The Nights of Lothal [For Orren]

[apathy_is_death]

When the Ebon Hawk settled itself onto the grasses of Lothal, the evening was rapidly coming on. It had been a hot day, but the night promised welcome relief - a small mercy for a population in fear for their lives. The pirate lords - for that was what they could be termed - had found Lothal to be the perfect base of operations in the aftermath of galactic-scale conflicts. It was out of the way, and not important enough for the Republic to assemble a task force to push them off.

And so they ruled, absolute, the open grasslands and hills host to at least three rival factions. Eventually, one would rule, and all knew this. And so they fought, incessantly, and the people of Lothal were caught in the crossfire. It was an irony, she thought; a planet so strong in the Force, to suffer so under such an undignified, mundane yoke. She wondered, idly, why the Jedi had never come here. There was...a peace here, underneath it all. The woman she had once been would have found great solace here.

When Surik came to her, she allowed some of her weariness to show on her face. "Go forth without me," she said, her plan weaving itself around what she sensed of the place. "I find myself tired, and I will retreat into the grasslands to meditate and re-center myself. Take the Fool and the Iridonian with you - they have the most experience of such places, and will blend in the best. Under no circumstances should the assassin leave the ship."

Meetra looked doubtful, wavering. It was her way, to question. She loved that about her, truly she did. Her mind was always ready to question what it was told - and that is what made her special. Dogma would never chain her. Lies would never stop her. But that kindness would be her undoing, if she could not contain it.

"Heed my words, those who oppress this planet are stupid but suspicious. Give them nothing that will arouse such thoughts. Go, now. I will be waiting when you are done."

When they had left, of course, she slipped away. It was simple enough. None of the others on board were powerful enough to track her movements, if she did not want. In fact, with some careful manipulations, they not only didn't note her but would be certain they had seen her. It was likely unnecessary, but again, questions. Had she not been born to change the universe, Meetra Surik would have still had a career as the greatest of detectives.

She wandered into the grasslands, seeking her quarry. He sought to hide from everyone - she wondered, idly, if he had closed himself off so much from the Force that he did not sense Surik. They had, she knew, been very close, once. Back when she had still taught under the banner of the Jedi, and Revan was a name unknown to the galaxy. Had time dulled their connection so? Or had the walls he erected at least buried it, for now? She couldn't take the risk. If events were to proceed as she had foreseen, he was a pawn that needed to be removed from the board. Let the others deal with the pirates; she had no doubt that within a day, at most, the Exile would have broken them forever - but she could not find the Jedi they sought, however much the Exile's eyes had sparked with joy and fear when she had read the name on Atris' list.

Sightlessly, she moved through the long grasses, occasionally letting her remaining hand brush over their tips. Yes, she could have found peace here, once. She and...

She locked the thought away. Had Atris been able to sense her on Taris, she might have struck her down to keep them apart. As it was, the woman once known just as Kreia knew exactly why her daughter was in Atris' employ. A last insult, from a woman who despised her. Who would, in a heartbeat, take the Exile from her, too. One from spite, the other from jealousy. Another pawn to be removed, when the time came. And one whose mind she would take pleasure in ripping apart, before shredding her body to the last molecule.

She wore her visage as the old Jedi woman well. He might see through it, when they met. He might not. Nevertheless, Darth Traya came for him.

Comments

[orren]

Retreat was an option in his mind, just one he hadn't chosen to exercise yet for two reasons.

The first was that he wasn't sure his options for stopping her here and now were exhausted yet. Her power had clearly grown since they last met, supplimented by knowledge of darker things ... but he had faced far more than his fair share of challenges over the past few years as well. He's bested Vrook, Kavar, his own former master, and many of Revan's Sith beyond that. What Kreia was capable of, he didn't know, but the situation wasn't a hopeless one in his mind.

If it was, though ... if the darkest possibility was true and she was somehow responsible for the death at Katarr, then a retreat might not be possible.

That was the second reason.

The lightning arcing from Kreia's finger-tips was not a surprise, but it did catch him at an inopportune moment. The lunge that set him up to slice one of Kreia's levitating lightsabers out of the air also left him open and, quick as he is, he didn't have the time to muster a complete defense. He barely has the time to draw upon the Force to try and push back against the crackling energy - to try and divert it away from him or back on her.

He finds some success in that. The worst of the attack is channeled away from him. Some of the bolts snapping through the ground bend away from him and strike the hut behind him instead, starting small fires along the front of the hovel.

Kreia's attack does find some purchase, though. Thin fingers of light fork up from the ground, stabbing into his legs and lower extremities. He feels the searing pain lance through his body along the pathways of her nerve endings. He feels his strength ebb momentarily, and the mechanical servos of his prosthetic hand begin to lock up.

But he's not done. Far from it.

He pushes through the pain, lifting his hands and pushing back with all the strength he can muster - a wall of telekinetic force that launches from his fingertips with enough force that it churns up the ground between them.

[apathy_is_death]

Her robes whipped around her, and she was pushed back a good ten feet. But her stance held. And what he would feel when it was done would be unlike anything he had felt before. She was righteous fury; a woman scorned in ways that bit far deeper than merely spurned or betrayed love. No, she had known far worse betrayals. She had fallen. Oh, how she had fallen; twice over and each time betrayed. But not now. Not again. Not to an impudent love-lorn little child, despite all he should have learned.

"Enough of this."

The retaliatory strike he feels will come seemingly from nowhere, and then the sabers will begin to strike. One after the other, as she begins to advance, darting in and out like thrown knives, alternating stab after stab at him.

"You are a fool, Organa. You should not be. You learned your lessons well, but never enough. You could have seen, as I have done, you could have realized the truth of the universe. You could have severed yourself from the strings of the Jedi and of the Force itself."

The worst part, perhaps, was the calmness in her voice. Her fury was deep, profoundly so, but it was channeled, honed. It came with purpose.

"You, who witnessed the futility of it all, the decay of the Order, the horrors of the wars - and here you stand, hoping you can save her. But she doesn't need you. Soon enough, she will not need me - she will become a force of pure destiny, the greatest hero in the history of the universe. A moment is coming, Orren Organa, that can reshape the universe forever - free it from its chains. The Jedi will fall. The Sith will fall. And then...we shall have peace."

And the next force push comes with the power of a tank shell, a concussive blast that is aimed to shatter bones or bricks, to cave in armor plate and liquefy its target with the fury of an angered god.

"But I have just enough rage left at the Jedi," she added, face still impassive, "just enough hatred left, to teach you a lesson this day. Because someone needs to be left who knows. Someone to let that fool Atris know who it was who caused her to fall, and why. Once, when students like you closed their ears to thinking about my lessons, I found love. There was, for a time, perfection. And it was taken from me, and my child made to debase herself as a servant of that pathetic woman - stripped from me, stripped from her heritage, her birthright."

She paused, only for a moment, seeming to grow in the darkness, a dark and sickly purple light emanating from her.

"Atris is fallen, by my whispers. Your masters, my betrayers, will die for the stupidity they are about to unleash, out of their weakness, their fear...their apathy towards making the universe truly better. I will tear down everything. Know that, and suffer."

And the force lightning came again, all the stronger.

[orren]

To his credit, Orren meets her assault readily. Her sabers dart in an out, attempting to lance through him and he turns them aside, parrying with his own blade or pushing them back with the strength of his own mind.

The Force push - the telekinetic cannon ball she launches at him ... it hurts. It rattles his bones, knocks the wind out of him, and staggers him ... but his own strength, his own push in return spares him from the worst of it.

Without that, though ... she'd have killed him outright with that. It's clear that whatever she has learned, whatever dark power she has claimed for herself, it has made her into something far beyond the Kreia that he used to know. She was always strong with the Force, but he'd have been able to overpower the woman that she used to be.

Whatever she is - Jedi, Sith, or something else ... it's becoming increasingly clear that she's beyond his ability to fight on his own.

'Atris is fallen, by my whispers. Your masters, my betrayers, will die for the stupidity they are about to unleash, out of their weakness, their fear ... their apathy towards making the universe truly better. I will tear down everything. Know that, and suffer."

The words cut deeper than the blades would have if they'd struck home. They cut because she's capable of delivering on every, single one of those promises - he can feel it. In that moment he can almost see the faint outlines of what would come if her ambitions were fulfilled. They are amorphous, almost entirely without shape, but the impressions of them fill him with a familiar dread.

Perhaps he's always known where that path ends.

Perhaps that's why he'd always felt ill at ease in her presence, even decades prior to her fall.

He doesn't have any time to consider it. The storm of force lightning she unleashes crashes into him. He's able to block some of the tongues of forking energy with his lightsaber and blunt others with the force, but the assault is far more than he can defend against. Other bolts of searing energy stab into him, burning across his skin and along his nerves, sapping his strength.

"You're every bit as lost as the masters who wronged you!" He snarls through teeth gritted against the pain. "Just as they let themselves be consumed by their dogma - their self-righteousness - you've given yourself over to the pain and rage from the betrayals you've suffered!"

He takes a step back. His body instinctively begins to draw into itself, as though he can somehow shield himself from the pain.

"What was done to you was wrong. The Jedi have been in wrong for a long time, they've forgotten the ideal the need to live up to, but unleashing a travesty on the galaxy won't undo their mistakes!"

Orren drops to a knee. He can't withstand much more. He'll lose consciosness soon, and be left at her mercy.

Behind him, the fires started by her first volley of lightning are beginning to consume the hut that had been his home for the past year, and in that, he sees an opportunity. A desperation play that might give him the opening he needs to escape.

"I am sorry, Kreia, for what was done to you ... for all the failings of the Order ..."

And there are many ... far too many to count.

He still holds hope, though. That the Jedi might learn from all the mistakes that have lead them to this point ... that they might live up to the lofty ideal that they're meant to embody as protectors, and start helping the galaxy again instead of harming it any further.

He reaches out through the Force. He feels the wooden walls of the hut, weakened by the flames, start to splinter.

"But you must be stopped."

Orren pulls on the weakening structure with everything he has left. The walls shatter, shredding into a cloud of splintered wood, burning debris, and cinders - a swarm of missiles that Orren guides towards Kreia with as much force as he can put behind them with his rapidly depleting strength.

[apathy_is_death]

The debris swirls around her, and she is forced to switch her attention to it. With gritted teeth, she summons her strength. She doesn't bother trying to stop the projectiles, that is a fool's errand. But she redirects their energy, swirling them around her, turning them and accelerating them.

Finally, when a dense enough cloud is turned around her, she pushes them outwards like a whirlwind of shrapnel. She steps from it with deep purpose then stops, reaching down. One piece of wood is pulled from her side with an annoyed grunt, before she applies a healing touch - a light side power - to the wound. It wouldn't do to come back bleeding, after all.