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| - For a time, the Jedi woman had disappeared from the planet; allowing Dareus to come and go as he pleased. One would think that she had so quickly forgotten her promise. After all, he has already left the planet without being killed. Perhaps she dismissed him the moment of exiting.. or perhaps something else had called her off. Still.. one cannot know if she will return to this dustball... All in all, Dareus has had several long runs of luck. His last few major dealings with the Jedi served a far better purpose; and helped confuse the actual truths of many things to come. Sitting at Cochran for several days was enough for him, as his personal shuttle descends to the public docking bay, and he moves down the ramp; cloak flowing softly as the evening breeze catches him in the open. Giving only half a glance around, before stepping past customs- inspection and all; moving into the more populated areas of the city. The Sith pulls the hood from his body, letting it fall behind him as he walks; giving himself a better view of the people around while he continues his journey to get the well deserved drink. There are promises kept, promises broken, and promises on delay. Nothing is written in stone and certain words can always be rewritten. The man's track is watched from a pair of eyes that follows him from above. From one adobe roof to another. This time of night the streets are dark and certain parts are less inhabited. In one of these spots, the figure following drops down into Dareus' path and, for the moment, their hands are empty. "When you felt the Dark Side take you for the first time, what did it feel like?" The Sith stops dead in his tracks as he becomes certain that the voice was familiar to him, if anything the brief meeting that it was. It had only been a few hours since there was a resoundingly small accomplishment for him, while his own master watched, nonetheless- and it was Dareus who had announced that the Sith were back; in force. He still doesn't turn around quite yet "Oh there's just so many ways to really describe it." The silence is broken by the sound of his feet shifting under the sand while his eyes fall on the woman "Maybe birth would be a good way to start or better yet, the first time you did anything you later discovered you didn't want to live without." An eyebrow raises towards her "I would have thought that you'd be forbidden to even ask that question." Ai'kani starts to move, but she does not go closer. Instead, she starts to circle him; managing to keep a feet radius between the Sith and her. "Forbidden? That would be far too one-sided. You should know--" she raises a graceful hand to point to him "--that the Force is not one side or the other. The Force is what we make of it... a neutral power fueling our war and our peace. It is the wielder that chooses what is forbidden and what is fruitful." She is halfway around him now; still appraising. "You are still a fledgling. Who is your master?" In some sick acceptance, Dareus was becoming used to philosophical confrontations above running at each other with guns blasting. His eyes follow Ai'kani slowly, even his head starts to turn while the angle forces the movement but his senses are what he truly is listening to. "Who else...the brother of one of your own." She was right of course, with what she said; but the apprentice had a different view "War is a necessity; but one I don't enjoy. Death is happening all over faster than birth, weakening us all." Of course it's in the grand scheme of things; but not every with was alike. Malign made it clear about the living force and only kill when it was absolutely necessary- though emotions did get he better of people from time to time. "If you think that I'm surprised, you're mistaken. Along with the fact that I might die here and now. I fall and one will take my place- it's the nature of things." "True. It is the nature of things. If you strike down a weed, another merely grows." She continues her circle. "So, why feel remorse to the weeds? Regenerating viruses. Never ending bacteria." The woman smiles, but it is far from sweet. It is dark and hungry. "I did not come here to prattle philosophy with you. I came to kill you. Then your Master. I will find the root of your weeds and destroy it. I imagine I am giving you the honour of having a legacy before you die." He starts to laugh slightly; something that's barely audible though; neck turning the other direction to catch her while she circles him like prey. "You will get me easy enough. I can guarantee you that." There was no point in lying about it; they both could feel it, and he also was unarmed. "But you'll need something far darker in you to even think of taking down my Master." Dareus doesn't say it in a rude fashion, more like a simple matter of fact. "Assuming you have the courage to even step through that route." The whole time, his eyes remain locked on her and barely blinking. "Malign is no stranger to me," Ai'kani answers without feeling. No boasting. No fear. "Unlike you, I do not rely on the Dark Side to leech power. Unlike you, my training in both surpasses." She stops her circle where she had started. "Tell me. What is your goal in life? Why do you live? Why do you fight? Why do you serve your Master?" This was starting to get on his nerves now; nothing but useless questions like he would be on IGN instead of speaking to a Jedi. "Just what do you expect my goal to be? Emperor? Not likely. I have one purpose, to live my life to what I have made of it. Goals? I don't bother with it, I've already lost what was important to me more than once." Dareus crosses his arms over his chest while even himself is forced to ask the questions and not everyone has an answer "I fight for the same reason everyone does. To win. That path brings me directly to why I serve; I'm among the future, not idiocy like Palpatine or failure like Vader. No more insane plans to turn whole planets to dust; just a simple life that you'll see soon enough." The silence was deafening to him now, he had ingored the pain of loss in the head of battle but this...woman brought it back. That drink would feel good, if he lived long enough to buy it. The woman isn't irritated or bored. Nor is she intrigued or entertained. She is... just is. Slowly now she makes her approach on him. She doesn't need to threaten him or even wield a weapon against him; knowing there is little he can do against her. "So will be your legacy, my friend. Simple. Dull. Without real reason or goals." If the man does not back away, she smiles deeply once more and lifts a hand to place it against his head. "Let me share with you the reality of the Dark Side... let me show you what is at the end." Dareus makes no move to back away. He had resolved when he first kneeled before Malign and stood a Sith that he would not back down and see everything through to whatever end that might bring. Something wasn't quite right about it all; though he also had let other Jedi near his own mind. Thoughts within the Sith dwell on what used to be his wife, and many things he made mistakes with in the past; he used them carefully now when he needed to feel the force stronger but he still wished he could forget them at times. His hand slips up to stop her but it only would hold it for a brief moment "Don't dig up what I live to forget." It was a simple warning that probably sounded more like a request; but he couldn't back up any threat towards her- not yet. Her eyes darken to him and that smile grows just a bit at the corners of her mouth. Her other hand rests on the other side of his head and slowly, the Jedi begins to sing. The language is unintelligable. Perhaps not even a language but a series of notes that when said in sequence starts to lull. Her voice echos into the Force; encircling them. Blocking out the rest of the world, the desert town around them goes black as pitch. Her hair seems to glow and sway like the breeze and her eyes being a strong focal point. "Follow me... Dareus. Relax and let your mind open to what I have to share." If only for a short second, he wonders about his name- before the reality slips back into his mind for a second. This was almost embarassingly new to him; though it's not the first time that thoughts have had to pass between himself and another. Dareus feels comfort when the city slips into darkness and his eyes see past her into the shadow- the solitude he sought out. Reluctantly, what he dwelled on several minutes ago slips away while he clears his thoughts like many times he had sat and meditated; feeling almost again like those first new times that he felt something. There is a calming serenity between the two. The sort of relaxation and comfort that is so innocent and pure. "It is the end we all seek," her voice echos in the darkness. "A life of no fighting. No wars. No feuds. Feel it? That serenity. It can be so seductive. That is what we all seek." The blackness around them suddenly shatters into blinding light and the woman's presence feels gone from in front of Dareus. The light continues to burn bright and violently from all sides... yet feels so cold. He seems lost before the storm arrives, first quiet but still without question. Once the brightness hits Dareus screams when he's instantly blinded by it all; quickly falling to a knee to bring his sleeve to cover his eyes. Quickly the Sith discovers that he's even too distracted to try to fight it; being helpless and blind- nearly certain that the wisps of heat brushing past his lips is his own breath. His fear slowly takes it's own form, his body and mind bending it with what small bit of strength he can gain as his body shivers. His fingers move through the sandy ground beneath him but he doesn't see or feel it; but he manages to partially stumble to his feet and force his eyes open- the pain would clear his head then. Dareus can hear his heart pounding in his head while his face changes color before his scream can leave his mouth "STOP THIS!" His screams echo into the nothingness and suddenly, the light explodes. The roar of the winds and the power of the light is deafening. When it fades into the distance, it leaves only a ringing in the man's ears. Around him now is an endless field. Filled with tall grasses and swaying white flowers. In the blue sky, clouds drift overhead. "That is our war. Peace and violence. Serenity with darkness. Violence in blinding light." Ai'kani is standing behind him now not even an arm's length away. "And this... is the Force." She spreads out her arms from her sides. "Neutral. Accepting. Seductive and powerful. You stand in these fields every day... but this is not what you see, is it?" Once he's in the field, the release hits him though his shaking continues softly for several minutes though inside his version of the force is being brought out. Heavy breathing stops while he turns around; obviously shaken from it; Dareus' voice quickly grows cold though, echoing in the field where the sound shouldn't be coming back. The man's eyes burn with his own pain while she wants the truth that he will show her. The field doesn't vanish or fade, it melts into cold steel at first; just a simple medical bay on board a ship. He'd brought the images in malice; but now he falls into his own regrets but not looking while the screams echo from the table. "I exist in my own redemption." Staring blankly while the images remain himself while he watches and tortures his own wife continue...his own lack of control over the voice sending the tones high and loud throughout the room that increase his torment. Turning to look at Ai'kani, he has a different expression on his face, simply lost. "You and your people did this to her, not me." Even he doesn't believe that he wasn't without guilt in it. "This is my dark side, and my force." His hand waves the scene away quickly in disgust; fading it into blackness. "There is no peace. There is only passion." Ai'kani takes it on all; an unfelt wind seen spiraling around her in ribbons. "No," she corrects him. "There is peace and there is passion. Accept the existence of one and you accept the existence of the other. Accept your actions as ripples in the Force; affecting everything with. Those closest to you rattle the hardest. Those furthest receive mercy. Now." The ribbons wrap around her body and start to lift her up and the torrents of howling wind begins to pick up. "Now you will see what the Dark Side is!" It was an endless argument that really couldn't be started, Dareus turns his head to see when everything changes once again partially plagued by questions that weren't answered yet. Something about her, he didn't even know her name for sure since he was partially drunk the other night. The words that came from Ai'kani were partially true, but even those truths were in what people saw and did with them. He looks up at her "I walked this path freely. I asked for it and now it is my burden to bear, there is no one around me anymore." He began to keep it that way, aside from a few encounters that no one could blame him for. Partially he braces his body for pain but he still has courage in himself that was driven by curiosity "Show me." The blackness shifts and warps. Sounds screeching and rip into time; painful screams of thousands dead. "See /my/ Dark Side.... See what will become of your steel grays and torture!" Fire lights up all around them. Charred black ground all around them and red skies filled with smoke. Bodies lay all around them; unidentifiable. Unnamed. Unloved. Ai'kani appears in a cyclone of smoke and fire. Her hair black as the sky and streaked with the red of the skies. Her eyes sunken in and her light tan robes now tattered black leather torn to shreds and stained. "You." She lifts that same graceful hand to him as she had before only now, it is decaying and bloody. Her hands rough and worn. "You know nothing of the seduction of this power. How much it will eat you." Her voice splices into the heat of the fires and contorts with a demonic echo. "You will burn all who touch you. Bodies will fall to your feet. Foes. Allies. They will become nameless screams in your sleep. Phantoms haunting your dreams." Fear went through him for a brief moment; but it passes with his own force of will. It was now a reality since he can smell the decay and fire; he stands tall while his eyes glance around though his thoughts go over many considerations- not just the fear and future she brings to him. This wasn't his dark side yet, and it might never will be since everyone made their own way with how they played their destinies. He had already brought down allies, friends and family with his own actions even before the force spoke to him; but his resolve falls on something new. It breaks back in his soul to loyalty and to a commitment he freely walked into. The blue eyes look up to what used to be the Jedi "I was given the choice. The chance to step away before but I embraced it to whatever end. Acceptance will come sooner or later. Let it consume me, and haunt my dreams so I wake up screaming in agony at night." He takes a step forward, a bone snapping beneath his boot "I am Sith." The words come out proud, and it gives him some measure of solace; though each part of his will and strength is keeping him from screaming to leave this place. Her eyes glow for a moment. "I know you are, Dareus. As am I..." She moves up to him and that pointing hand rests on the side of his head as it had before this all started. She is staring intently in his eyes now as a voice echos around them. Dareus would recognize the voice as Ai'kani's own. Words she had spoken to Enb'zik only days ago. They start to collide and lay over each other. "Do you know what it is like to fall into darkness?" "I do not sense the dark in you." "But you... fall, Dark One." "Before you leave this planet, you will fall." "Forbidden? That would be far too one-sided." In those simple words, Dareus realizes his own weakness- he never saw it, thought it or sensed it. He couldn't have before. Standing silently he loses himself in her eyes, unable to even blink while he's lost in confusion and pity. "You would have killed him..." A small smile crosses his face when he realizes how close it actually was- Johanna had put lightsabers at his throat, but this one would have split her own in half just to take him down. The overlapping voices echoe, making sense but generating their own questions in him about how things could have played out. "You should have killed him." His hand moves to his cheek and rests on hers "You must see it coming then...feel it in the back of your mind like I do. Someone stalking you from the shadows but you never can turn fast enough to see. Out of those ashes and shadows...we've come back." "It is the wielder that chooses what is forbidden and what is fruitful." "So, why feel remorse to the weeds?" "I came to kill you." "Unlike you, my training in both surpasses." The voices fall over one another like a stampede; attacking them from all angles as the answers are spiraling out of control. Ai'kani's hair flails all around her as the storm grows. The fires rage and the smoke climbs higher. The bodies around them start to dissipate in the wind carrying the ashes to the uncaring beyond and filling the sky with black. "Let me share with you the reality of the Dark Side..." "Relax and let your mind open to what I have to share." Her other hand comes to touch the other side of his head; Ai'kanis eyes darkening. His head turns to look around while the ashes kick up the in the storm. Dareus was well acquainted with the fact of the mind being more powerful than any body- he'd seen some but not enough. It was a craving and envy inside him for what Malign wielded at his own will. Looking down at his hand while what used to be corpse blows throught it and his cloak billows in all directions his eyes are quick to meet hers again when her hand touches his face. For all outward appearances he was waiting for more although there was fear forming in him slowly- hidden and deep; just as they were here together in this place that he couldn't find on his own and certainly couldn't survive. The darkening of her eyes locks his attention on her, looking no longer at, but into her with everything he has. Dareus wanted to; but more importantly he now needed to. When his eyes come up to hers again, Ai'kani leans in to kiss him. It is a connection that causes the ground to shake beneath them. The sky cracks and shatters; falling to the horizon as it burns. The kiss deepens and the ground starts to pull apart. Ai'kani tilts her head and tastes him deeper. Blackness falls all around them and as a hand slides from the side of his head to the back. Digging into his hair, there is a moment shared between the two for a moment more. Her hand grabs his hair and pulls his head back suddenly to take his lips from hers. The connection is suddenly broken and reality sets back in. Tatooine returns to them untouched by their journey. Ai'kani is back to herself; no longer sunken and decaying. Her eyes, however, seem a bit darker. "I came to kill you," she whispers; her lips brushing to his. If anything, this was the exact opposite of what he expected. The fact that everything around them has returned to normal makes no difference to Dareus in the least, in his own view and mind, time stopped on the now empty streets and his hand moves up to Ai'kani's cheek and cups it softly. The Sith's eyes haven't left hers yet, and if he had blinked it would have gone unnoticed. "You just made me stronger" It was a simple metaphor, but there was no more fear or confusion with that simple display- he had his future clear in his sights through her visions. "If this is the dark side...welcome home." Her eyes are half-closed; as if in a daze. However even a fledgling can feel her senses are all about her. "I know," she whispers; that space between them neither closed in nor parted. Her lips still brushing against his, she asks the question that started it all. "When you felt the Dark Side take you for the first time, what did it feel like? Did it feel like fire burning. Did it feel like a fresh new beginning? Did you smell the corpses. Did you hear their screams? And your own mind... did it have a moment's thought before you suffocated it?" Questions clearly not meant to be answered. Not yet anyway. "I came here to kill you," she repeats and starts to pull away. "And I have. This will lead to your ultimate destruction." Somewhere in between being lost in her eyes Dareus remembers when he first bowed before his Master and sealed his fate with several simple words. There was fire and redemption in his soul that led to nagging questions in his mind that had yet to answer themselves in any form. Then came the nightmares that he fights with meditation and war. In the space of however long it was, the entire concept has changed for him; leaving him consumed by need and desire for what she had shown the Sith. "You remember the answers to those questions." His voice is rather quiet and introspective "You'll feel it once again." As she pulls away he steps partially forward and gives the brush of a kiss past her lips but again steps back "Every man dies...perhaps I'll welcome it more than most." He still seems somewhat in shock- now standing silent though now he had no more need to move to the cantina, Dareus would need to find answers no longer at the bottom of a bottle but in the force. Ai'kani continues to pull away from him until she is at the same distance she had started from. As if things are coming full-round, she starts to circle him once more. "It felt like justice. Like oozing black tar in my body. I blamed the Jedi for everything that was taken from me." She stops halfway; standing just behind him. "Nothing prepared me, though. All the hatred and bitterness in my life could not compare to the truth." "I've taken things from many people in my life, including myself. You can't stand there, show me what you did and tell me you don't miss it." Dareus' eyes follow her again in a far different light though, not some annoying Jedi who he would eventually have to kill- but someone he instantly had some measure of respect for above others because she knew both sides of the coin. "We can only prepare ourselves as best we can and follow our destiny, and the force." Though she's behind him he doesn't turn around "Consider me naive all you like and I have a lot ahead of me. Where my predecessors failed, I will succeed. At any cost." He was proving something to himself as well but he wouldn't share his reservations or fears with her. That was his to hide as best he could. Ai'kani's presence reaches out through the Force; wrapping around him gently for a moment. Testing him. Measuring him. Perhaps even drinking in some of the darkness around him. "Many before you have spoken those words. All have fallen under the crushing weight of their own attempts. Perhaps you will succeed... but history does not bode well for you." With a spring in her legs, the Jedi woman leaps into the canopy of adobe roofs and disappears, however an echo of her voice follows. "I can easily say I do not miss that shadows... but so long as he is alive... they will always call to me..." There were many things to consider now that he's met her and been shown things he had not expected from a Jedi. Taking the hood of his cloak in his hands to pull it up, his face sinks into shadows which blend him further into the night while he nods. "They were also arrogant and impatient. I am not." Dareus' eyes follow her while she leaps into the air while she vanishes; the Sith pulling himself together calmly once more, hearing his own voice echo through the force *And so will I*. With the thought of drinks long leaving his mind on this desert planet, the figure simply disappears up the ramp of his ship which promptly closes and takes off.
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