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| - Silence reigned for a few moments as I took advantage of the temporary lull in the battle to get a sense of what was going on inside the Sith warship. The intruder alarms had been silenced long beforehand, and I was thankful for that; it was difficult enough to concentrate while nursing a fresh blaster wound, shallow though it might be. In the Force, I immediately hit upon the presences of most of First Squad as they rapidly made their way back toward our location. Elsewhere aboard the massive vessel, the quintet of Jedi led by Bastila Shan, accompanied by the four troopers from that unit that I had attached to them, were carving a bloody swath through the ranks of Sith soldiers, crewers, and the occasional Dark Jedi. They were very close to the main bridge, where the singularity of emotion that was Darth Revan lurked. The showdown, I knew, was about to begin. Just before the errant squad from Lieutenant Ibratu'na's platoon rounded the corner, I gathered my strength, stood up, and secured my holed shoulder plate back onto my body. “Any signs of pursuit?” I asked as the sergeant reported in, though I knew full well that there were no Sith on this deck for about a hundred meters in any direction. “No, ma'am,” the sergeant replied. “We've been dropping trip mines like crazy, but only one of them went up. We lost Corporal Ylestin, though; a Dark Jedi got him, but the murglak went up in smoke when he ran afoul of that mine I mentioned.” I sighed inwardly. “It's okay, Sergeant, you did all you could. Have your people take a breather, we're going to be moving out again shortly.” “Yes, ma'am,” he said, then began motioning his troopers inside the compartment. I removed my helmet, secured its comlink to my ear, and followed the noncom in, posting more troopers from Second and Third Squads at the control room's other access points. The room itself was fairly big, about half the size of a shockball court, and lined with consoles as well as a central island that included a number of large plotting screens and yet more terminals. The deck itself was covered in the bodies of slain Sith crewers and gunners. No one was wasting time policing the dead, and I didn't blame them; it was bad enough that we had to leave the bodies of our fellow troopers behind when we eventually made the run back to the lander. Finally, I caught sight of Silas who, also helmetless, was busying himself with accessing the ship's main computer. “What have you got?” I inquired. “I'm in the process of locking down more barracks complexes,” he replied with a tired sigh. “I'm also securing us a route from here to the main bridge and then back to the hangar deck, just in case Bastila's team fails and we have to see the mission through ourselves.” “They'll do their job,” I reassured the Bothan, placing a hand on his shoulder. He shot me a look that said quite clearly stop that, everyone is looking! but I offered him the ghost of a smile in return. And then several things happened at once. A disturbance in the Force was my only warning. “Brace for impact!” I shouted into my comlink, mere moments before the entire vessel shuddered violently as it was lambasted by a fusillade of turbolaser blasts against its unshielded hull. A few troopers managed to stay on their feet, but everyone else, including the other two officers, were dumped unceremoniously to the deck as the overhead lights dimmed. I managed to grab hold of the terminal next to the one Silas had been working on, and caught a brief glimpse of the display, which showed the main bridge. It had been turned into a ruined tangle of metal and transparisteel, and for one horrible, agonizing moment I thought that surely it had been opened to space, snuffing out the lives of everyone within. As the ship settled back down, I grabbed the Bothan intelligence officer's arm and helped him to regain his feet. “Find out what just happened,” I ordered, then began seeing to the other troopers, one of them having wrenched her ankle as she had impacted on a console. Admiral Dodonna knows why we're here, I thought furiously. She wouldn't fire on this vessel while we're still on board, much less at the bridge, where our whole reason for being here is! The truth of what had happened hit me like a ton of permacrete blocks, just as Silas began reeling off a damage report that I took in without much interest. Several compartments on the port side of the cruiser had been breached. The bridge had taken a direct hit but its outer armor had held, only to be wracked by secondary explosions. Other compartments on the upper hull had also been holed, including the one immediately above us. But that wasn't anything compared to who had done the damage; another nearby Sith warship that pulsed with the most intense dark side aura that I had ever witnessed, an aura that blazed with evil triumph. Malak, sensing weakness, had turned on his old friend. Revan was dead. I didn't bother to try and rationalize what happened, or to try and salvage some hope that maybe, by some miracle, Bastila or one of her people had come out of the barrage alive. With this unexpected turn of events, the mission was well and truly a bust, and it now came down to a simple matter of survival. If we didn't get back to our lander and get the kriff off of this dying rat-trap, the new Dark Lord was sure to blast it out from under us. Acting on pure instinct fueled by adrenaline, I shoved my helmet back on and rallied the platoon. “Back to the ship, double-time!” The survivors didn't need telling twice, and soon we were galloping through the flagship at top speed, contenting ourselves with taking halfhearted snapshots at passing Sith crewers and troopers as they ran for their own lives. We reached another turbolift and bolted inside, only to find out that it could only take us two levels down due to damage to the ship's secondary command processors. While we attempted to find another turbolift that would take us the rest of the way, or at least off this deck, a dark presence in the Force lunged at me as I ran at the head of the platoon. The Dark Jedi, clad in a slate-gray bodysuit with a black hood, facemask, belted smock and gloves, slashed at me with a violet lightsaber. I ducked the blow easily, bringing my own cerulean blade into play as Ibratu'na's troopers backed off to give us room to duel. The human woman had to be no older than Bastila, but she seemed only half-trained in the Force, as though its presence had only recently been discovered and put to use. However, what she lacked in experience she more than made up for with sheer gall and aggressiveness, pushing me back as I picked off her rain of blows. My left shoulder began pulsing with pain once again as I countered her Makashi style with Shien parries and counterstrokes. I bit down on it, however. "Get to the hangar!" I ordered Ibratu'na's people. My concentration briefly broken as the troopers dashed past our dueling blades, I was nearly decapitated by an overhead stroke from my opponent. Stepping back and out of the way of a follow-up jab, I retaliated by swiping one-handed at her midshection while my left hand gestured outward in a Force-push. She seemed to realize what was coming, however, and attempted to vault the pulse of invisible energy. Though it succeeded in knocking her feet out from under her as she leaped, the Dark Jedi managed to land, catlike, on the deck four meters in front of where I stood. Barely a moment later she was charging once again, and I was again forced back in a one-armed Soresu defense that was only barely able to keep pace. Realizing that this fight had to be won soon or not at all, I feinted an offhand jab as I stepped to my right, then switched my lightsaber from left hand to right, clawing at her weapon with my free hand. The gutsy maneuver nearly cost me my other shoulder, but I managed to grab her right wrist. Squeezing with Force-enhanced strength as my left shoulder screamed in agony, I forced her to drop her weapon, which deactivated as it fell free and skittered along the deck. Letting her go, I backed up a step, my blade pointing directly at her heart. Any delusions that I might have had as to the outcome of the duel vanished in an instant as the woman somersaulted away from my blade, pushing me back with another lash of energy that sent me cascading into the wall as she called her weapon back to her. Pain once again shot through my wounded shoulder as I rebounded off the bulkhead, clenching my teeth as I fell to one knee. I immediately looked back up to see the fanatical Dark Jedi charging once again with Force-enhanced speed. She was screaming bloody murder as she swung her violet lightsaber over her head, bringing the blade to a position from which she could easily stab through the backplate of my armor. Scrambling desperately to my feet, I tried to get my own weapon back in line to defend, but I could see the triumph in her eyes, a hateful gleam that told me in no uncertain terms that I would be too late. Time seemed to move like an eternity as my helmeted gaze looked up to witness my impending doom. But I wasn't afraid, no; it was disappointment that flitted through my mind as the end approached. Disappointment that, despite all my training and commitment, I was about to be killed by this upstart while fleeing from the site of a mission that had since proved a failure. And then, without warning, time sped back up. The Dark Jedi gasped in surprise and consternation as the armored form of a Marine smashed a rifle butt against the back of her skull from behind and to her left, the impact sending her flying once again. Fear, anger, and wholesale shock filled her eyes as she slammed against the far bulkhead and slid to the deck, her weapon once again working itself free of her slack grip. Rising gingerly to my feet, I watched as the trooper who had come to my rescue unloaded bolt after bolt from his blaster into the woman's back, making sure beyond all doubt that she was no longer among the living. "Ibratu'na?" I asked breathlessly, panting both from exhaustion and surprise as I took in the overlarge helmet with the blaster score on its side. "What are you doing here?" "When you ordered us to make for the hangar bay, I could not simply leave you behind," he explained grimly. "After seeing them halfway, I returned to this corridor, to find you on the deck and that woman rushing toward you." Deactivating my weapon and attaching it to my belt, I slapped his shoulder with my good hand. "Technically speaking, you disobeyed orders, you know," I said with mock seriousness. "But all the same, I'm grateful. Now, let's get out off this sithspawned warship while we've got the chance." Without looking back at the smoking corpse of the Dark Jedi, the Twi'lek and I began trotting off after the rest of the platoon. In doing so, we nearly ran headlong into Bastila and Oakes as they and Privates Soskins and Tarsis from First Squad rounded a corner. The two Jedi, each of them smudged with dirt and sporting cuts on their faces and tears in their robes, were supporting the limp form of a masked and hooded man between them, the troopers covering them with their blasters. “What the kriff happened?” I asked her quite harshly. “And why in blazes are you dragging that corpse around with you?” “He's not a corpse,” Bastila replied meekly, and I found myself shocked at the anguish she was feeling. “And if we hurry, we may yet be able to save him.” “But who is he?” I asked again. “And what happened to Jenn, Rha, Biddell and my other troopers?” “The soldiers were slain when we stormed the bridge,” Georg continued somberly as Ibratu'na stepped forward to relieve Bastila of her burden. “Our brothers were killed when a nearby Sith warship fired upon this one. We had thought that Darth Revan here had died as well...but Bastila was able to preserve the spark of life that still flickered within him.” The young woman looked at me, and even though she couldn't see my eyes behind the visor of my helmet, our stares locked, and she communicated without words that it was only through Master Kavar's supervised healing session that she had picked up on the technique. I answered back with an acknowledgment that she knew what she was doing, and that we'd better get moving or he really would be dead along with the rest of us. We both knew that there would be time enough to mourn our losses once we got back to our own fleet. “Let's go,” I said, and the small group moved on to rejoin those already in the hangar. — — — Ten minutes later, as the ship died around us, we made it back to the level of the docking bay. The command frequency, which had remained silent up until now, crackled with Admiral Dodonna's deeply-concerned voice. “...repeat, what is your status? If anyone can hear me, please respond...” “Admiral, Captain Reyolé here,” I replied, keeping my tone neutral. “We've got the package and are about to disembark.” “Oh, thank the Force,” she said, and I caught the hint of a suppressed sigh in the fleet commander's voice. “The Sith fleet is attacking itself; they've already fired on the flagship and they're about to tear it apart! What's going on over there?” “You remember that thing we discussed?” I asked. “About how strong leaders are the key to successful groups of bad guys? Well, it seems Darth Revan's old friend Malak decided that he was better suited to lead the Sith Empire, and I'm betting he'd hoped to take us out as well.” “You'd better get off as soon as possible, then!” the admiral advised. “We've lost a few ships, but we can still close to range for a fast pickup. Wrangler and Battleaxe are working well together, I'll send them in to ward off further attacks while you make for Vibrosword!” “We're almost at the docking bay,” I replied. “We'll take separate ships to help mask our destination.” “Acknowledged, Vibrosword out.” Suiting action to words, Ibratu'na, Shan, Oakes, Tarsis, Soskins and I, while carrying the limp form of Darth Revan, made for the hangar, running unopposed through the red-lit passageways we'd slashed open on our way in. Nobody noticed or cared that we were causing quite a racket, for when we finally bolted into the bay itself, it was to see that three of the four ships that were there when we had arrived were still present and under guard by the rest of the platoon. Thinking quickly, I came up with a suitable arrangement for our egress. “Bastila, Ibratu'na, take the platoon and our guest aboard the lander and head for Vibrosword. Georg, take that KT-400 over there and make for Battleaxe. Dan'kre and I will take that Herald-class shuttle and try for a hyperspace jump Rimward of here. The Sith won't know who to follow, so it'll maximize your chances of getting back safely.” “And I'll be able to use my battle meditation to ensure that,” Bastila acknowledged with a nod. “But where will you go?” “Agamar,” I said with an exaggerated nod as I smiled behind my helmet. “It's been a while since I got the chance to go home, might as well take it on the Empire's credits.” The survivors of this desperate mission, every one of them scorched, battered, bruised or cut, nodded their own acknowledgment and boarded their respective ships. Silas and I entered the shuttle, waving goodbye to Georg Oakes as he boarded the droid-dropper. As the two of us settled into the small ship's upper cabin, the Bothan at the helm and myself in the rear seat, I got onto the platoon tactical frequency. “If anything happens to me and I don't make it back to the Republic, I want you all to know, it was an honor to serve with you. When you get back to Coruscant after this mission, you'll find that I've recommended every one of you for induction into the Marine Corps. Whether or not you take the offer is up to you, and I wouldn't think any less of you if you chose to stay with your comrades. But know this: a Marine is the best of the best, and we make it our business to put the needs of the Republic before our own. All of you have proven that you are the best, and the Republic needs you now more than ever.” “Touching speech,” Silas replied as we removed our helmets while the engines finished warming up. “Do you think any of them will go for it?” “I know one who will,” I said with a doleful sigh as I tightened the straps on my seat harness and, with the Force, did the same for the one I loved. “You ready?” “Ready as I'll ever be. Engines are go, just waiting for Jedi Oakes and the Jarhead's crew to clear the way. Then we can swing by your homeworld for a nice bit of shore leave. Maybe even meet your parents.” "That'd be a nice surprise for them," I agreed, laughing. "They'd be thrilled to learn I'd taken up with a Bothan." "Just imagine what mine will think upon learning I've taken up with a human..." The lander exited first, its portside blaster cannon turret firing off a salvo at a passing interceptor as it rocketed toward the echelon of Republic warships. The droid-dropper followed suit, and then it was our turn to vacate this crumbling wreck. Just as we cleared the magcon shield, an explosion rocked the vessel, sending scaffolding crashing down into the bay as armor plates blew out and vented atmosphere elsewhere on the hull. Soon the ex-flagship was well behind us, and for the first time I looked out upon the battlefield in orbit of Ord Mantell. The Republic fleet was withdrawing, conducting a fighting retreat away from the suddenly divided Sith force, whose unit cohesion was disintegrating rapidly. As Silas put us on an outbound vector, I wondered casually about what would happen next. Would the Jedi be able to save Darth Revan's life? If so, would they be able to learn what they needed to from him? Would it matter if they did? I started to search the Force for any possible insight, but as soon as I closed my eyes, my psyche was bombarded with a deluge of images and feelings. “Hard to starboard!” I nearly screamed. The Bothan reacted instantly, and the shuttle wagged to the right, but not quickly enough. An errant turbolaser blast clipped the rear of the craft, slicing through the shuttle's deflectors as though they weren't even there and boiling off hull plates. Alarms blared throughout the cockpit, and I caught Silas's frustration in the Force as he scrambled to do something useful. “Damn this piece of junk!” he said angrily, pounding the instrument panel. “The ion engines are leaking fuel and I think the hyperdrive's been damaged! I don't know if we can make it back to the fleet, much less make the jump to lightspeed!” And then, inexplicably, a wave of calm washed over me. This is how it happens, I thought to myself—or, more accurately, the Force whispered to me. Just go with the flow. “Silas, do you trust me?” I asked, my voice gentle but firm as I leaned forward to place my hands on his shoulders. “You know I do, Laera,” he replied, turning in his seat to look me in the eye. “Then punch it.” — — — “The Jedi Order thanks you once again, this will go a long way toward improving the Archives,” the slender, silver-haired and opal-eyed woman said as the trader handed a small, jade-green obelisk over to her. “The Holocron of Revan was thought to have been lost even before Palpatine rose to power.” “The credit transfer was a success, so I thank you in turn,” the giant of a man replied. “It's been a while since I ran into the Solusars, do you think Kam would be amiable to dinner aboard the Venture?” “Oh, Booster, you are too kind, but I'm afraid Kam is on Ossus right now,” Tionne Solusar replied with a gentle laugh. “I have to ask, though, where did you find this holocron?” “An associate of mine found it, buried in a monument on a planet called Tython,” the smuggler chief replied. “I don't suppose you've heard of it?” Tionne let out a small gasp, as though a plethora of opportunities had been opened for her by that casual mention. Booster Terrik smiled radiantly, though in his old age it was costing him more and more effort to maintain his high spirits. Mirax had been telling him to start taking it easy for years now, but he was damned if he would let himself be relegated to a repulsor chair, like that bloated obscenity who had called himself Threkin Horm had been prior to his untimely demise. “So, you have heard of it.” Tionne managed to keep herself from gushing, but it was a near thing. “I don't suppose you happen to have the coordinates?” she asked, hoping that the answer wouldn't cost too much more than the significant sum that the Order had paid Booster for the holocron—once Master Corran Horn, Mirax's husband, had confirmed its origins and nature, of course. Booster smiled again and offered the Archivist a wink as he pulled a datacard from a vest pocket. “It just so happens that I do. No charge, though, because there's really not that much there that isn't available on countless worlds more convenient than the Deep Core. The human population is small, they're actually quite independent, and I don't think they've seen an off-worlder for at least a couple of centuries.” “Thank you again, Booster,” Tionne replied. “Tython's location has been lost to the Jedi for more than a millennium, and there is much history there that we can learn from. There must be some way we can make this up to you.” “Forget about it,” the elder smuggler replied jovially, waving the thanks away. “You Jedi saved me and my daughter countless times, and never asked for anything. Well, beyond the occasional lift to a nearby star system, or lending my ship for some pitched battle...wow, you know, I should start a running tally...” The two humans, so different in temperament and appearance, shared a good-natured laugh before the meeting was concluded and the giant left the Temple, bound for his personal Star Destroyer and parts unknown. — — — The comm call came in the middle of the night, ship's time, but Luke Skywalker was awake in an instant when he saw who it was from. “Tionne, is something wrong?” he asked, sensing that something was amiss, if not exactly a danger. “I won't even ask how you got this channel.” The holographic image of the Jedi Archivist shook her head and smiled, brushing a forelock behind one ear. “Thank you, Luke, there is nothing wrong, and I apologize for disturbing you. But it is something important.” “Please, go ahead,” Luke replied. “Ben and I are actually pretty free of commitments these days.” “Very well,” the Archivist began. “A few days ago, the Order acquired an ancient holocron from Booster Terrik, who says that an associate of his found it on a world in the Deep Core called Tython. The holocron was created by a man named Revan, who we had believed was last seen about a year after the Jedi Civil War ended.” The Jedi Master's eyes perked up at once, he knew that name well. One of two Jedi Knights who had fought the Mandalorians four millennia prior to the rise of the Empire, he had fallen to the dark side of the Force and turned his fleets and armies against the Republic, before being captured by the Jedi and given the chance to redeem himself. If this holocron had indeed been created by Revan after his redemption, but before his departure into the Unknown Regions, than it could hold an incredible amount of data, experiences, and reflections about that period in history, the man himself, and the circumstances of his fall. “You've probed this holocron for information, I trust?” “Yes, and it is a truly magnificent trove of knowledge,” Tionne replied breathlessly. “I expect that you will want to access it at the earliest opportunity, so I am making arrangements to have it sent offworld; all I need is a preferred exchange point from you. There is, however, a small catch.” Luke let a smile creep onto his visage. “There always is.” Tionne took the quip in stride. “It seems that there is a small portion of the holocron's cache that I cannot access. In fact, the holocron has rejected the efforts of every Jedi I could get to attempt an interface with it, insisting that this is a personal message meant for one whose life Revan affected deeply. But surely, she can't still be alive.” “Who was this message intended for?” Luke asked, thinking about the ancient Jedi Knight known as Bastila Shan. The sources that the Archives did possess in regards to the two historically-significant figures and their relationship were vague and occasionally contradictory. It was said by some that Shan had fallen in love with the mysterious Revan, after he had redeemed her at the height of the very last battle of that long-ago war, while others went so far as to claim that the two had sired a child. “It was intended for a human woman, one Laera Reyolé...” Fin
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