sith was quite handsome in a way that disturbed Kathar more than he'd like to admit. He was also younger than anticipated. It took the Jedi remembering another aphorism - beauty was only skin deep - to return his thoughts to the mission.

The mission. Right. Kathar released the breath intended to voice verbal assaults and allowed the tension to flow with it. Later he would be ashamed of his reaction, how he let Karn get under his skin, but for now, there were more pressing concerns needing his attention. For example, the hologram that flashed up in front of the two.

"You who have come to this place, beware..."

The hologram intoned its warning, who knows how many centuries old. Kathar found his eyes drawn to the liquid dripping and disappearing as it reached the edge of the holofield - and came to the same conclusion as Karn. Blood. Whoever this person was, they had encountered something in the depths and hadn't made it out alive.

"...forever."

The final word before the projection faded away echoed through the chamber. Or at least, that was how Kathar perceived it. It was likely a trick of the mind rather than anything intentional. Regardless, the shiver sent down his spine was real, and Kathar couldn't help reaching for the lightsaber still hidden away. His fingers brushed against the bag, but he pulled away as Karn addressed him.

He couldn't help the small smile that creased his face as the Sith spoke the collective 'let's'. It wasn't even a false smile - he genuinely enjoyed the almost begrudging nature of it. "Yes, let's," he replied with warmth in the tone. Kathar stepped forward onto the platform with Karn and stood.

And waited.

And waited.

Kathar frowned, lifted a boot and slammed it on the platform. Immediately following this percussive maintenance, the lift started to move, slowly at first but then speeding up to take them deep, deep underground. "I guess sometimes brawn works out, hey?" A gentle, gentle prod back at their animosity; also an acknowledgement that he recognised Karn's point.

The silence stretched as the floors flew by, and Kathar shifted from foot to foot. Typically he was okay with quiet, but the place had him on edge. "So, Karn...how did you become a Sith?" A ridiculous question, really, but it was all Kathar could think to ask.

With a thud, the two explorers reached the last stop on the lift. Kathar couldn't even guess how deep they were - he looked up just in time to see the passageway seal shut above them. Then, moments later, torches - actual torches with fire - lit up, revealing that they stood in a room with four exits, all open and leading off in the cardinal directions. The flames continued to flare up along the hallways, illuminating more and more of the temple.

Kathar stepped off of the platform and turned in a circle, getting his bearings; or trying to. "The hologram said we should not go alone. Considering I've chosen which way to go before, why don't you pick."

[Rugs]

They moved forward. Karn was the first onto the panel, a half-step ahead of Kathar. For a long, silent moment they waited. For something to happen.

For anything to happen.

Then the Jedi stomped on the pad and the lift groaned to motion, taking them down and down beneath the citadel. “I suppose it does.” Karn couldn’t quite suppress a stupid smile. The Jedi had some humor to him, at least. With the — presumably — dead man’s warning that they must cooperate, even Karn recognized that further antagonizing would serve no purpose.

Well, he’d try not to antagonize Kathar too much. At least until they were topside again, anyway.

The lift rumbled on and on. The fact that it was made entirely of stone had the side effect of leaving Karn with no idea exactly how underground they were going, and nothing to look at as the journey passed. Except Kathar.

And he did, stealing occasional glances from the side of his vision when it seemed the Jedi’s thoughts were elsewhere. He was handsome, now that Karn was standing as near as he’d gotten since they first met back beyond the citadel gates. Pity he’s a Jedi.

During one of these glances, he noticed Kathar reaching, as if to grab something, but stopping short. He thought to say something, but stopped himself and filed the motion away.

Kathar eventually broke the silence, and at his question, Karn turned to regard the Jedi in full for a silent, thoughtful moment.

Had Kathar asked before they got stuck on the lift together, Karn very well may have told him to shove the question up his own ass and mind his business. But they were to be teammates — however temporary — and no facet of his journey to the Sith was shameful or deserving of secrecy.

“You scold me about guarding information, then ask questions about myself?” Karn smiled, wryly. “You owe me a question, of my own choosing.”

“My story is straightforward,” he said over the lift’s grinding and groaning. “I could have been a Jedi, you know. They knew of me.” Arkania was--in Karn’s youth, as now--a Republic world, and he was young when his Force sensitivity was discovered and relayed to the Republic. “My family turned them away.” That was an undertstatement — the Albrechts had never been fond of the Republic, or the Jedi, and summarily refused to hear what the Order had to say.

“I had some training from a tutor in the years after that, and then the Sith came calling.” Karn shrugged as if everything was simple, was as it should be. “I’ve been with them ever since.”

The lift stopped, as if on queue. The unlikely duo found themselves in a stone room with four corridors leading out in different directions. Karn’s eyes went wide as torches lit, seemingly on their own, lighting not only their present room but the way along each of the corridors.

“I’m not sure,” he muttered as looked around. One way seemed as good as any other. He turned to look down each corridor in turn and noticed a shape slumped against a wall, beneath a torch, a few dozen meters down the east-facing hall.

Karn pointed this out to Kathar as he activated his datapad to take more notes. The lift, the warning hologram, the self-lighting torches — none of the texts in the archives mentioned any of these things.

He led the way along the hall, certain that Kathar would follow. As they came closer to the figure, Karn realized it was a skeleton, in a tattered black robe that seemed so old and frail it would crumble to dust at a touch.

Karn crouched down by the figure. “Is this our hologram man?” he wondered aloud. “No,” he muttered as he peered at the skull. “I don’t think this is a Twi’lek...” He noticed an old datapad on the ground near one of the skeleton’s hands and grabbed it. With some disappointment, he realized that the power source had long since failed, but with some careful fishing around, pried the data card loose and inserted it into a spare slot on his own.

A series of logs displayed on his screen, each dated over the course of a month to the year 958 A.H.W.

“This is 450 years old,” he said, with some astonishment. “It’s a wonder it still works.”

His elation was immediately crushed as he tried to access the logs. Several failed to open, instead displaying corrupted data error messages. The last one, however, worked.

“We never should have come here after Qurzit went missing. I told them we should leave him for dead, but we came anyway. Three of us at first. Now there’s only me. I’m out of food. I’d eat their corpses, but those beasts didn’t leave any behind. No closer to accessing the Vault than on the first day. Not with those things guarding it. I thought they only lived on Korriban?

But we failed in the tests to get the relics that open the Vault, and now I’m alone. I can’t do this alone. We barely killed one of those guardian robots together, and I need whatever is in the Vault to get out of here. We should have listened to that damned hologram.

Another of Varik’s foolish ventures. So much for his Reborn Sith. Who are we to lead if we can’t even get out of this damned prison?

I hope I can find a way out before the spirits come again. Something makes them restless, at times. I do not know what. I don’t think I’ll make it if they come again.”

Karn read the entry aloud to Kathar and looked at him, brows knit in thought. The Reborn Sith? He’d never heard of them. Perhaps this group, this team, had come to Khar Delba in the hopes of forging a new Sith Empire.

Regardless, they’d ultimately failed. The notes, without further context, was frustratingly vague.

“Guardian droids, spirits, and beasts,” Karn said. “Relics to open this... Vault, wherever and whatever it is.” Had Sadow or his followers hidden away secrets of the Sith Lord’s powers? Karn looked down the hall. It stretched on and on, but he thought he could see a large chamber at the far end. Where this hall led, he had no idea. If there’d been any instructions or maps on the dead man’s datacard, he could think of no way to access them.

A chill ran down his spine and he stood, looking to Kathar again. “Sounds like we’ve got our work cut out for us.”

[Symm]

Kathar mostly failed to spot the looks Karn gave the man and those that he did notice he put down to assessing the enemy. After all, what else could they possibly mean? He snuck his glances too, justified in his mind as performing the same assessment. That's all they were, evaluating looks. Yes. Definitely.

An amused smile plastered its way on Kathar's face as Karn proposed a quid pro quo. He even gave a soft chuckle before nodding, and offering by way of reply, "Tell you what. Once we both get out of here alive, you can ask me anything you want about myself, and I'll answer truthfully. No state secrets though." The last added wryly, more self-deprecating than directed. As if he knew any state secrets, after all.

The story was straightforward, as promised, and Kathar found himself in thought. "That's strange. Why would your parents turn the Jedi away?" He couldn't fathom why any parents wouldn't jump at an opportunity to have their child serve the Order. It was an honour and a privilege in his mind. Especially when the alternative was the Sith.

That question was left to hang as Karn pointed out the object down one of the hallways. Kathar, as expected, followed the other man down. He stood over Karn as the other crouched down to work, darting a watchful eye in either direction. When Karn pointed out the age of the datapad though and got it working, Kathar looked down, "Impressive you got it working." A compliment, pure and simple. Even the worst enemies could find something to admire in each other, right?

Karn began to read aloud, and as he reached the end of the notes, Kathar crouched down beside him to glance at the pad. He was probably too close - Karn wouldn't even have to stretch to touch the man.

"Indeed," he replied, brow furrowing. "This also seems to imply that nobody has succeeded in accessing this vault since Sadow. How many explorers do you think have been down here?" How many masters? And yet these two young force users thought they had a chance? It was a laughable proposition on the face of it.

Still.

Kathar wasn't about to back down, not least because he didn't know how to get out. He wasn't about to let the Sith have unfettered access to whatever Sadow left behind - and he wasn't about to leave Karn alone to face whatever those droids, spirits, and beasts were. It was justified in his mind as protecting everyone, but would he have been so willing to help if it were any other Sith? One less engaging? A troubling question.

"I suppose we should get prepared, then." Kathar unslung the backpack and placed it on the floor in front of him. He then fully unbuckled the cold-weather gear, slipping it off of his torso to reveal the light tunic beneath. Shoulders rolled as the weight of the clothing slid away, freeing himself for unrestricted motion. He reached to the heavy belt and pulled it away, taking the blaster with it, while he shucked the winter pants. Of course, he was wearing a second set of pants below those - comfortable, suited for a duellist.

Before he placed the heavier clothing away in the backpack, he retrieved his lightsaber, which he clipped to his belt. The weapon was simple, smooth, lacking any sort of originality to its design; clearly, Kathar didn't care much for aesthetics. The pistol disappeared with the rest of the bundle.

Freed now from the constraints of his winter gear, the man stood - looking much more like a Jedi: Dull tans, whites, and browns head to toe.

While he lifted the bag and slung it lightly over a shoulder, easy to discard, his other hand reached to his neckline. There it found the strand of his necklace, which he carefully tucked away, out of sight once more; whatever, if anything, hung from it remained entirely beneath the cloth of his tunic.

"I'm going to guess four tests, four relics? Starting with this one." He pointed down the corridor and, after waiting for whatever preparations Karn had to make, began to walk down it. This time he took the lead, subconsciously taking on the role of the protector. Hopefully, the Sith didn't take it as a slight!

He drew up to the exit but, before entering, looked back at Karn, "Ready?"

[Rugs]

“Impossible to say, with so long since Sadow’s time.” Karn regarded Kathar thoughtfully, datapad still in hand. “I... don’t think I want to think about it, really. But the hologram — he said countless souls.” His eyes narrowed in thought, pale brow furrowing. “Trapped here. Maybe those are the spirits?”

But what could be keeping the spirits there? The hologram-man’s warning was at least more than 450 years old if the unlucky Sith aspirants had failed to heed him. How many could have come before him?

All dead. Captive for eternity in this place of ancient, terrible power.

Karn swallowed. Surely, someone more powerful than either of them had ventured into the citadel in the near millennium-and-a-half since the Great Hyperspace War. And now here they were, a Jedi who — Karn realized — couldn’t be much his elder and a Sith acolyte.

Trapped.

No turning back now. He looked back the way they came. They’d need something from this Vault to return to the entry hall. Without it, they were as good as dead. He’d not surrender now, and he’d not fail in escaping this place. He’d fought too hard, suffered too much to only just gain his status as Viren’s apprentice to lose it, forgotten to sands of time.

“I suppose we should,” he said, though he paused as his newfound companion began stripping out of his winter gear. Karn understood it — while cool, it was warmer in the crypt or wherever they were than he’d have expected, especially with all the torches alive with real flame. With combat seemingly inevitable, gear meant for survival in the extremes beyond the citadel would be more a hindrance than a help.

He realized, with some embarrassment, that he’d watching Kathar change his gear, and made a too-hurried effort to do the same. He’d worn more or less regular clothing beneath his winter set — a light grey shirt with white slashes on the sleeves, expertly tailored to his slender form. His pants matched, and even his boots — if not exactly matching for having been suited for the weather outside, went well enough with the ensemble.

Karn knelt next to his sack for a moment to stow away his heavy coat and retrieved another, much lighter one in its stead. It, like his clothes, was sleek and well-cut, and warmer than it appeared at a glance, and boasted enough pockets — many hidden — to carry extra incidentals that might not fit on his belt, if needed.

With a subtle smirk at Kathar, Karn took an extra moment to affix a small pin — a bronze sword — to his coat’s collar. The symbol of the Cult of Strife, marking his place within the Sith Order. A moment more to place his earring stud — a small ruby in its center — in his right ear, and he stood. He’d left it out during the trek in through the brutal weather outside, but it was rarely far from his reach.

If Karn was going to die here, he’d at least do it looking good. He decided that was his reason. Certainly not present company.

He fell in behind Kathar, slinging his sack onto his back again, as the Jedi led the way down the hall. “So the blaster,” he said, as they walked the rest of the way. “Was that just a ruse? Could be handy, you know.”

They reached the end of the hall in short order. Karn, steadying himself, answered Kathar’s question with a silent nod. He reached to the Force, and winced, slightly. The Dark Side lay thick on the Force here, like a sludge. It was nearly overbearing, despite his own affinity for the Dark Side and its ways. He’d not felt such a heavy presence in some time, even at the temples on Korriban and Dromund Kaas.

The corridor’s low ceiling shot up into the darkness as soon as they entered the room beyond. It went up and up, lost to shadows beyond the edge of the torches’ flickering light. The chamber in which the two found themselves was, while wider than the corridor, relatively narrow, but deep. At the far end, Karn could see a raised pedestal with something atop it, flanked by two large torches that threw more light than the others.

No sooner had they taken five steps into the chamber than a rumbling from above — stone on stone — stopped Karn.

Something whooshed through the air and a giant, shadowed figure landed with a thud and crash before. An automaton of some sort — Karn’s first instinct was a droid, but the Force moved about it in some strange way.

It was humanoid, made of dark metal with bronze or copper-colored accents--it was hard to tell in the flickering light. It towered above them as it stood to its full height. A disconcerting red light emerged from within it, visible through some of the small cracks in its armor, as it faced them.

It reached behind its back and retrieved a small pole, which quickly expanded to suit its size. Red energy crackled and sputtered at one end.

Karn lit his crimson blade in one hand, as blue-white spark danced among the fingers of his other. The droid stomped toward them, heavy footsteps loud on the stone floor. “Let’s destroy this thing so we can get whatever the fuck it’s guarding.”

[Symm]

It was hard to miss the slow start of Karn's undressing following Kathar's, even for the Jedi; especially knowing that Karn watched. The delay raised some flags in Kathar's mind, and he wasn't quite sure what to make of them. Was it a strategic decision on the Sith's part? He thought over that possibility, trying to discern what sort of information he would gain by watching his opponent disrobe. When his deliberations came up empty, other considerations trickled in, bringing a warmth to his cheeks that he hadn't felt in a long time. So when Karn began to gear up (or down, in this case), Kathar specifically turned his face away.

He blamed the temptation to look on the citadel.

"I can use the blaster," he replied, "but it is mostly a 'ruse'. When people see a lightsaber, they change their behaviour. A blaster? Every person and their grandparents carry one of those, and in some places, not having one is suspicious. So I wear it by default unless I need to make a statement." Kathar looked back at Karn, then quickly away again. Without the bulky gear, Karn cut quite a dashing figure. Out, evil thoughts, out!

Thankfully, the droid crashed into view - just in time to save Kathar from further embarrassment. The red faded from his cheeks only in time for the red from Karn's blade to cast over his face. If the damned bronze pin wasn't enough to remind Kathar that Karn was his enemy, the red blade cut through any illusion just as well as it did anything else.

At Karn's yelling order, Kathar nodded, "On it!" He rushed forward, hilt flying from his belt, summoned by the invisible hands of the Force. The blade ignited before it even reached his hands, projecting an orange glow against the red of the Sith warrior and Sith droid. This mix of colours set the chamber alight as if the flames of the torches suddenly billowed up into an uncontrollable blaze. The conflicting sources of light cast strange shadows about, appearing and disappearing with each passing moment.

He drew the Force back into himself, sacrificing his protection against the citadel itself in favour of empowering his offensive. Both hands wrapped around the lightsaber, adopting the Ataru stance - even as he flew at the automaton. Kathar's eyes tracked the polearm as the droid sought to strike the quickly moving Jedi, the sputtering end swinging down in a high arc to try to catch him across the shoulders. In response, he raised the blade high, meeting the other weapon and deflecting it into the ground, where the red energy discharged harmlessly against the stone.

Meanwhile, Kathar's feet slipped, using his momentum and that imparted by the blow to slide past the droid. The tip of his lightsaber scorched a path along the floor, arresting his motion. Flanking the opponent now, Kathar began a stabbing strike towards it's back - but he checked that blow after a feeling issued him a warning. The Jedi quickly rolled to the side, just before a massive hammer slammed into the spot where the man was moments before. The blow reverberated throughout the chamber, causing the torches to jump from the vibrations.

A second droid, carrying an impossibly large and heavy hammer-headed weapon. Kathar grit his teeth, "Now there's two of them!"

[Rugs]

Karn began to lunge forward after Kathar, then waited, slowing his advance. The Jedi rushed on regardless, and Karn took a moment to watch. Whatever he thought of Kathar’s looks, Karn hadn’t forgotten the chiding, the taunting that he’d tipped his hand before the Jedi.

Ataru. The Jedi arced gracefully through the air, to a position that would allow him to strike from the droid’s side. He’s fast. Athletic. Agile. Karn was impressed, though whether that was rooted purely in the skill on display or something deeper, he could not say.

He began to move forward again, lightning still crackling between his clawed fingertips as his lightsaber’s tip dragged a molten trail into the floor. Rumbling, an echo the sound that preceded the first droid’s arrival sounded above the fray, and Karn barely saw the shadowed shape descending from above.

“Watch out!” he yelled, and before he knew what he was doing, he was flying in motion to aid his ally.

Kathar, fortunately, evaded the hammer blow before it fell, crushing and cracking stone where the Jedi had once stood. Karn arrived, leaping onto the back of the hammer’s head while it was still on the ground and throwing himself at the automaton’s faceless head.

He plunged his sanguine blade into the thing’s shoulder, between two metal plates. The red light within flickered and roiled, but the plates themselves seemed unaffected by the plasma blade burning against them. Karn, not immediately noticing this but using the plates’ resistance on his blade to anchor himself on the droid’s upper body, put his open palm against the droid’s head and unleashed a withering blast of lightning.

Often, in spars against his peers at the Sith Temple, Karn was forced to pull his punches, to limit his greatest strength — his considerable capability in the Dark Side — to avoid needless killing. Here, he had no such limitation. Here, he held nothing back. The droid rocked and shook, and for a moment Karn thought he’d put it down and out of the fight.

Next he knew, he was being grabbed and sent airborne, hurtling at the far wall. He acted more on instinct than active thought and, with the Force’s aid, twisted in the air so that he landed in a hard roll. Karn yelled out as his impact with the floor sent a shot of pain lancing through his shoulder. He clenched his jaw as he came up to a crouch and stood, checking his shoulder. Nothing serious. It would, perhaps, bruise, but there was nothing to do for it now.

The Dark Side swirled within him, around him, as seething fury threatened to overflow. “Take the one with the staff,” he called to Kathar. The droid was beginning to reach up to Karn’s lightsaber, ripped from Karn’s grip when it threw him and still stuck in its shoulder. Karn reached out with the Force, remotely killing the blade and pulling it back to him. The crimson blade erupted again as the long hilt slapped into Karn’s waiting palm. “The hammer one is mine.”

The droid hoisted its heavy hammer and faced Karn, as if taking his challenge. Red energy sputtered fitfully from its left shoulder, where the lightsaber blade dug into it. Its arm moved awkwardly, stiffly.

“Hit that red light if you can,” he called again, noticing this. “I don’t think they like it.” Karn raised his lightsaber, taking Juyo’s opening stance, and renewed his assault.

[Symm]

There was no doubting that feeling: The dark side roiled in this chamber. The crackling of electricity brought Kathar's eyes up to watch the energy dance over the machines outer shell. He set his lips in a thin line, tracing it back to its source: Karn. That power was awesome - frightening in a way that the Jedi found hard to describe. It was not a power the Jedi taught; in fact, it was something they actively abhorred. The ability was close to the ultimate expression all they stood against, and the realisation that Karn wielded it settled like a stone in his stomach.

This inner turmoil prevented him from foreseeing Karn getting thrown across the room, and stopped him reacting to catch the man. It took the younger man yelling out targets to shake Kathar out of his stupor. He nodded grimly and shifted his stance, blade angled straight out from his body towards the staff-wielding droid. The Jedi buried his feelings deep and, with an exhale of breath, stepped forward to intercept the now charging automaton.

What followed was a dizzying display of swordsmanship, both from man and machine. The droid, suffering not from the limits of the flesh, swung and parried and dodged, while Kathar spun, somersaulted, and struck. Faster and faster, both moving quicker than their builds would suggest possible, till eventually with a backflip away from the metal monster did Kathar score a critical blow. His lightsaber, following a riposte, struck up and along the pole-carrying arm, slicing it clean through and sending it clattering to the ground.

With the machine disarmed, Kathar allowed a smile to cross his face. It was only a matter of time now. Kathar pressed his advantage, scoring hit after hit along the metallic body. His orange blade sliced cleanly through the palm the remaining hand, and Kathar was about to turn the strike along the body into a killing blow when an impossible warning flowed into his mind. Blade otherwise occupied, he shifted into a one-handed grip and shoved his hand forward - just in time to catch the polearm with telekinesis before it buried deep into his chest.

It took Kathar a moment to realise what happened. While the droid fought a defensive battle, small tendrils of the Force that powered the machine reached out and dragged its dismembered arm and weapon back. The limb reattached through some method that evaded Kathar, and frankly, right now, he didn't care. It took all his strength, both physically and otherwise, to keep the machine still. It struggled against the blade and fought against the invisible hold Kathar had on its weapon. Kathar yelled as the polearm inched closer and closer, the energy crackling from its tip beginning to score burns against the robes and the flesh revealed below.

It was then that he saw it. Deep within the chest of the machine, revealed by one of the deep cuts Kathar had inflicted on it, the source of its power. A red crystal, shaped like a pyramid, coursing red streams of energy like veins throughout the metallic body, and now seeking to burn its way through Kathar's abdomen.

He had a moment to make his decision - that he knew. The possibilities flew through the Jedi's mind, and he set his course. In less than a second, Kathar released his hold on his blade and sent that hand straight into the gap where that crystal lay. Fingers wrapped around the 'heart' of the droid and his telekinetic power flowed from keeping the polearm at bay to ripping the gem out. The machines weapon dug into his chest but, before it pierced anywhere vital, the power flowed out, and the droid collapsed at Kathar's feet.

Muscles trembling, sweat flowing down his body, and lowered body scarred, burned and bleeding, Kathar stumbled back against a wall. He managed to hold the crystal up, one half of a whole. "Get this," he called out to Karn, before starting to hobble over towards the Sith, his blade called from the wreckage of his opponent. Clearly, he meant to help, but his shaking limbs would be of little use.

[Rugs]

Karn’s focus narrowed on his hammer-wielding foe. He was dimly aware of Kathar exploding to action again against the other droid, dimly aware of the Jedi’s orange blade weaving through the air as he danced a deadly duet with his own opponent. Given the chance, he might have watched, might have been struck by the talent and skill on display.

But that collision with the floor hurt and Karn’s temper, barely restrained to focus his connection to the Dark Side, demanded vengeance.

He started toward the droid in a walk, then run. It too approached him, with halting, heavy steps. The crackling, sputtering red energy that’d vanished from the hammer after discharging into the ground reappeared and the droid wound the heavy weapon around for a crushing blow at the Arkanian Sith.

Karn slid along the ground, dodging underneath the blow so narrowly that he felt the wind of its passing tug at his pale hair. His blade licked out like a viper at the automaton’s leg as he passed by, leaving a glowing scar but not penetrating. Karn sprang to his feet on the droid’s far side and attacked again, blade striking wrist, elbow and side as the droid recovered from the force of its swing and turned to face him. In every place his blade struck true, the metal plating glowed angry orange but held fast.

The guardian turned to face him, hammer dropping from overhead, and their fight began in earnest. Karn dared not risk trying to block the hammer’s blows. The weapon was impossibly huge, and even with his own strength bolstered by the Force, Karn doubted his weightless blade would offer much resistance.

The droid, of course, suffered no such restrictions, and proved to be frustratingly adept at using the hammer to block Karn’s strikes. Still, the aggressive Sith pushed the attack, as Juyo demanded, again and again. Relentless. Reckless. The Force swirled within him, around him as he entered a frenzied assault that bordered on mindless against the guardian. Blow after blow broke through the droid’s defenses, but it didn’t seem to care. It was slower than its counterpart — too slow to keep pace with Karn — but very heavily protected.

Still, the droid found chances to strike, forcing Karn to break off his assault or have his body crushed under the hammer’s weight. With every blow that hit something, be it the ground, or the wall, in a few instances, the sputtering energy discharged in a violent dizzying explosion, and, for a time, vanished. Though Karn evaded the hammer itself, he could not always escape its explosions.

The energy imparted a buzzing, burning agony every time it touched him, and Karn felt no shame in the pained cries it tore from his throat. Yet after every painful blow, he renewed his assault. Each new agony added fuel for his Dark Side-powered frenzy.

On and on, the fight stretched, with Karn ignoring the mounting strain on his own body, until his lightsaber connected with the glowing light between two plates of armor at the droid’s elbow. There was a moment of resistance, of crackling light as Karn dragged his lightsaber onward, through whatever energy held the damned thing together. When the blade came wrenching free on the other side, the droid’s forearm came loose, dropped limply to the ground.

At the same time, Kathar yelled something to Karn. He glanced back to see the Jedi holding aloft a crystal of some sort. He turned back in time to see the hammer’s shaft streaking toward his chest.

A panicked burst of telekinesis, too late to stop the blow, but enough to slow it, was perhaps the only thing that saved Karn from having his ribs crushed. As it stood, he was sent to the ground, pain wracking him as he struggled to breathe.

The droid towered over him, energy flaring out of its severed arm like the torches’ fitful flames. Up came the hammer, hanging like a scythe over him, with red energy writhing and roiling around its flat head. The droid’s arm reared back, preparing the blow...

“No,” Karn said, a whimper as fear, that powerful emotion, wrapped icy fingers around his heart. “No.” Again, more forceful as he lifted his hand.

The Force arced from his fingertips in red lightning that wove like a spiderweb toward the towering foe. The droid shook violently when it collided. It was not Force lightning that Karn called upon now, but drain, with terror gripping him.

A flood of power — more than he’d expected — rushed into him from the automaton as the light within it began to fade. Too much energy. Karn felt like a balloon about to pop. His body ached from the pain. He couldn’t hold it.

The drain stopped. The droid staggered, hammer falling with a heavy thud to the ground. For an instant, Karn wondered if he’d gone too far; if he’d made his own undoing in an instant of thoughtless panic.

Then he did it.

A single bolt of lightning, focusing all of his strength and the reservoir of power he’d stolen from the droid, erupted from his palm. It flashed and was gone in a half-heartbeat, with such furor that it punched a hole through the titan’s chest and threw it back and to the ground.

Thunder echoed in the stone chamber, a loud crack that reverberated again and again, battering Karn’s ears.

Karn felt suddenly lightheaded. He lifted his head from the uncaring floor to look at the fallen droid. It was still as dead air in the chamber. The dark red glow from within its body vanished.

He turned his head to see Kathar hobbling toward him. That’s strange. He didn’t remember seeing those bits of the Jedi’s skin showing when they came in. He’d surely have noticed those.

“You’re hurt...” he said faintly as he laid his head on the floor and closed his eyes.

[Symm]

The hammer slammed into the Sith, and Kathar's eyes widened, "Karn!" A moment of fear struck through the name, and the Jedi hastened to quicken his pace. His tired legs rebelled though, carrying him forward far too slowly to be of any help. He watched, helpless, as the droid raised its hammer for a killing blow. A hand pushed forward, beginning to draw the Force to reach and grab the weapon, but before the mystical energy began to obey Karn's red lightning soared from his fingers.

To Kathar's eyes, it seemed as though the world dimmed, just for a moment. Karn tapped into power so anathema to the Jedi that it made him feel physically sick, even not being the target of it. It was something that was supposed to make him hate the Sith, push him into an absolute rejection of the younger man. Yet, too, he felt that which powered it; his senses, empowered, felt almost first hand the fear that fueled Karn's assault. It pushed all other emotions aside and left Kathar in a state of shock. He'd never felt something so strong, so raw - the Jedi taught him to control it, but in reality, he ended up burying it behind walls built in his mind.

The conflict still roiled in Kathar's thoughts as Karn blasted through the droids torso. He reached out with his mind and grasped the crystal inside, which he brought back to his hand. The two gems, both pyramids, fused to form a perfect cube.

The younger Force adept pointed out Kathar's wound - but he shunted the pain away. Karn's concerns were more pressing in Kathar's mind, and so he put the other's wellbeing above his own. "I'm fine. Karn?" He dropped both his lightsaber and the newly forged artifact as he knelt. His hand reached out to touch the man's neck, to feel for a pulse. "Are you alright?" He asked, genuine concern in his tone.

Kathar's own wound, ignored, spilled blood over burned flesh, but at a slower rate than before. The weapon hadn't dug deep and hadn't hit anything vital; so he would live.

[Rugs]

For a moment, Karn could only hear the sound of his own breathing against the heavy silence that filled the chamber. His chest ached with a line of dull, constant pain where the hammer’s shaft struck him. Good thing it wasn’t the head... he managed to tell himself. Or I’d be dead.

“I’m fine. Karn?”

That was the Jedi’s voice. Kathar. He had a nice voice. Karn’s eyes fluttered open. He was — vaguely — surprised to see the Jedi very close to him, to feel Kathar’s fingers on the side of his neck.

He found himself staring into the Jedi’s green eyes for a silent moment as Kathar took his pulse. “I’m not dead,” he said, breaking eye contact. “Just... tired. I’ve never drawn so much of the Force. Not at once.” He tried to sit up and failed. His body protested fiercely, and his muscles felt like water. “Almost killed myself,” he muttered, feeling foolish.

“The victorious warrior fights with the mind first, and emotion second.” His master’s words, from their first meeting as mentor and student. In the months since, Karn had made a real effort to follow Viren’s instruction, but he let it slip. He’d let himself get distracted, was punished for it, and nearly burned himself to ash in a moment of terror.

“But I’ve never done something like that before either.” Karn raised his hand, staring at his open palm in the flickering torchlight. A single bolt of lightning, focused and immensely powerful. He wasn’t sure he could reproduce it if he tried.

He sighed and laid his head on the stones again, turning his gaze again to Kathar and his wound. He could see blood flowing from it. “That injury doesn’t look fine to me,” he said, looking flatly at him. “If we’re getting out of this crypt, only one of us can be reckless, and I’ve got you beat there.” A boyish smile flashed across his face as he pointed toward his sack, near the door where he’d left it before leaping to combat the droids.

“I’ve got a couple of medpacks in there,” he said. “Get one. Should have a stim in it and some things to treat your wound.”

A short silence lingered, then Karn added, “Seems you know your way around a lightsaber.” He lacked the energy to be catty, so what might have been a begrudging admission earlier was plain, honestly spoken. “Ataru, was it? Now I know another thing about you.”

Truthfully, Karn wondered whether he could best Kathar, if they crossed blades. From what he saw, the Jedi boasted some real skill in his bladework, and he still knew little of his ability in the Force. Not a sure thing. I’d have to be careful.

“You know, aside from the whole being trapped-down-here-forever thing, if you wanted to kill me,” he called, still laying on the floor, “now would be a pretty good chance.”

[Symm]

Karn's eyes flicked open, and Kathar slowly brought his hand back away from the Sith. It took a lot of effort not to snatch it away as quickly as possible, and Kathar would have to find some personal time to figure out why he felt embarrassed about the situation. He was only performing a necessary check to make sure Karn was still alive!

"Good," he said, perhaps a little too readily and eagerly. The Jedi covered this with a cough, which sent a wave of dull pain through his body. "Good," he repeated, a little more neutral this time. "What you did was," he paused, biting the inside of cheek as he chewed over which word to use. Awesome? Amazing? Terrifying? Ultimately he settled on, "impressive. I've never seen anything like it. I can only imagine what it did to you." After all, the Jedi taught that the dark side always took a toll.

He wet his lips, about to ask about the fear he felt when Karn channelled the energy, but thankfully Karn pointed out the injury once again. Happy for the distraction, he couldn't help returning the boyish smile with a giddy one of his own. Giddy? What was he, twelve? He pretended another wave of pain shot over him and grimaced instead. "Thanks," Kathar replied, turning away from the man and walking over towards the packs. He left his lightsaber and the new artifact on the ground near Karn - oversights he would later overanalyse.

Kathar leant over to pick up both his and Karn's packs, grunting with effort as he hefted them up. It wasn't that they were heavy, but his body was stiff and pained and bleeding! He smiled while his back was turned at the prod from Karn, "Yeah, Ataru is one of the forms that I use." He left that to hang there, not elaborating further. "And you, Juyo. I'd recognise it anywhere. Quite dangerous, if performed poorly." Kathar turned and started walking back, "But effective in your hands."

With a sigh of relief, Kathar settled down into a cross-legged sit beside Karn. "But if I killed you now," he said while searching through the packs, "how would I be able to keep my promise and answer your question?" The Jedi extracted from the bags a water bottle which he immediately passed to Karn, "Drink. You need to regain your strength." He kept the bottle held out and maintained a silent look until the man took the drink from him. Finally, the bottle taken, Kathar pulled out the med-pack and started to treat himself.

"Did your parents know you were going to join the Sith? After they sent the Jedi away?" He tried to keep the conversation going, genuinely intrigued - but also to keep his mind off what he was doing.

Teeth grit as the man shifted the tunic, pulling it up and over his abdomen to get it out of the way of treatment - or tried to. As he drew the clothing up, he found the burns spread further across his chest than he thought. The energy from the polearm had branded lightning scars across him, burning or raising welts over his skin. He traced such an injury all the way around to his back. Needing to treat more than just the small square where the weapon touched, Kathar shifted and pulled the tunic up over his head, revealing his bare torso to his companion.

Aside from the new wounds, Kathar's body was remarkably unscarred. By this age, a Jedi not having battle scars was either a sign of being sheltered - or immense skill. In Kathar's case, it was mostly the former - but hey, Karn wouldn't know to break the illusion, right? He was well built, strength evident in his frame, yet the surprise came in how lithe his motions were considering his size and weight. The ginger hair colour carried down to the light fuzz in the middle of his chest, barely visible in the light of the torches. A small metal circle with intricate bindings winding through the middle hung from a simple string necklace - the only jewellery or personal touch to the Jedi's outfit.

He treated the bleeding first, stemming it with a bandage which he wrapped around several times to keep still. The burns he applied a treatment, both an anaesthetic and a healing compound to speed recovery. Kathar smeared the balm along the welt that wound to his back, then turned his head to look down at it. "Can you see anything I've missed?" He asked, frowning.

[Rugs]

“That is true,” Karn said, fighting back another smile. He wasn’t sure what he expected Kathar to say. A part of him expected the Jedi to balk, to show disgust at the suggestion that he’d strike down a defenseless foe. That was what Jedi were supposed to be, right? Stuffy and self-righteous? Whatever Kathar’s true intentions, Karn felt a strange comfort in the Jedi playing along with his japes. “Though I may have more than one question by the time this is through.”

He watched as Kathar brought the packs over and began to rifle through them. The Jedi was still a bit of an enigma, though Karn was starting to get a better picture of him. A talented duelist — with more than Ataru up his sleeve, it seemed — and refreshingly practical. As he took the offered water bottle, Karn wondered, idly, if Kathar was representative of what most Jedi were like or an outlier?

After all, he’d never had any real interaction with a Jedi.

The question brought his attention back to the here and now as he touched the bottle to his lips and drank. It was cool, refreshing. Karn hadn’t realized how thirsty he’d gotten until he felt the water running down his dry throat.

“At the time? I don’t think so.” He’d been very young when the Jedi came. Young enough that he remembered their arrival but only through a fog, like a mostly-forgotten dream. “The war hadn’t started yet, and the Sith Empire wasn’t anything more than some wayward worlds in the Outer Rim trying to make a name for themselves.” The Order certainly hadn’t revealed itself to the Galaxy yet.

“I had a tutor, for a time,” he went on, closing the bottle and setting it down beside him. “He taught me to touch the Force. The basics. But eventually, I learned all that he had to...’’

Karn’s voice trailed off as Kathar raised his shirt. It was perfectly reasonable — he did have an injury to treat — but Karn hadn’t anticipated it. Despite the welts wrapping around the Kathar’s torso, the Jedi’s figure held his gaze.

He was more thickly-muscled than Karn, though that was hardly surprising. Karn had ever been slender, and — though he was well built and stronger than most thought at a glance — he’d never tend toward mass without a prolonged, concentrated effort at it.

The silence stretched out for a long, awkward moment until Karn realized he was staring at Kathar’s chest, at his stomach. His mouth felt dry. It took a few moments to recognize the necklace and by the time he did, Karn was making a perhaps exaggerated show of turning to his water bottle. He hoped the warmth he felt in his face wasn’t a flush of embarrassed red rising in his cheeks.

“I learned what he had to offer, so we sent him away,” he finished hastily. “I joined the Sith a few years later.”

At Kathar’s question, Karn turned to inspect him again — with permission, of course — for any missed wounds. “I don’t think so,” he said after giving Kathar a look-over. His white-eyed gaze flicked to the Jedi’s green again, and he allowed a subtle smile.

“Too bad you’re a Jedi,” he muttered, almost under his breath. He quickly pressed on as if he hadn’t said anything at all.

“You’ve asked me two questions, so I'm getting some questions now.” His tone made it evident that this not a request, but simply a matter of fact. First, he turned to the still opened pack and, with some effort, withdrew a food ration. It was freeze-dried stuff; a bit better than military rations, but hardly a delicacy. It would help restore his strength and keep him going, and the size made it easy to carry a few days’ worth. His ship had enough to last for some months, but that didn’t matter now, with them trapped in the bottom of the citadel.

After adding a bit of water to prepare his food, Karn looked at Kathar, thinking. There was a lot he wanted to ask, and that was without the tension lingering between them. After some consideration, he decided to begin with the most obvious.

“That necklace,” he said, stirring his small meal with a disposable utensil that came in the pack, “what’s the deal with that? I thought Jedi didn’t have personal possessions, other than lightsabers?”

---

Some hours passed with Karn and Kathar resting in the empty chamber. They talked for a time, and despite their obviously-divergent moralities, Karn found it increasingly easy to an open, honest conversation with Kathar. Distressingly easy. Kathar was Jedi. He was Sith. They were supposed to be mortal enemies.

And yet...

After a while, Karn took the opportunity to sneak in a nap with the assumption that, if the Jedi hadn’t killed him when he was too weary to meaningfully fight back, he wouldn’t stick a lightsaber through him while he rested.

Save for his datapad’s chronometer, it was impossible to tell how much time passed by the time he awakened from his brief, mildly-uncomfortable slumber on the floor. The torches flickered on. The broken droids still lay on the floor. Still, he felt better than he did before. Some weariness lingered from his earlier exertion, but he felt well enough. After getting to his feet and stretching, going through a few brief exercises to limber up, he looked to Kathar.

“Ready to keep going?”