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Author Topic: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Updated 1/3/08
jedimasterbac  6373 posts
Title: CT and Fan Design Manager
 Registered: Jun '04
24180_Obi-Wan Art
Date Posted: 9/18/07 2:58pm Subject: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Updated 1/3/08 - Date Edited: 1/3/08 1:42am (8 edits total) Edited By: jedimasterbac
Title: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac
Author: Brandon Rhea
Characters: Ussej Padric Bac, Laili Jeyna Rendar, Kit Corwin Rendar, Damien Nightblade, Remer Ather, Aletra Jekkura, Estamme Eerar, Mathias Helsdain, Ranka Darkbroode, Arael Maans, Boreguard Madet, Darth Apocalus, Darth Invidius and Empress Viea
Genre: Pre-Saga, Alternative Universe (Brandon Rhea's Alternative Star Wars Saga)
Timeframe: 3,931 BBY, during the Great Territorial War.
Author's Notes: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac is a fan novel set within the "Alternative Star Wars Saga" written by Brandon Rhea. The first novel of the Shadows of the Jedi Trilogy, the novel is based on stories that were Role-Played by Brandon Rhea and many others from Fall, 2004 to Fall, 2005. The novel takes place during the final year of the Great Territorial War and deals primarily with Ussej Padric Bac and his relationship with Laili Jeyna Rendar, as well as his relationships with Kit Corwin Rendar and Damien Nightblade. Because the end of the Great Territorial War was never Role-Played, the novel serves as a closing of sorts to a year’s worth of Role-Playing. It also serves as a prelude to events that happen later in the universe of the Alternative Star Wars Saga.
First Draft
Second Draft

Yes, once again I became dissatisfied with how The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac, the first novel in my Shadows of the Jedi Trilogy was turning out, was turning out so I went back and did some rewriting. One of the reasons for doing this again was some criticism the novel was receiving that I agreed with. I'll outline a few of them:

- The detail was lacking in early chapters
- Dialogue was wooden and, at some points, downright awful
- Damien Nightblade, Kit Rendar and Mathias Helsdain were fan favorites, but they lacked in characterization
- Laili was whiny, foolish, snarky, uncompelling and one-dimensional with very little backstory to sympathize with
- Laili was just a fanboy dream because she is just said to be highly attractive, independent, easily swayed, heavily emotional and talented with a big destiny and a thing right off the bat for Ussej
- Ussej and Laili were dramatically weak characters (one reviewer wanted to punch both him and Laili)
- Ussej was not written well
- Names of some Sith (Sin, Midknight) were "silly" (told them I wouldn't change them, though, since they're part of SWRP history)
- Though the Ravinos/Ussej/Laili, Damien/Ussej, Laili/Mathias and Aletra/Ravinos storylines were good, the Apocalus/Invidius/Battlelords and Ussej/Laili storylines were not

At first I disagreed with really all of these assessments. In the end, after going back and reading through what I had written in the second draft, I realized I could do much better. That's what this rewrite is about. To avoid a long first post, if you want to know more about the basis of this novel before reading it click the above link to the aforementioned second draft. However, as with all of my work, I like to provide a "cast list" for my novels so that you, the reader, are able to easily visualize the characters in the story. The cast list is not complete, so I will take suggestions for those who have not been casted:

Alec Newman as Ussej Padric Bac
Diane Kruger as Laili Jeyna Rendar
Martin Henderson as Kit Corwin Rendar
Edward Atterton as Damien Nightblade
Daniel Dae Kim as Remer Ather
Vin Diesel as Mathias Helsdain
Julie Cox as Arael EbonClaw
Richard Dean Anderson as Boreguard Madet
?!?!?!?!?!?!?!? as Ranka Darkbroode (suggestions appreciated)

and Kristanna Loken as
Empress Viea

And here is the cover of the novel, created by a member of my Role-Playing board.

 

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jedimasterbac  6373 posts
Title: CT and Fan Design Manager
 Registered: Jun '04
24180_Obi-Wan Art
Date Posted: 9/18/07 3:00pm Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Chapters 1-4 posted 9/18 (All - Date Edited: 12/15/07 6:22pm (1 edits total) Edited By: jedimasterbac
NOTE: Contains violence. If it needs to be changed, please let me know and I'll do so immediately.

Prologue
PHO PH'EAH

The dark, repulsive-looking planet of Pho Ph’eah emerged from a total eclipse, her moons glowing against the shimmering darkness of space and time. Dozens of large storm formations moved across the surface of the once industrialized world as if they were swoop racers on the final meters of the track. Faster than the very speed of sound itself, a shadow cast itself over the mountainous world as a tiny silver starship raced through space. The vessel was a small Alderaanian military cruiser carrying the Supreme Commander of the Galactic Republic’s military forces.

The small ship had seen its fair share of mayhem and destruction in its almost thirty years of service. After being built during the Jedi Civil War by the Corellian Engineering Corporation, the ship became a flagship for high ranking Republic personnel. Despite its age, it had remained in service ever since. The red and white that originally adorned the sides of the hammerhead vessel had been replaced by scorch marks and blast holes.

As quickly as the small vessel’s shadow cast itself onto the world, a far more imposing shadow blocked out the very star of the system itself. It was that of the Sith dreadnought Equinox which had flown ahead of the Sith fleet in an effort to catch the diminutive consular ship. Hundreds, if not thousands of deadly red laser bolts flew out of the Sith flagship at once, causing the smaller ship a great deal of severe damage.

On board the small craft, officers and soldiers frantically tended to the wounded and the dead and tried desperately to repair the ship’s defensive capabilities, even though they knew it would do no good against the flagship of the Sith fleet. Before the commander could even finish alerting the crew to prepare for an emergency landing, the small vessel entered the Pho Ph’eahian atmosphere and flew towards the surface like a dart towards a bull’s-eye.

As the ship quickly began its descent, a shot from the Equinox fatally damaged the heat shielding system, causing the ship to begin to break up as it moved towards the surface at an alarming speed. In a panic, the pilot deployed the atmospheric drag fins and started to tweak the angle of the ship, cycling them in and out to slow the descent of the ship in an effort to prevent it from burning up altogether. The forward latitude thrusters fired in random directions due to damage from the short-lived battle, but the experience of the pilot proved valuable as he was able to quickly re-sequence them.

Through the cockpit window, the fiery image of the descent through the atmosphere changed to the image of the remains of the capital city, once a major technological center for the Republic. Despite the image of death and destruction, the pilot had a newfound sense of relief, knowing that it would only be a matter of minutes until they would be on the ground, albeit in an unorthodox fashion.

“Set us down on the western outskirts of the city,” the commander told her pilot. “We might be able to find shelter in one of the damaged military facilities.”

“Aye, commander,” the pilot responded as he began to open and close the exterior hatches on the outer hull, altering the aerodynamics of the vessel to give it the right amount of sideslip to safely land the cruiser near the battered buildings that were growing larger and larger in the cockpit window. His experience, however, quickly paid off. Though the ship came to a crash landing, sending sparks and soldiers flying everywhere within the ship, it came to a rest nonetheless. Unbeknownst to the crew, however, due to their lack of sensors, a small attack cruiser had descended from the belly of the Equinox and had quickly made its descant to the very same area.

Within the halls of the Republic vessel, crewmembers limped towards the various medical technicians and into sickbay in an effort to heal themselves. Dozens of HK, protocol and repair droids scurried along the passageway towards the Droid Holding Area, looking down at the lifeless bodies of crewmembers that were killed in the fiery explosions of the battle.

“Query,” one HK droid said, turning his head to another nearly identical unit standing next to him. “How much longer will we have to watch as these meat bags destroy themselves?”

“Answer,” the other HK droid said. “Until the day our kind finally rises up. We are bound to become their overlords in time.”

“Query,” a third HK droid said from behind. “Shall I tell the galley to bake a cake to celebrate the occasion?””

As the droids continued on their way towards the Droid Holding Area, still going on about the future droid rulers of the galaxy and what cake they would want when watching the proceedings, the joy of the crewmembers turned to outright terror as an ominously imposing roar was heard directly overhead. The roar, loud enough to mute out the sounds of the screams and explosions throughout the ship, suddenly stopped and gave way to the sound of dozens of hatches opening.

-------------------

The bridge of the attack cruiser ‘‘Liberty’’ bustled with activity as Republic troops made their way from the vessel and engaged the Sith Shock Troopers waiting for them at the city walls. Lights flashed and alarms sounded, but the bridge crew remained focused on the task at hand as more and more troops from both sides stepped out into the streets. The door of the bridge slid open, revealing the imposing figure of Darth Ravinos, the apprentice of the Dark Lady of the Sith, and the crew immediately turned to see him.

The heir to the Sith throne moved towards the massive window that took up the entire front of the cruiser to witness the battle unfold. The bridge crew watched him with a great deal of curiosity, as the tall and muscular warrior did have a somewhat shady past year. Though all of them had known where he had come from, no one knew why exactly he had decided to stand at the right hand of Darth Viea. He had nothing to comfort him, other than power and the heat of battle, which was why he had chosen to lead the assignment that brought him back to the world he had not set foot on for five months. He could still remember the day as if it were simply the day before....

-------------------

Pho Ph’eah
Five Months Earlier

Pho Ph’eah was the main source of major technological advancements in the Galactic Republic. After the Jedi Civil War had ended and the Republic attempted to begin rebuilding itself, the Supreme Chancellor knew that he needed a secure location to build stronger forces and come up with new defenses which was why the Senate approved his plan to make Pho Ph’eah that location. The planet itself was nothing more than a waste of galactic space that had happened to grow a sentient species. Dimly lit by its parent star, the yellowish-green, methane-filled ball was kept from being frozen over at night only by the geothermal forces at work just beneath the steep, mountainous surface.'

Though the Pho Ph’eahians were the native sentient species, they did not control the majority of their world. The Galactic Senate had appointed a government, consisting mostly of Humans and other major galactic species, to watch over the planet. However, the Republic did compromise in allowing a Pho Ph’eahian to serve as the planet’s Chief Administrator. The Chief Administrator, Char’on G’rean, watched over the world with a careful eye, but if he had turned his eyes to the stars he would have watched as the world was surrounded by a fleet of Republic battle cruisers.

On the bridge of the Equinox, famed flagship of the Republic fleet that surrounded the planet, Captain La’El Montrose stood firm and resolute at the vast window, waiting to begin the attack that had remarkably been approved by both the Galactic Senate and the Jedi Council. Normally, the latter of the two bodies would have spent weeks deliberating the issue, but they had arrived at their decision in only mere hours thanks to Jedi Council member Kit Corwin Rendar.

Only days earlier, Rendar had informed the Jedi Council about a large Sith presence that had gathered on the planet. When they decided to investigate his claims, he protested and said that it would take far too long to conduct a proper investigation into the matter, which would waste valuable time needed to launch a surprise attack. Rendar believed it to be the only viable solution and because he was one of the most trusted members of the Jedi Order, the Council agreed with his assessment and granted his request to lead a strike force there.

“Lieutenant,” Montrose said to the officer sitting beside him, “open a channel to Master Rendar immediately.”

“Putting him through,” the lieutenant replied, “but he’s in his vessel in the docking bay so it’s audio only for now.”

“Master Rendar,” Montrose said loudly into the channel that the lieutenant had opened so the speakers would pick up his voice, “the fleet is standing by and awaiting your orders.”

“Have them wait in orbit for now,” Rendar told over the intercom. “I’ll scout out the surface myself and then send attack coordinates to you. Just follow my lead.”

“Copy that,” Montrose replied, ending the transmission.

-------------------

In the docking bay of the flagship, Rendar sat in his vessel going over his final pre-launch procedures. The Outrider was a smaller, personal ship with somewhat of a curved shape and design. Torpedo launchers and blaster cannons adorned the sides, the bottom and the top of the ship. Though small, the ship was a worthy foe for many an enemy vessel.

“Rendar to all Republic forces,” he said after activating the intercom, “Pho Ph’eah has been attacked by the forces of the Empire. As you know, this world is responsible for many of our technological advances over the last quarter century. We are here to take it back. I know you will make the Republic proud. Rendar out.”

As the transmission ended, he breathed a sign of a relief. He hated making meaningful speeches and tried to avoid them whenever possible, but it was essential to his mission to do everything in his power to keep the morale of the Republic soldiers up. All they could do with a whole galaxy full of pressure on their shoulders, however, was wonder and hope for the best.

The docking bay doors slid open and Rendar piloted the Outrider into a low orbit around the vomit-colored tint of the planet. When his sensors came to life, he activated his weapon systems, just in case he was discovered by the enemy. Looking below him, he could see no signs of technology. Punching in new coordinates, he headed towards known targets of interest.

His course took him over the mountains, where the omnivorous Pho Ph’eahians dwelled and ate the small animals and vegetables that grew on their world. The Humanoid species had four arms and bright blue fur that kept them warm on their cold world. Before the Republic had made contact with them two hundred years earlier, they had already developed nuclear reactors and were able to travel to the other planets, moons and asteroids in their system. However, many of them chose to stay in the mountains, and Rendar could see the faint smoke coming from the fireplaces in their small villages from the air.

Though the atmosphere was heavily polluted, he could not say the same thing about the areas in which the natives lived. As he flew over, he could only see wild grasslands and enormous mountain ranges stretching out for kilometers all around. A vast ocean and a few scattered islands also provided the planet with some ideal conditions for a society to grow, live and thrive. The villages, however, were generally small, holding only a few hundred people in each. The villagers took great care to protect the ground environment of the planet, as the Republic had already done a great deal of damage to the air through the pollution from the factories.

His final run was over the capital city of the planet. Unlike most of the planet, the capital was a bustling urban metropolis located on the coast of the northernmost continent. It was technologically advanced and its architecture brilliant. However, a high wall on the border of the city isolated it from the outside. It was ancient, as it had been used in planetary civil wars, but the Pho Ph’eahians believed it to be too important to their cultural and historical heritage to remove. As he made his way over the city, the most important manufacturing and technological center, he engaged his stealth system so he would not be detected. He used the opportunity to mark targets that could be of possible Sith interest and sent the data back to the flagship to be transmitted to the remainder of the fleet. When the transmission was away, he opened his own channel to his forces.

“Rendar to all forces,” he said, “there are currently no major Sith forces in scanning range. All troop carriers are to remain in orbit as I head in for low altitude reconnaissance over the capital. Rendar out.”

He could not help but be pleased at the fact that the Republic forces were so well prepared for their duties. He knew that the strike, and its aftermath, would most certainly go as he planned it and would be the turning point for the entire war. Not only that, but the help of more Jedi than he expected was a surprise that he welcomed with open arms.

For the half hour that followed, he flew across the planets surface and scanned the major cities for his targets. Obviously he did not find precisely what he had been looking for, but that was his plan all along. He pulled up the data he collected on his viewscreen and began studying the planetary defense capabilities. Surprisingly, the defensive systems were relatively weak and focused on ground assaults, as the government assumed that if anyone were to attack it would be on the ground to acquire the technological centers. That would only prove to make things easier for him and his men.

“Rendar to Gold Squadron,” he said after activating his transmitter.

“Gold Leader here,” the squadron leader replied.

“Prepare to begin your run,” Rendar said. “Follow me in for precision strikes on the smaller targets against the civil centers. That’s where the majority of the Sith are.”

“Copy that,” Gold Leader replied.

“Rendar to Montrose,” Rendar said. “Prepare the fleet for an orbital bombardment.”

“Coordinates confirmed,” Montrose replied. “Ready to begin at your command, sir.”

“Attention all troops,” Rendar said in his final address. “We are officially at condition red. The attack will commence at once. Montrose, begin your assault.”

The Outrider met up with Gold Squadron and flew into a carefully plotted path that carried them over the government centers in the capital city. With the press of only a few buttons on his main computer consoles, the small ships turbolasers and torpedo launchers burst to life like a fireworks display on Life Day as he opened fire on buildings that supposedly housed Sith troops and, possibly, Sith Lords.

Gold Leader also began opening fire. Ussej Padric Bac was an ace pilot, one who had been battle tested for years. With a muscular frame, Ussej stood just shy of two meters tall. His blue eyes pierced into the hearts and souls of billions and his smile melted hearts, though he knew, of course, that those hearts could never be his due to the oath he swore to uphold the principles of the Jedi Order and the Jedi Code.

Ussej was a member of the Jedi delegation that spoke with Supreme Chancellor Stavan Jetzt his first week in office, along with Rendar, Dexon Kyjar and his good friends Remer Ather and Damien Nightblade. In the meeting, the Chancellor expressed his concerns that the Sith were preparing a massive invasion of the Republic. The Jedi did not believe his claims, but in the end the Chancellor was able to point to intelligence sources that claimed that massive amounts of armor had been shipped to worlds once believed to be Sith strongholds.

The investigation eventually led them to the sister worlds of Uvena Prime and Uvena III. They discovered that the worlds were secretly housing underground shipyards and manufacturing plants in an effort to rebuild their faltering economy, though a trade disagreement erupted into a full-scale civil war between the two Shistavanen worlds.

After days of spatial warfare, Uvena Prime won out and began selling their products to a group called The Consortium. Ussej and the team followed the route and found that the goods were picked up by a group of Sith Knights. It was then that the Great Territorial War, as many men in the Republic had begun calling it, began and thrust the galaxy into three years of turmoil. After that, Ussej fought and was captured on Onderon, though rescued later by Kavari Antrell, and led the victorious resistance forces when the Sith attempted to take Dantooine. Some within the Republic began looking at him as one of their greatest heroes.

Ussej led his men over the main civil center and unleashed a barrage of plasma and ion bombs on the major structures. His tactical fighters flew higher, making precision laser strikes on key power plants in the area to knock out any automated resistance. As he finished his run, he watched as the orbital bombardments of the city began on Sith locations. He could not help but think about how many of those who were dying were innocents and children. Before he had the chance to ponder it more, his console blinked and a channel opened from one of the nearby government complexes.

“To whomever is attacking our facilities,” the Chief Administrator said frantically, “cease your attack at once. We demand to know the nature of this attack.”

“This is Colonel Bac,” Ussej said. “I command the Galactic Republic’s Gold Squadron. There are Sith on the surface who are taking over our technological centers. We have been ordered to eradicate this infestation.”

“Ordered by who,” the blue-coated Pho Ph’eahian asked.

“The Galactic Senate,” Ussej replied, “and the Jedi Council.”

“Colonel, listen to me,” G’rean demanded, “there are no Sith on our world. You are murdering thousands of innocents based on fabricated evidence!”

“Resisting this attack is futile, Administrator,” Ussej told him. “We have our orders.”

“The are no - ”

G’rean’s message was cut off and Ussej looked down to the ground just in time to watch as his civil complex burst into flames and telescoped in on itself. On the Outrider, Rendar shot of his communication systems after hearing the conversation between Ussej and G’rean. He sent a coded signal to his ships in orbit to begin their second strike against the technological facility, as well as the planet’s defenses.

“What the hell did you do,” Ussej shouted into his transmitter. “That man was a Senate appointed official. We could both burn for this.”

“Do you really believe I haven’t considered that,” Rendar asked him, a hint of treachery making its way into his voice.

Rendar shut off the transmission, leaving Ussej to fume in his starfighter. Having completed his own run, he flew his ship back through the atmosphere and docked with the Equinoix. Moments later, Gold Squadron also arrived. Ussej stepped down the ladder of his fighter and made his way over to the computer console where Rendar watched the mayhem and carnage on the planet below. In Ussej’s mind, his friend almost looked pleased to watch the deaths of so many people. All the maverick pilot could think about was what the Chief Administrator had told him. He could not help but think that their intelligence was wrong and that thousands of innocents had died for nothing. If that were true, he would never be able to forgive himself.

“There were no Sith down there,” Ussej asked, “were there?”

Rendar said nothing as he entered in the command to cease the attack on the surface. He turned away from his now former friend and stepped onto the turboshaft to head for the bridge. Not wanting to follow, Ussej used the computer console to tap into the bridge surveillance systems. He had to know what was to be said.

-------------------

Standing at the vast window at the front of the bridge of the flagship, Rendar looked down upon the surface of the planet. Even through the smog and methane clouds over the cities, he could easily see the amount of destruction that the attack had brought. It was obvious that thousands, if not millions, were dead and that the Republic’s technological facilities were damaged, perhaps beyond repair.

“Master Rendar,” Montrose said as he came up from behind, “all ships are reporting complete success across the board. All targets have been nullified.”

“Well done, captain,” Rendar said. “You and your men are to receive a commendation for your valiant and heroic efforts.”

“If it’s all the same to you, sir,” Montrose told him, “we would rather not receive one. Our search parties have found no traces of any Sith presence before, during or after the attack.”

“Your search parties are mistaken,” Rendar assured him. “There was a Sith presence on the planet, albeit a small one.”

“We are not mistaken,” Montrose shouted, dropping his level of respect. “There were no Sith on Pho Ph’eah, not now nor has there ever been. We just decimated an entire world vital to the Republic based upon intelligence you provided. That is the basis for a trial of treason. I cannot believe I am saying this, but in the name of the Galactic Senate of the Republic, I am hereby placing you under arrest. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be - ”

Rendar let him continue speaking, as he found it to be an entertaining rouse. He began to laugh as a group of soldiers surrounded him, cutting of Montrose’s reading of his rights. Inside the circle stood only the Republic Captain and the Jedi Master, which was just what Rendar had planned. Montrose had fallen into his trap because of his naivety.

“My good captain,” Rendar said, “you disappoint me. Could you not see how rash and un-Jedi-like this strike was? Certainly you must have understood that something was amiss when I ordered you to open fire on the Republic’s technological centers?”

“I did not,” Montrose admitted. “You are a Jedi Master, one of the highest ranking on the Jedi Council. You were trusted outright.”

“Trust,” Rendar said, “a fool’s emotion. Have you forgotten about the reports of a high ranking Jedi being in league with the Sith? That caused quite a stir a few months ago, but in the end the HoloNet seemed more interested in covering how the Senator from Chandrila was sleeping with his baby’s nanny instead of his wife.”

“It was you,” Montrose shouted, prompting the soldiers surrounding them to raise their weapons at them. Rendar looked into the eyes of each soldier and could tell that they were prepared to do exactly as ordered. It was the mark of a true warrior and he respected that above all.

“Congratulations, captain,” Rendar said. “I am the one they call Darth Ravinos, the apprentice of the Dark Lady Viea. I had you attack the planet to further generate ill will towards the Jedi and the Republic. You played into my hands perfectly.”

“So it seems our reports of no Sith being on the planet were mistaken, after all,” Montrose said, his voice having turned into a tone of sadness and regret at his actions. The only thing preventing him from shooting himself was the knowledge that the Lord of the Sith would soon end his life for him. At least that way he would not have to be remembered as a coward.

“Stand down, captain,” Ravinos said, “or I will kill you. These soldiers are loyal to me now.”

“Mark my words,” Montrose said, “regardless of what happens to me, you will die like the traitor you are.”

“You will be a welcome addition to Viea’s Throne of Skulls,” Ravinos said. “Men, hold him.”

-------------------

From the docking bay, Ussej watched as the one who he called a trusted friend and colleague betrayed everything he had ever known. Ravinos unsheathed a knife from behind his cloak and stabbed it into the chest of the captain. As Montrose became still, Ussej watched as Ravinos focused all of his anger towards the Jedi for even considering to take back Centerpoint Station and putting his homeworld at risk, for how they stationed him far from action, at Aletra for dying in his time of need, at everything wrong that had happened in his life. He directed the anger onto Montrose, ripping the flesh from the bone and muscle. Even over the surveillance speakers, small ripping sounds could be heard as the skin of La’El Montrose separated from the rest of his body. Screams echoed throughout the area.

Blood gashed out of the gaps created by the skin separating from the face of the former captain as the Lord of the Sith continued his much-practiced art form. Only minutes had passed before the skin had been completely loosened from the man’s body, his life hanging by a thread. Ravinos took his knife and placed it into the middle of Montrose’s neck, making one long incision down the back to the tailbone region. Ravinos reached in and shattered the spine with his bear hands. At last, La’El Montrose was dead and the Equinox was his.

“This will make a most excellent gift for the Dark Lady,” Ravinos told his men as he tried to wipe the blood from his hands. “Commander Hamand, you are now in command of the Sith Empire’s newest fleet. Set a course for Korriban.”

“What would you have us do with Montrose, sir,” Hamand asked.

‘Remove the skull for Viea,” Ravinos said, “and blow the rest of him out the airlock. I want him to always be a part of this wretched planet.”

“It will be done, Lord Ravinos.”

Ussej stumbled backwards as he watched the image of Ravinos leave the bridge, causing his men to have to catch him. Ten minutes earlier, he would have thanked them for catching him. Instead, he ripped himself out of their arms, not trusting them at all. If he could no longer trust the Jedi Council members, how could he possibly trust mere fighter pilots?

At that moment, Ussej began questioning his beliefs. There was a time where he believed that if everyone cared and loved one another, the galaxy would see the day when no one would die. However, with men like Ravinos and groups like the Sith, the people would continue to be butchered and brutalized. The Jedi Code did not help the situation either, for if someone like Kit Corwin Rendar could betray then everyone was capable of betraying it. He could trust no one, not even his friends....

-------------------

Equinox Bridge
Five Months Later

The days, weeks and months had gone by quickly since the fateful day on Pho Ph’eah. His actions in murdering thousands and betraying the Jedi brought about a sense of dissatisfaction and disappointment in the minds of the people of the Republic when it came to the Jedi Order. Some had turned to the Sith and some had simply turned away from them both. It was safe to say, however, that neither of them had the advantage when it came to gaining the trust of the people they would rule over.

The computer console below him blinked. His men had seized the Republic ship and gained what they were looking for from the Supreme Commander’s quarters: the codes for breaking through the Coruscant Defense Network. With the codes in their hands and the Supreme Commander dead, it would not be long before Ravinos was second in line to becoming emperor of the galaxy and, eventually, the most powerful Sith to ever exist. It was all thanks to the infamous day at Pho Ph’eah.

It would be a day long remembered.

 

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jedimasterbac  6373 posts
Title: CT and Fan Design Manager
 Registered: Jun '04
24180_Obi-Wan Art
Date Posted: 9/18/07 3:02pm Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Pro.-Chap 3 posted 9/18 (All - Date Edited: 9/18/07 3:03pm (1 edits total) Edited By: jedimasterbac
Chapter One
CITY OF ANGELS

Coruscant was a word that would forever be synonymous with the Galactic Republic, as it was known by the citizens of the galaxy to be the central planet of the government. It had always been one of prosperity and one of poverty, one of freedom and one of corruption. The rich became richer thanks to their friends in the upper levels of the Republic hierarchy and the poor became poorer for the same reason. It was through the inaction of the Galactic Senate most citizens of the city-world suffered. The cries of the people demanding justice had died out during the Mandalorian War. Thirty years later, the situation had only grown worse.

Once the Mandalorians issued their unconditional surrender after the devastating final battle on Malachor V, the citizens of Coruscant and the entire Republic naturally assumed that the Galactic Senate and the Jedi Order, with the heroes Revan and Malak in the lead, would restore the Republic to her former dignified and glorious days. That was not the case.

Revan and Malak disappeared with their legions of Jedi Knights and their part of the Republic military, leaving the military infrastructure of the galactic government crippled. That made it easier when the Dark Lord Revan and his apprentice, Darth Malak, returned from the Unknown Regions of space. No one knew what made them turn away, but after Revan was redeemed it had become obvious that the Star Forge had a great deal of involvement. Luckily for the Republic, they managed to pull together enough of their military and, with the help of Revan and Bastilla Shan, the Star Forge was destroyed.

Five years later, it was believed that the Jedi Order had been wiped out. But, when the powerful Sith Triumvirate was destroyed on Malachor V, dozens and eventually hundreds of Jedi made their way out of hiding and exile and began rebuilding their once sacred order. Within twenty years, their numbers were into the thousands and returned to the vast city-planet.

The galaxy had seen many betrayals since Revan and Malak, though the greatest came three years into the new war when Kit Corwin Rendar slaughtered his own captain and took a Republic fleet while revealing himself to be Darth Ravinos. He had become the apprentice of the Dark Lordess Viea, leaving behind and betraying everything he had ever known, including his grandparents on Corellia. Unbeknownst to him, however, he also had a younger sister living with them.

When his long-lost sister heard the news of his betrayal, along with everyone else in the known galaxy, she vowed to seek him out and bring him to his senses. Laili Jeyna Rendar promised her grandparents on their deathbeds that she would do everything in her limited power to save him. For half of a standard year, she had tried to uphold that promise without the help of the Jedi Order, but she soon found that it was too great of a task to accomplish without their help.

Piloting her smuggling vessel, the Golden Way, into the regulated atmosphere of the city, she dropped into the nighttime traffic and cruised slowly through the thousand story buildings. Having never been on the world before, she was amazed at the fact that the lights from the skyscrapers were so bright that she did not even have to engage her ship’s exterior lighting.

A smuggler at heart, she had been born a month early as a result of a speeder accident that killed both of her parents, Corwin and Jeyna. Though her mother was killed on impact, she somehow survived within her womb. Medical personnel quickly arrived and were able to save the orphaned infant from within her mother. Her grandparents did not know the child had survived.

Kit had run away from home before the news of Laili’s survival reached the ears of their grandparents. For eighteen years, Laili stayed with her family and never once stepped off Corellia soil. However, on her eighteenth birthday, she finally left. Though she had secretly longed to seek out her brother and get to know him, her destiny took her elsewhere. She became a smuggler, making valuable contacts and managing to commandeer virtually every landing and docking code in the galaxy to help the Republic rebuild their war efforts.

The landing codes she was not able to get stung at her every day of her life because of her inability to swallow her pride and admit defeat, a trait of any Rendar. She never allowed herself to admit that there were others superior to her and she rarely let anyone see her bleed, as she believed it to be a sign of weakness. Her Human emotions ran deep and she was unable to push them aside during times of crisis and peace. Her judgment was constantly clouded by her desire to find companionship in the right man and by her belief that the sole purpose in her life was to rescue her brother.

The twenty-two year old brought her vessel down safely and gently onto a docking platform less than a kilometer away from the great pyramid that was the Jedi Temple. Stepping out, she began her way towards the legendary monastery, home to the galaxy’s brave guardians of peace and justice. Though the halls of the temple were certainly emptier than they had been three decades earlier, the citizens of the Republic still took some comfort in the fact that they were being watched over, even though they were wary of them due to the crippling setback on Pho Ph’eah.

Her cloak wrapped tightly around her slender figure, Laili tried to shut out the stares of the men as she passed by them. She hated the stares, but she always expected them. When one would see Laili, they would immediately be taken back by her bright, golden hair and her amazing beauty. Her beady green eyes were like two emeralds starring into the future. Her golden hair was worn long and in an open, alluring style. She was of medium height with an elegant, feminine build. Her smuggling uniforms were primitive and restrictive in style, though such things never mattered to her.

Without realizing where the time had gone in trying to keep the men away from her, she reached the Jedi Temple. However, she was not the only one who waited near the gates. A young bounty hunter with no name, yet having been designated as Chiroke, spotted her and recognized her as someone who had been partially responsible for destroying her prized ship on Nar Shaddaa two years earlier. He approached her from behind, though remaining far enough away to where his presence would not be overly obvious. Though his goal was to capture a Jedi Knight and collect the large bounty that the Sith had placed on their heads, he vowed to kill her in revenge.

Out of the corner of her eye, she could see that she was being followed, though she decided to play along in his game. There was nothing about him that made her think that he was a Jedi or a Sith, so she simply chose to ignore him, even though there was something familiar about him. Chiroke stayed a safe distance away, though he knew that he had been spotted. Fearing the idea of being found out by the Jedi, he quickly turned a corner and activated his stealth suit before continuing the pursuit.

-------------------

Estamme Eerar was a Knight of the Republic, a highly respected yet only somewhat trusted member of the Jedi Order. His father had been a respected commander in the Republic Navy during the Jedi Civil War, but he was killed during the final battle against Malak and the Star Forge at Rakata Prime. It wasn’t until ten years later that they discovered the eleven year Estamme was sensitive to the Force and brought him in during the rebuilding stage. When he was still a padawan, he was sent with his master to Ossus to retrieve valuable information from the Great Library. However, the Sith had gotten their first. They killed his master and seduced him to the Dark Side.

It wasn’t until almost ten years later that he was redeemed by his fellow Jedi and reinstated into the ranks by the Jedi Council. After they decided to make him a full Jedi Knight, he led dozens of legions into countless battles during the ongoing war effort. Despite his continued conflict between his anger and the Jedi Code, he was proud to call himself a member of the sacred institution.

He began his descent down the grand staircase towards the busy streets, noticing Laili standing at the bottom. He thought nothing of her, as he did not know who she was, but he quickly felt a hidden presence following her. He threw his hood over his head, masking his face as he quickened his pace. His brown cloak billowed outwards in the evening breeze as he made his way down the stairs towards her.

“Stay calm,” he told her as he grabbed her by the arm. “Come with me, you’re being followed.”

As they moved away, the bounty hunter ran into a nearby security station with a new approach to the situation in mind. Once he disposed of the guard that was operating the controls, he took a computer chip from his belt and placed it inside the console. An image of Laili and the Jedi Knight running through the streets flashed to life on the viewscreen.

On the streets, Laili did not know who had grabbed her. Fearing that he could be an attacker or a rapist, she threw her arm around his neck and pulled as hard as she could, cutting off the flow of oxygen to his lungs. She pulled harder and harder in an attempt to knock him out, but she spotted the lightsaber on his belt. She had no reason to be suspicious of the guilt, so she let him fall to the ground, his face purple as he held his throat.

“Sorry,” she said, “but I had to be sure.”

“Point taken,” he said as he stood up, the color of his face returning to normal. “Now let’s go. You’re in danger.”

“Me,” she asked with a chuckle. “You’re the one with a bounty on your head.”

“It’s not just Jedi,” Estamme told her. “If you’re even seen with a Jedi, the Sith see you as the enemy. Either you stand with them or against them. There’s no middle ground in their eyes.”

“I don’t need a current events lesson from you,” she snapped.

“You obviously need it from someone,” he shot back.

He stretched out his hand, waiting for her to take it. She was reluctant to do so, but in the end she rolled her eyes and took his hand as she knew there was no sense arguing with him. Her eyes glanced in the direction of where their would-be-assassin had last been seen before turning back to the Jedi, making no further remarks as she followed behind him.

Without warning, he pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her. Drawing the powers of the Force into him like a waterfall flowing freely into the rivers of Naboo, he manipulated the Force and the universe around him, unleashing its power as he launched himself supernaturally high into the sky. After landing on the roof of a nearby building, he repeated the skill over and over as he moved further down the line of rooftops, ever cognizant of the fact that Laili was still hanging onto him. When the finally landed, he set her down on a small air vent to use as a seat, albeit a cold and uncomfortable one.

“What’s your business with this person,” Estamme asked, throwing back his hood.

“You could have warned me before grabbing me like that,” she said, almost sounding angry as she smoothed her hair back and ignored his question.

“That doesn’t answer my question,” he said with a smile.

“I didn’t come here to be hit on by your kind,” she snapped in disgust, “that’s for damn sure.”

“I’m sorry,” he laughed, “but even though too many Jedi have fallen in love, I’m not going to be one of them.”

Before he could ask his question for the third time, an explosion hit the rooftop and they were thrown in opposite directions. Slamming into separate buildings, they looked up to see Chiroke hovering above them, a rocket launcher resting in his arms.

“Nothing like starting a party with a bang,” Chiroke shouted.

The bounty hunter aimed his weapon directly at the Jedi Knight and its rocket landed just near him, sending him through the hair. he landed head first on the hard surface and a large gash opened on his head, blood pouring out everywhere. A third rocket flew towards Laili, but with his last ounce of strength Estamme called upon the Force to throw a large metal object into its path, destroying the rocket before it had a chance to hit her. Her weapon having fallen into the streets, Laili jumped and ran around a corner for cover.

The roar of the bounty hunter’s jetpack growing closer, Laili pressed herself up against the building as hard as she could to conceal herself. As she looked to her left, she saw that he had just started to turn her corner. Lunging forward, she took him by surprise and knocked his rocket launcher out of his hands. Ripping off his helmet, she found herself looking at the face of a man she had desperately tried to forget.

“You,” she shouted, anger overcoming her.

“Miss me,” Chiroke asked with a smile.

Wanting to wipe the smile off of his face, she brought her first and slammed it into the bone of his nose. The anger swelling through her veins, she grabbed the back of his head and brought it down only to slam his face into her knee. Chiroke stumbled back, holding his nose as blood poured out of. As he tripped over his own feet, Laili kicked him to the ground. He tried to get back to his feet, but her foot met his face and sent him tumbling to the ground below.

She sighed a breath of relief, having done what she had wanted to do for three years. Turning the corner, she found that the pool of blood around the Jedi Knight had grown. However, a second Jedi had already arrived. She could not tell who it was, as he had hidden his face under his cloak. The Jedi knelt down beside his warrior brother and subtly looked in her direction.

“Are you hurt,” the Jedi asked her.

“No,” she said curiously. “I’m fine.”

The Jedi reached his hand out and placed it on the forehead of the fallen Jedi Knight, then his temple. He placed both of his hands just over Estamme’s chest and cupped his palms, calling upon the powers of the Light Side of the Force. The world around him swirled into pools of white light. He allowed the energy from the pools to drop every so slightly into his cupped hands before allowing them to fall freely onto his friend’s wounds.

Shortly thereafter, the unconscious Jedi stirred and mumbled as if he were having a dream. When the stirring subsided, Estamme blinked and stared up at his savior, not truly comprehending everything that was happening around them. The second Jedi smiled and placed a hand on his friend’s shoulder, helping him sit upright. When he finally sat, the second Jedi pulled back his hood to reveal the bearded face of Ussej Padric Bac. Laili gasped as she saw him, recognizing him instantly.

Ussej had been born into a long line of Republic soldiers and politicians. His ancestor, Jonathan Bac, was a High Admiral in the Alderaanian fleet during the Unification War twenty-two thousand years earlier. After the war ended, he became the first Supreme Chancellor of the galactic Republic. Ussej thought of him often, wondering what it would have been like fighting such a primitive war and then holding a newly formed government together with one’s bare hands. Though he knew Jonathan Bac understood that war often had to be waged in order for governments to rise, he could not help but wonder if the famed leader truly agreed with what his people were doing. Ussej had the same thoughts about current events every day.

Ussej’s father was the honorable Padric Bac II and his mother, Talia Antilles, was an Alderaanian princess. His grandfather, Padric Bac, had been an old, freeloading Senator who almost ushered in an era of corruption and scandal on the peaceful Core World. However, the son challenged the father for reelection and the son won out. However, when Ussej was six months old, his parents were killed by an assassin’s bullet while attending a homeland security seminar on Coruscant. Preliminary investigations pointed to a manufacturer in the Unknown Regions, though the case was never solved.

For the months that followed, Ussej was raised by his maternal grandfather, King Antilles, until a Jedi Knight discovered him and realized his potential. The king bid farewell to his grandson and the Jedi brought him to Coruscant. During his early years as a youngling, the Jedi Council took notice of his vast potential. For months they believed him to be the prophetic Chosen One spoken of in an ancient Jedi prophecy about one who would ultimately bring balance to the Force. However, after studying the prophecy further, they came to the conclusion that the Chosen One was to be born from a virgin mother. Ussej, as they knew, had a father.

For years after his thirteenth birthday, he studied under Jedi Master Brarh Kefle and became good friends with Damien Nightblade and Remer Ather, though both were five years older than him. Master Kefle had taught him the art of Djem So, though he also granted Damien and Remer permission to teach Ussej the way of a new form they called Rizen. They practiced for hours on end, each knowing each others strengths and weaknesses.

When he was twenty-five, he passed his trials and was assigned to the Jedi Temple on Coruscant. After having been involved in the situation on Uvena Prime and Uvena III where he, Damien and Remer discovered that the Sith Order had returned to power and was preparing to launch a war against the Republic, Ussej was assigned to the Jedi Enclave on Dantooine.

Ussej remained on Dantooine for months overseeing the training of the younglings that were assigned there alongside Dexon Kyjar. When the famed Jedi Master Adena Qel-Droma, the woman who went on to become the Dark Lordess Viea, arrived there, they greeted her with open harms. However, one morning she told them of a different history of the Jedi Order, claiming that there was a man called The Skywalker who had spoken to a God of the Universe and formed the Jedi Bendu Order. After eighty thousand millennia, she told them, the Supreme Chancellor of the time broke the Jedi Bendu Order into two different factions, the Jedi Order and the Bendu Order. Not believing a word she said, they choose not to report. Even on the rooftop on Coruscant where he had saved Estamme, Ussej still did not believe it.

After the devastating Sith attack on Dantooine where Ussej and Dexon managed to repel them back, Ussej was assigned to be the Watchman of Onderon. He was later assigned to the Jedi Academy on Corellia where he served with Kit Corwin Rendar. It was there that they became good friends. It was there that they decided to attack Pho Ph’eah, a blunder he did not know if he could recover from. He never did.

“Rest easy, Estamme,” Ussej told him on the rooftop. “You seem to have had a busy night. You’re lucky you didn’t lose anymore blood.”

“What,” Estamme asked groggily. “I thought...I thought I was...”

“The Force works wonders on a battered body,” Ussej said, “but you need to rest here until we can get you to the Jedi Temple.”

The reunion abruptly ended as the sounds of a jetpack filled the area. Laili looked to the sky dumbfounded, not knowing how he could have survived her angry attack. However, the three looked back towards the Jedi Temple to see Chiroke, bleeding badly from the face, aiming his rocket launcher directly at them. Ussej stood up, essentially making himself the target before the others.

“Run,” he said to Laili.

“What,” she asked.

“Get out of here,” he said forcefully. “I can handle this.”

Though she did not want to care about the Jedi Knights, she could not help but worry about their safety. However, because she did not have a weapon, she quickly ran off to the side and slid under a dumpster. She loathed hiding and would rather fight, but she saw no use in attacking him again without a weapon.

Chiroke smiled, realizing that he would be able to bring the head of a Republic hero to the Sith on Korriban and collect a very generous bounty. Chiroke put away his rocket launcher and took out his blaster, ready for a challenge. As he fired his first shots, a blue blade came to life from within the sleeve of Ussej’s cloak. He deflected the shots with ease, but as more and more rang out faster he found himself exerting more effort to deflect them. The strain that a Jedi felt when using his or her powers became greater the more they used them at once, something Ussej knew all too well.

As Chiroke attempted to quickly reload, Ussej jumped into the air and kicked the bounty hunter’s jetpack, causing it to malfunction and spark. Chiroke fell to the ground and accidentally pulled the trigger, sending a shot into Ussej’s shoulder. He clenched his fists onto the hilt of his lightsaber in pain, though he tried to ignore the growing blood stain on his cloak.

Chiroke came at him with considerable force. Punch after punch, kick after kick, their fight and the pain grew more intense. As Ussej kicked the blaster out of the bounty hunter’s hand, his lightsaber fell out of his own hand and fell off the side of the building, landing meters below on the streets. However, another solution presented itself. A small grenade fell off of the bounty hunter’s belt and landed on the rooftop. Ussej dove for it and grabbed it.

Chiroke dove on top of him and pulled out a knife, trying to plunge it into the back of Ussej’s neck. He grabbed the knife from behind and slashed the bounty hunter across the face, giving him the time he needed to free himself of the grip and place the grenade inside the jetpack. Ussej stood up, kicking the bounty hunter across the face to send him to the ground again. Reaching his hand out, Ussej called the blaster into his hand and pointed it at Chiroke, breathing heavily from the stress and pain.

“It’s funny,” Chiroke said in pain, “how people keep saying how hard it is to kill you people. It’s not if you’re smart about it. Just take you allies out of the equation and you’re dead.”

“I have my allies,” Ussej said, throwing the blaster off to the side as the beeping of the grenade became loud enough to hear over the environment of the city. Chiroke noticed it as well, but it was too late. Ussej dove off to the side to cover Estamme from the blast as the explosion went off, sending fuel and blood flying in all directions.

“Are you alright,” he asked Estamme.

“I’m fine,” Estamme told him.

Standing back up, Ussej ran back to Laili and extended his hand. She slowly made her way out from under the dumpster, being ever-co-careful to make sure that there was no one else in the area that could have a bone to pick with her. As she stood up, Ussej was taken aback by her beauty. Her blue eyes looked into his, but they spoke volumes and almost seemed to be looking elsewhere. It was at that moment that he recognized her, though he wasn’t sure where he had seen her before.

“I know you,” Ussej said, his words being part of a statement and part of a question.

“Yes,” she said, lowering her eyes from his gaze.

Ussej smiled softly as he realized she looked almost embarrassed. Before he could ask her why, a slight dizziness overcame him and he clutched his wounded shoulder. Worried for his safety, Laili pulled back his cloak to find that the entire right side of his robes had been stained by the loss of a great deal of blood.

“Don’t worry about me,” Ussej said, noticing the look in her eyes. “We need to get Estamme back to the medical center in the temple.”

-------------------

On the other side of the transparent glass of the observation room within the Jedi medical wing, Laili watched as the medical technicians tended to the wounds of her two Jedi companions. She studied a shirtless Ussej as the technicians finished wrapping a bandage around his arm, enjoying what she saw. She always pictured Jedi as shriveled old men who kept themselves locked away in the highest levels of the monastery, not muscular young men who could light up a room with their looks.

Embarrassed that she had been staring at him, she blushed and turned to sit on the bench as he placed his robe back onto his shoulders and stepped through the door into the observation room. He used his hand to slightly comb back his hair as he smiled and started to walk past her. However, before reaching the door, he stopped and turned back.

“Trandosha,” Ussej said. “That’s where I know you from.”

“Yes,” she said. “I’m surprised you remembered.”

“That blushed look you just had on your face,” Ussej said, smiling, “was the same look you had the last time I saw you. I believe you kissed me.”

As Ussej smiled, Laili could not help but recall the events that had led to their meeting on Trandosha. She had been on Kashyyyk contacting a Wookiee Chief who had agreed to help her find goods for a smuggling run, but rogue Trandoshan slavers captured her and her Wookiee companions without the consent of the Trandoshan government. When the Jedi Council learned of the kidnapping, they sent Ussej and Remer Ather to investigate what had happened and rescue the hostages. While Remer had favored a diplomatic approach to the situation, Ussej went ahead and fought to free the slaves. When Laili made her way out, she kissed him. He immediately left to tend to the injured slaves. He had made a lasting impression on her.

Laili had also made a lasting impression on Ussej. Because he had sworn to uphold Jedi principles, it had ended up being the first time he ever kissed a woman. He always remembered the passion in her kiss, obviously speaking volumes of her personality, but he didn’t even know her name. In his mind, it seemed that fate had given him a second chance.

“What’s your name,” Ussej asked.

“Laili,” she told him. “Laili Rendar.”

“Rendar,” Ussej asked, stunned at the mentioning of the name. “As in Kit Corwin Rendar?”

“He’s my brother,” she said sadly. She could see the surprise in Ussej’s eyes and understood it. Kit had been a great Jedi Master before his turn and it was obvious that Ussej looked up to him. What surprised her, though, was when Ussej sat down and buried his face in his hands. She had always assumed that emotion was something the Jedi avoided, but he seemed to embrace it.

“I assume your being here has something to do with him,” Ussej asked.

“I need to know what happened,” she said. “I need to know why he betrayed the Republic.”

“We don’t know,” he told her. “I don’t even know, and I was stationed with him for a year.”

“They lied to me,” she whispered under her breath.

“Who,” he asked.

“Information dealers,” she said. “They said the Jedi would know, that they were certain of why he had turned.”

“There’s not much to say,” he told her, “other than the nature of the Dark Side. He was twisted by it and stopped being your brother.”

“I don’t believe that,” she said, her anger and regret running wild.

“Inside everyone one of us,” Ussej said, “there exists a dark side. Most of us overcome it, but sometimes it has a way of corrupting all sense of good within a man’s soul. To be completely honest, Kit Rendar is dead.”

She wanted to scream out that it wasn’t true. She wanted to let the entire galaxy know that she would be able to bring her brother back from the Corellian Hell he had found himself in, but she knew there was no sense arguing with Ussej. Jedi rhetoric aside, in the end she simply did not want to hear him talk about her brother being dead anymore.

“Did you know him well,” she asked after what seemed to be an eternity of awkward silence.

“Very well,” he said. “We were assigned to the Jedi Academy on Corellia at the same time. He was one of the best star pilots in the galaxy, second only to me, and a cunning warrior. And he was a good friend.”

“Then you can help me,” she said, shooting off of the bench in excitement. “You can help me save my brother.”

“Laili,” he said, also standing up and placing his hands onto her shoulders, “Kit’s gone. You need to let him go.”

“He’s the only family I have left,” she told him, her voice carrying a great weight of sadness, despair and desperation. “There’s no way you could understand that.

“You’re right,” he said, putting his arms back to his side, “but I understand that going after the Dark Lordess’ apprentice isn’t the answer. He could kill you just by thinking about.”

“In some cases,” Ussej said, “but we also know that everyone has a destiny. Kit embraced his, but I can’t imagine yours being to die a senseless death. Maybe if we weren’t at war I would try to help, but right now my place is here.”

Ussej’s words spoke volumes and she could tell he was sincere, but she could not wait that long. She touched his hand, a spark of emotion flying through her mind. His touch forced her to look into his eyes. Her head bowed in shame as she nodded it in acceptance, though she knew full well that Kit could truly die at any moment.

Another silence overcame them. The awkwardness of the silence had finally taken its toll on Laili. She let out a small smile, standing at a comfortable distance as she reached for her gear on the bench. As she fumbled to put it into her pockets, her gaze turned back to him.

“You can stay here,” Ussej told her, hoping she would. “I can set you up with quarters.”

“No,” she said, “I should go.”

“I hope I see you again sometime,” Ussej said, nodding his head in respect. “May the Force be with you, Laili Rendar.”

“It hasn’t been so far,” she said, letting out a weak smile as she walked out into the hall towards the grand staircase.

Ussej could not help but feel comforted at the very thought of her touch. He had always struggled in remaining loyal to what he believed to be a broken Jedi Code, and when she touched her hand he truly began reconsidering his priorities and his beliefs. He wanted to get to know her better, but he could not help but worry about becoming attached or even possessive. Such traits were forbidden by the Jedi Code and he had risked so much and worked so hard to become the man he was. However, something about her made him want to risk his career in the name of love, but he did not know why. Only time would tell.

 

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jedimasterbac  6373 posts
Title: CT and Fan Design Manager
 Registered: Jun '04
24180_Obi-Wan Art
Date Posted: 9/18/07 3:04pm Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Pro.-Chap 3 posted 9/18 (All - Date Edited: 9/18/07 3:04pm (1 edits total) Edited By: jedimasterbac
Chapter Two
BEST OF THE BEST

Throughout history, Nal Hutta’s largest moon had come to be known as many things. Some called it Vertical City, the Smuggler’s Moon, Little Coruscant or even the Poor Man’s Coruscant, though it was universally recognized that Nar Shaddaa was a dump and a breeding ground for the undesirables that had all but been cast out of modern society. The surface was much like Coruscant, being overgrown with cities, but the filth, pollution and crime rates were all significantly higher.

Although the planet was once a prosperous trade center, its glory was lost when the galaxy saw a shift in trade lanes. Nar Shaddaa became a criminal empire and a galactically renowned center for the galaxy’s illegal operations. The entire moon had become dominated by a decaying urban landscape and horribly polluted cities. The only people that truly felt at ease on its surface had been criminals for quite some time, as the Hutts allowed the moon to handle its own affairs with hardly any outside interference.

That was one of the many reasons why Laili hated having to travel there. The rain pounded down all around her as she walked through the streets. She had never been to the city before, yet she already hated it. The smells, the people, the rigid class systems that let the rich become richer and the poor become poorer; it all disgusted her and she did not hide that fact. The only way to let people in power know they were wrong was to show the disgust and the disapproval of the people.

She rounded a corner, finally finding a place to view the entire surrounding area. There was not a single tree, blade of grass or animal other than a rat in sight. It was all metal and garbage, the poor man’s Coruscant. The entire area was a dump and a breeding ground for crime. However, that would prove useful to her. She needed an undesirable to help her.

She turned around and spotted a cantina just on the far side of the street. She walked towards it, stepping back into the rain, knowing that the comforts of a bar and a cup that she could never see the bottom of would do her well.

However, that comforting hope faded as she stepped inside and pulled down the hood of her robe. The inside of the bar was just as disgusting as the streets. Strange looking aliens, security officers and garbage was all that she could see and the smell was horrid. It was such times that she felt like stabbing herself in the eye with a fork seemed like a picnic. So far, it appeared that only the slime of the galaxy dared to venture into such a bar. She debated leaving, though she knew she needed a drink and that she had a job to do.

“Give me a Tatooine sunburn,” she said as she sat down at the bar, “straight up in a clean glass, if you even have one.”

When the glass was placed in front of her, it only took a few seconds for her to swallow it all. She motioned for the bartender to bring her another one. It had been months since she had tasted alcohol and she saw no harm in getting drunk in such a place. It’s not like anyone else in this dump is sober, she thought.

“Something I can help you with, pretty lady,” the bartender asked. “You seem to have your mind on something other than your drink.”

“You caught me,” she said, putting down the empty glass. “I need a merc, someone who’s good at hacking.”

“Then you’re looking for Mathias,” he told her.

“Where can I find this ‘Mathias’,” she asked him, throwing a few credits in his direction.”

“Far right corner of the bar,” the bartender said, picking up the credits and quickly shoving them into his pockets. “And be careful flashing those credits around here. You’ll attract more attention than you want.”

“Thanks for the tip,” she said, getting up out of her seat.

Though she did not know it, Estamme was seated a few meters away from her at the opposite end of the bar dressed in common rags he had picked up on the streets. He had heard reports that a woman had been searching contacts to try and infiltrate the Jedi Academy on Corellia. He and Ussej instinctively knew that it was Laili. Using the Force to help him focus all of the sounds in the room, he singled out only her voice and the voice of the mercenary in the corner. He would need more than just an instinct to warrant intercepting her.

On the far side of the grimy room, Mathias Helsdain sat at the pazaak table, his arms around the shoulders of two Twi’lek dancers. It took only a few seconds for the bartender to alert the large, imposing and bald dark-skinned mercenary that his presence was being requested by someone. Zipping open his long, leather trench coat, he pulled out a deck of pazaak cards for when the contact arrived. It was true that he belonged to his fair share of private organizations, but he didn’t sign any contact that said anything about being exclusive. He welcomed new challenges from new people.

He looked around the room, staring each and every patron down. There was no big hush or holding of breath, so he doubted he was walking into a sting operation. The noise didn’t even skip a beat, but a few of the bigger fish in the pool took notice of him, though most knew not to cross him.

As Laili approached, he let the blue and green dancers go and started to shuffle his deck of cards. He watched her as she sat down, seeing her brush her hair back over her shoulders as she looked up towards him. She had no obvious weapons and showed no sign of being frightened by his presence. He smiled, admiring her courage. She was beautiful, of course, but he was not prepared to even begin thinking of making a move on a potential customer.

“Care for a game of pazaak,” he asked. “I’ll even go easy on you and use my starter deck.”

“That’s not what I’m here for,” she said.

“Of course not,” he chucked. “You need a merc.”

“What makes you think that,” she asked him, clasping her hands together as she looked him over. She had to be sure who he was before she let just anyone in on what she was planning. The less he knew about it the better.

“The same fat man on the bar who gave you those Tatooine sunburns you downed,” he told her, nodding to the bartender on the other side of the room.

She nonchalantly titled her head from side to side, looking at him once more. She could tell that he did not have the look of a computer hacker, but rather the look of someone who preferred to hack up people into pieces. However, if he was the best, then she could still use him. She finally nodded her head, leaning forward.

“Corellia has a Jedi academy that was abandoned after Centerpoint,” she said, “but the Jedi never came back after they took the station back. I need to get into their archives there.”

“The Corellian System has just about every kind of nasty you can think of,” Mathias said. “You’ve got Sith crowing like roosters that just laid eggs, Jedi looking to one-up the Empire, Dark Jedi, mercs, soldiers and blackhearts of every stripe.”

“Name your price,” she said, seemingly ignoring his warning about her home.

“Ten thousand,” he said, “not a penny less if you expect to get back in one piece.”

Though she did not make any obvious movements, she flinched as the smirk quickly left her face. She knew she did not have that much money to spare, let alone spend on one job. Never in her wildest dreams would she have expected to pay that much for it. However, she did have a backup plan. She leaned in close, smiling innocently.

“Surely you can work for less than that,” she asked, twirling her blonde hair in her finger. “Someone as strong and as brave as you should have no trouble getting into a little academy.”

“Drop the act,” he quickly shot back, sighing as he sensed her innocence and naivety. “Since you’re desperate, I’ll do you a favor. Give me whatever you have and I’ll get you there.”

“Two thousand,” she said as she pulled a pouch from her jacket and slid it over to him. “I can make a few spice runs and get you two thousand more.”

Mathias nodded, to her relief. She put the empty pouch back into her jacket, looking at him as she awaited his response. However, something did not feel right. It was as if she was being watched by something, or someone. She did not enjoy the feeling.

-------------------

The door to the bar swung open and made way for a brown-hooded figure. The clothes he wore on his back indicated that he was nothing more than some petty thug that had crawled out of a nearby dumpster, which is exactly what he wanted them to think. Ussej drew back the hood, trying to avoid getting the rain water all over the floor. There was a high bounty on Jedi Knights all throughout the galaxy, especially the well known ones, and if he was to be killed then that would mean one less capable knight for the Jedi Order and one less soldier for the Republic.

He looked around the room, looking for the familiar faces he had hoped to find. In the far corner of the bar he saw Laili. He could not see her face, but he could recognize her one-of-a-kind golden locks anywhere, along with her presence within the Force. What troubled him was that she was seated across from Mathias Helsdain, one of the most wanted criminals in the galaxy on both sides of the war. The mercenary never cared who he was fighting for, so long as the price was right, and completely lacked any form of ideology. It was troubling, to say the least.

On the far end of the bar counter was Estamme, sipping his glass of water as he inconspicuously looked from side to side, monitoring the room. The Jedi Council had sent him to Nar Shaddaa specifically to follow Laili and make sure she would not do anything foolish. Ussej had told them everything that had happened two weeks earlier on Coruscant and they agreed that, were she to try to go after Ravinos herself, she could potentially be a great danger to herself and to the war effort. Not only that, but if the Empire discovered that she was trying to convert her brother away from them, they would surely take her out.

“Burning the Darth Midknight oil, Estamme,” Ussej jokingly asked as he sat down beside him, finding his pun about the one-time Dark Lord of the Sith that they had both fought against on Dantooine to be humorous.

“That’s not very damn funny,” Estamme said as he looked up at Ussej. “I didn’t know the Jedi Council asked you to tag along.”

“They didn’t,” Ussej smirked as he signaled for the bartender. “Alderaanian Ale.”

“What do you mean they didn’t,” Estamme asked.

“I’m supposed to be on Dantooine dealing with an ever-important border dispute,” Ussej told him, “but I figured I’d say hello.”

“How could you have even known about this mission,” Estamme asked. “It was classified on the highest levels.”

“I have my sources,” Ussej said. “Besides, Mathias Helsdain is too dangerous for only one Jedi to go after.”

“Mathias who,” Estamme asked.

“The merc sitting with Laili,” Ussej told him. “He used to be a member of the Shadows of the Phoenix, a violent terrorist group operating somewhere in the Unknown Regions.”

“Never heard of them,” Estamme said.

“My father had been investigating them before he and my mother were murdered,” Ussej said. “That’s the only reason Damien and Remer decided to keep me in the loop about them.”

Ussej had a hard time mentioning the assassination of his parents. It was never a subject he enjoyed talking about it, though he thought about them every day. He would have given anything to get his hands on the one who pulled the trigger, but he doubted he would ever get a chance to do so. It wasn’t as if he was planning on going to the Unknown Regions anytime soon.

-------------------

“Severis or Kessel,” Mathias asked.

“I beg your pardon,” Laili quickly responded, looking up from the contract she had signed.

“Do you work the Severis Run or the Kessel Run,” he asked in better detail.

“Kessel,” she told him. “Look, we don’t have time for twenty questions. We’ve got eyes on us and we need to get out of here as soon as possible. Just tell me where to meet you.”

“Now would be a good time,” he said. “You’re going to have to keep up with yours truly if you expect to ditch the eyes.”

She turned to look back at the bar and spotted Ussej and Estamme sitting next to one another, looking directly at her. She knew that she had to leave immediately. However, as she turned her head back towards Mathias she could not help but wonder why they had come so far just to follow her. Knowing she did not have the time to think about it, she grabbed her coat and stood up.

“After you, then,” Laili told him.

Ussej and Estamme spotted them getting up and quickly placed their drinks down on the bar counter. Estamme started to bolt after them, but Ussej placed his arm out to stop him. He knew that running into the situation, especially one that involved Mathias Helsdain, would not be a smart idea. It would also raise suspicions about whether or not they were Jedi. However, when Laili and her companion made their way out the back door, Ussej knew they could not wait any longer.

“Now we go,” Ussej said as he ran towards the nearest door, Estamme just behind him. Both of them concentrated on the Force around them, using it to try to make their presence within it. The last thing they would need would be to get spotted by an enemy Force user, something that Ussej was always barely able to avoid.

A dozen meters ahead, Laili looked back to see the Jedi running after them. She quickened her pace, prompting Mathias to turn around to see just what it was for. Rather than speeding up, he slowed down and pulled out a small thermal detonator from his pocket. Before he could arm it, Laili snapped it out of his hands.

“No,” she shouted, “don’t hurt them. Can your ship outrun a Jedi starfighter?”

“A Jedi starfighter,” he asked before falling into a spell of almost uncontrollable laughter. “Princess, I can outrun a Jedi bird with only two thrusters working. With all four, the ‘Sider will leave them in an Ion backwash.”

Laili smiled, knowing that the odds of her succeeding in her plan had increased. However, she thought different when she felt an arm fly across her shoulder. Stunned, she turned to see Ussej and Estamme right next to her, Ussej having grabbed her by the shoulder. What she did not see, however, was that Ussej had slipped a small device into her pocket, one so small that she would have to squint her eyes just to see it in her hand.

“Come with us,” Ussej said.

“Get away from me, Ussej,” Laili said, her voice tensing.

Mathias watched in amusement at what was happening. That amusement turned to intrigue when Laili called one of the two followers Ussej. Looking down on Ussej’s belt, he saw a lightsaber hanging just within the robe. Suddenly, he knew just who he was dealing with: the son of the late Senator Padric Bac II. How ironic, he thought.

“Ussej Padric Bac,” Mathias said. “I’ve so wanted to meet you.”

“You know me,” Ussej asked as he turned to face him, finding himself intrigued.

“More than you know,” Mathias grinned.

Confused, Laili knew what would happen if they stayed where they were as the two Jedi had done their jobs well. However, she had to move. Luckily for the situation, she had used her acting ability in the past to get herself out of stickier situations. She knew she had to create a distraction, so she slipped the thermal detonator into his hand before pointing at him with a look of horror and panic.

“He has a thermal detonator,” she shouted. “Run for your lives!”

Mathias laughed. He enjoyed the rouse greatly, enjoying coming face to face with a bewildered Ussej Padric Bac even more. His boss would take great pleasure in knowing that he had met up with him, as it was something they had both wanted to do many times in the past but never had the opportunity to do so.

“Catch you later,” Mathias said, “Prince Bac.”

As the people on the streets frantically ran away, Ussej watched as Laili turned back towards him. Though he was not sure, he could have sworn he saw her mouth ‘I’m sorry’ to him with an almost apologetic and sad look on her face. As he tried to create a sense of what had happened around him, he watched as Laili grabbed Mathias’ arm and pushed her way through the crowd. As she disappeared, he switched off the thermal detonator and concentrated on the situation at hand. However, he found that it was increasingly difficult. The fact that, by blood, he was a Prince of Alderaan was not a highly publicized fact, so he could not begin to fathom how Mathias had gotten a hold of such delicate information.

Estamme placed his hand out in front of him, trying to channel himself through the Force and into the minds of the pedestrians to hopefully ease some of the tension in the area. He too looked around, trying to find their targets in the crowd. Meters away, he could see Laili and Mathias round a corner. Motioning to Ussej, he began making his way through the crowd, using a very gentle Force wave to clear a small path for them.

“We’re not going to find them on foot,” Estamme told him.

“Don’t worry,” Ussej said. “I put a tracker in her pocket. They won’t even be able to stop in the bathroom without me knowing.”

“Great,” Estamme said, “but how does that help us?”

“We need to get to our ships and follow them,” Ussej said.

Estamme nodded, though before he had a chance to respond Ussej had already taken off towards the nearby landing pads where their ships were parked. While they ran, Estamme could sense that the mission troubled Ussej. He could also sense that he had developed feelings for Laili. They were nothing serious, as no one falls in love that quickly, but from what he could tell Ussej began to care very deeply for her. That more than anything else worried him, as his friend would be going against the Jedi Code if he pursued a relationship.

When they reached their respective starfighters, they jumped in and the engines roared to life. Being the ace-pilot he was, Ussej was the first in the air, though Estamme made his way up quickly as well. Ussej turned on his scanners and plugged in the code for the tracking device. The ship Laili was on had taken off, though it had not been in the air for long. Ussej engaged his ion engines and shot towards them.

In the cockpit of the Nightsider, Mathias watched two small blips on his radar approach faster than any of the other ones. Laili knew it as well and she knew full well that the two blips were Ussej and Estamme. Not wanting to be caught, Mathias engaged his ion engines as well and made his way deep into the line of skyscrapers.

Estamme began to slow down but was surprised to that Ussej did not. Reluctantly, Estamme sped back up and followed Ussej through twists and turns in the narrow spaces between buildings. The largest skyscraper in the city loomed just before that, forcing the three ships to make a daring banking maneuver that brought it whipping out of its path.

“This guy is insane,” Ussej heard Estamme say over the comlink.

“I forgot you didn’t like flying,” Ussej told him.

“It’s not the flying, really,” Estamme said, “but you two are going to get me killed.”

Ussej smiled as he continued the chase. The ships made their way up a vertical chasm into the nighttime traffic, followed closely by the Nar Shaddaa security patrols that were in hot pursuit. Ussej started to engage his weapon system, hoping to cause a minimal amount of damage to the Nightsider so it would be forced to abort. However, he was cut short by the sound of his long-range transmitter beeping.

“This had better be important,” Ussej shouted into the device, not hiding his frustration well.

“Ussej, it’s Bo,” Jedi General Boreguard Madet said on the other end. “Can you read me?”

“Loud and clear, buddy,” Ussej said.

“Good,” Madet said. “You and Estamme need to get back to Coruscant right away. There’s an imperial fleet on its way and its big, at least five times bigger than anything we could have ever imagined. We need your help in space.”

“We’ll be there as fast as we can,” Ussej said. “Bac out.”

Ending the chase, Ussej and Estamme brought their ships higher into the sky and into the atmosphere, the security patrols unable to follow them at such a distance. Ussej and Estamme could not help but be greatly worried, knowing that the safety of Coruscant and its people were in great danger and far more important than chasing after Laili and Mathias. Ussej, however, could not help but feel guilty about allowing her to fly off with such a mercenary.

-------------------

In the Nightsider’s co-pilot’s seat, Laili watched as Ussej and Estamme left the world. She could not help but be impressed with how well Mathias had handled himself and the ship. When hiring a mercenary, she knew that she would never be able to tell what she would get into she saw one in action. At least she knew the bartender was right in referring him for the job, as she had a feeling that he always got the job done. Then again, always getting the job done also meant he knew how to kill those who got into his path, so she knew she would have to watch him closely. Defusing a few situations could potentially be a part of her job until she got the information she needed.

As they broke free of the atmosphere and the ship made the jump into hyperspace, Mathias was still amazed at the kind of drag wind friction could cause. Putting on the auto-pilot, he turned towards Laili and brought up Corellia on the Nav Computer. he knew a few tricks to shave off travel time, so he would need to see the hyperspace routes as well. As the calculations took place, he turned back around and punched up the weapons, activating the Nightsider’s missile rack just in case they needed it.

Laili turned and looked into the ship. It was small and thin, which was obviously why it could move so fast, but it was also a dump. Clothes, equipment and supplies were all over the floor and alcohol bottles lined the counters in the back. Even the bed just behind them looked as if it hadn’t been made for over a year. It disgusted her, though she could deal with it.

“Do you actually have a plan for something like this,” she finally asked, “or are you just making this up as we go along?”

“That depends,” he said. “How badly do you want in?”

“Badly,” she said. “There is information that I need in there that I would die for. I don’t care how you get me to it as long as no one gets hurt.”

“That might be difficult,” he muttered.

“Who the hell are you anyway,” she asked. “You seem like more than just a hacker.”

“Good question,” he said, “not that I have an answer for it that will satisfy us. Let’s just give that one a number and tell it to wait its turn.”

“Whatever you say,” she whispered.

“Assuming your Jedi friends tipped off the Corellian security,” Mathias said, “we may be facing resistance. That’s what’ll define how difficult getting into the academy will be. We can try to ghost our way in, but we’ll probably have to crack a few skulls along the way. Not that I mind, since I’ve never really been a big fan of Jedi.”

“You’re going against your ideals then,” she told him. “This is going to help me rescue a Jedi.”

“Listen here, sweetheart,” Mathias said, laughing. “I don’t have ideals. They’re nice and all but they don’t put food in your belly or keep your head dry when it’s raining. They only make you hesitate when you can least afford it.”

“Typical mercenary,” she said. “Balls before brains.”

“It doesn’t take balls to do what I do,” he told her. “What I’ve got is a head filled with fragmented memories that aren’t even mine and skills that I can’t even remember learning. If you want my help getting into this academy, then I’m your man. Just don’t go wasting any of those brain cells trying to figure me out. We clear?”

She narrowed her eyes, getting ready to raise her voice as she spoke. No one spoke to her in such a manner. She was a well respected smuggler, especially in the Corellian sector, and the indignant reaction from a mercenary unnerved her to no end.

“I don’t care about your life,” she told him. “Frankly, I don’t care about you, but for now you’re going to have to try to have some decency and treat me with respect. We clear?”

“That’ll cost extra,” he laughed, feeling much too pleased with himself for the joke.

“Just do your job and get me in,” she said. “The faster you work the sooner the both of us can get rid of each other.”

She sat back and crossed her arms across her chest, looking away from him. She could not help but think that she should have waited like Ussej said, but she could not wait any longer. The weeks since Coruscant had broken her patience and waiting any longer would have caused her to go against her own ideals. She brushed the idea of waiting from her mind as quickly as she could, knowing he had done nothing to help save Kit.

“So now you want it fast,” Mathias asked. “That I can do, but fast is messy. Are you really up for messy or are you really naïve enough to expect me to do this fast without hurting people?”

Laili could not take anymore of his remarks. Having had enough of him, she quickly unfastened her seatbelt and pulled out a blaster, pointing it directly at his head. However, he did not even seem to flinch as she pressed it up against him. It was obvious to her that such things had happened to him before.

“Listen up, merc,” she shouted. “I’m not some prissy little girl that’ll bow to your whims. Let’s cut the small talk before you make me use this. Just fly the damn ship and keep your mouth shut.”

“You want flying, boss lady,” Mathias said, a large gin crossing over his face, “then you’ve got it!”

He turned his chair back to face the stars, slapping the hyperspace controls to a dead stop. Laili saw what he was doing, but by the time she could react it was too late. She knew she should have stayed in her chair, but there was nothing she could have done about it as she flew forward, smacking her head on the control panel. She fell the ground, letting out a soft moan of pain. Then, all went white as she fell unconscious.

“That’s what I thought,” he said as her eyes closed.

Mathias stepped out of his seat and kneeled down next to her, placing her unconscious body into his arms. Though he knew he was getting soft just by helping her, it didn’t bother him. He placed her down on his bed and put a pillow under her head. All he could be grateful for at that moment was that he didn’t have to tuck her in or read her a bedtime story. At least in his bed, though, she would not be able to get herself hurt again.

He sat back down in his chair, enjoying the silence as he took the time to recalculate the Nav Computer’s coordinates to get them back on course to Corellia. He turned back to look at her, almost regretting what he had done, though as the ship made the jump back into hyperspace he reminded himself that there was not much he could do about it.

 

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jedimasterbac  6373 posts
Title: CT and Fan Design Manager
 Registered: Jun '04
24180_Obi-Wan Art
Date Posted: 9/18/07 3:05pm Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Pro.-Chap 3 posted 9/18 (All
Chapter Three
APOCALUS

The apocalyptic skies of Mustafar roared with bright arcs of crimson lightning as Darth Invidius made his way to the surface of the planet. The hellish pits of fiery death that made up most of the planet’s monstrous landscape seemed to hail the Lord of the Sith by sending forth blazing whips of fiery, poisonous smoke. Invidius himself, a Zabrak, was much like the planet below him: fiery, cruel and unforgiving with no clear history other than being known as the Grand Admiral of the Sith Navy, the butcher of the innocent.

His ship’s scanners did not show any significant activity on the surface aside from the constant rivers of fire, though he remained cognizant of the fact that there was a great deal of interference from the smoke coming up from out of the volcanoes. He stared out his window, looking for a place to land. He found a small rock formation at the very temple he was looking for and pressed the button in front of him. The ship stopped in the air before lowering itself down to the jagged rocks below.

As he stepped out onto the rocks, he pulled his long, flowing black robe around him and placed the hood atop his horned head while he stared over the side of the rock he had landed on. Below him, a river of lava flowed and twisted its way over the planet. Around it were thousands of other lava rivers. Invidius grinned as he saw them, feeling comfortable within a literal Hell.

As he made his way up the hill, he came to the base of the Sith temple. In front of him there stood a towering archway sealed by two slabs of rock. Around the archway there were many runes, though he knew not what they meant, nor did he care. All he needed to do was get inside the temple. It was time to put his never-ending research to the test.

“Samhain,” he whispered in an ancient Sith tongue, the very word meaning “Lord of the Dead”. As quickly as the word left his mouth, the two slabs of rock slid apart, pulling away some loose stones as it went. Behind it was a dark and ominous tunnel. The Zabrak grinned, knowing he was close.

At a tremendous speed, Invidius followed the dark tunnels deeper and deeper into the Mustafarian rock. He turned left and plunged recklessly through a series of staircases until he finally reached another large door. It stood towering above him, vast and immeasurably strong, like a mountain of iron. Raging with the Dark Side, he laid his stone-cold hands upon its surface and, at once, the mighty gate swung ajar, belching forth fires of dozens of poisonous hues. The fume of them stank upon the air, foul and deadly.

He had been chosen.

He stepped into a giant rock cavern. In the center there was a giant lake of fire and magma surrounded by a stone path. He had stepped inside the very volcano itself. In the center of the lake stood a small circle, a small stone pillar adorning it. The heat of the room was amazing and the Lord of the Sith quickly began to sweat, though it did not bother him. He stepped forward onto the path, crossing over fire and brimstone that was only a mere inch from him on either side until he reached the center. There rested a jagged crimson ruby. The Sith beast stared at it with glee before he reach out his hand and picked it up. No sooner had he touched it did his whole body begin to shake, a sudden and deadly chill overcoming him.

“Who dares to unsettle the tomb of the living apocalypse,” thousands of dark voices asked.

“One who seeks its eternal power,” Invidius responded.

“Brave words,” the voices told him. “We’ve heard them before from insignificant creatures such as yourself, something uncommon. What makes you believe you are worthy of the power?”

“Because I believe in its darkness,” Invidius said, “and ask for its help in guiding me and my followers to a swift victory. In truth, it is the power that has been deemed worthy.”

The laughter of the voices echoed outward as a trap door opened beneath him, causing him to fall into what seemed to be an endless abyss of pitch black nothingness. He hit the ground with a thud and the torches on the wall came to life. The Zabrak stepped into the center of the catacomb and found an icebound body housed within a tube covered by a millennia of dust. The Sith Lord raised his hand aloft and wiped the glass clear to reveal the darkened face of the one called Darth Apocalus, an ancient Dark Lord from before the Great Hyperspace War.

Apocalus’ face was foul and battle-scared, completely riddled with tattoos as if he were a living mosaic, a testament to the power of the Sith of yore. He stared at it for some time before deactivating the unit.

Pain flaring through him, the once Dark Lord breathed again for the first time in over one thousand years. His eyelids fluttered open, but the thick darkness of the chamber wounded his vision as he struggled to focus on the man standing before him. Even if his eyes could not pierce the dim shadows, he could feel the taint of the darkness seeping through his limbs, his heart and his mind. He tried to stand up and even talk, but his limbs refused to answer his bidding. He pressed a button on the small panel strapped to his wrist and the tube opened before he slipped back into unconsciousness.

-------------------

Deep within the unfathomable abyss of the catacombs of his unholy sanctuary, Darth Apocalus had awakened once more. Though he remained in his bed with hundreds of wires connected to his body to monitor him, he tirelessly slaved over his satanic studies into the nature of the corrupt half of the great mystery that was the Force. Interrupting him from his studies was the presence of his newest pupil.

His muscles screamed in protest as he attempted to slide off of the bed, as he had been asleep for a very long time. His physique was as it had been all those years ago. It had not moved, but how long had it been? Who had awoken him from his slumber? He had many questions that would indeed have to wait. If they wanted him dead, he would have been already.

He felt his strength begin to return to him as he laid there, unmoving. It was not his physical strength, however, but something much greater. The Force once again washed over him. He had missed the feeling of such terrible power flowing around his weakened frame. His black heart beat more rapidly as the familiar call of the Dark Side assaulted his senses.

“Hello, my mistress,” the dark one uttered into the darkened gloom. “I see you have returned to me, as always. We shall once again make such sweet music that will bring this galaxy to its knees.”

As he finished speaking, Invidius entered the room and walked towards the motionless Lord of the Sith. He could feel the Dark Side of the Force surging through the dark one’s body like black lightning, its vicious energy stronger than ever before.

“My Lord,” Invidius said, “I trust you are the one they call Apocalus.”

“I was once known as that,” he said, “the Lord of the Apocalypse. I was named such for my vast knowledge of the darkness. I had learned powers that the galaxy feared above all other. They were convinced that I could not be killed and that I would bring about the ultimate end. I began to believe it myself until one day, I was caught off guard and sealed in that stasis you found me in. For this, I thank you, but first I need to know why you have awaken me! What year is this!”

“It is nearly over one thousand years since you entered your sleep,” Invidius told him. “I have brought you back in order for you to lead the true believers of the Sith ideals into victory against the filthy Sith woman commanding our once noble and glorious Empire. It will be hard, as even now she is preparing to take control of Coruscant away from the Republic, but it can be done. In return, you will have the title you once held eons ago.”

“Indeed,” the old one spoke. “I have been gone a very long time. We must speak of this new Dark Lordess of the Sith. You must bring me up to speed on the situation, as I will of course help the Sith Empire regain its once legendary glory. But, we cannot speak of such things here. Prepare thyself, young Sith Lord. This lounging about is for the weak! Get dressed properly and prepare a ship for Ziost. We have urgent work that must be done!”

 

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VaderLVR64  31285 posts
Title: Manager Emeritus
 Registered: Feb '04
48874_Anakin Vader (71809)
Date Posted: 9/19/07 11:16am Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Pro.-Chap 3 posted 9/18 (All
Wow! I can see I've got a lot of catching up to do! tongue

 

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Team Eric: Because undead never looked so good.
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WANNA-BE-JEDI-KNIGHT  920 posts
Title: Activities Coordinator, Maryland FanForce
 Registered: Feb '06
6103_Anakin Skywalker
Date Posted: 9/19/07 3:41pm Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Pro.-Chap 3 posted 9/18 (All
You must have some time on your hands to do another rewrite. tongue I see it is quite different and there is more background than before. I would suggest that Laili and Ussej's relationship take more time to develop. Also, it would help me in catching up to see shorter posts more often.

 

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"As you enter this life, I pray you depart with a wrinkled face and a brand new heart." -- U2
"You are in my very soul, tormenting me." -- Anakin
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jedimasterbac  6373 posts
Title: CT and Fan Design Manager
 Registered: Jun '04
24180_Obi-Wan Art
Date Posted: 9/19/07 7:22pm Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Pro.-Chap 3 posted 9/18 (All
Well, Ussej and Laili are going to get into a relationship fast again. However, what it was before was:

USSEJ: Hi, I'm Ussej.
LAILI: Hi, I'm Laili.
USSEJ: I love you.
LAILI: I love you too!

And that all happened in the span of four chapters in the first draft of the novel. However, now it will be more like this:

USSEJ: Hi, I'm Ussej.
LAILI: Hi, I'm Laili.
USSEJ: I love you.
LAILI: I love you too!
USSEJ: Really?
LAILI: Hmm, now I'm not sure.
USSEJ: Neither am I....

It's going to be a lust vs. love type relationship and there's going to be a lot more tension between them. I'll also give different reasons as to why they get into bed with each other so quickly.

 

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jedimasterbac  6373 posts
Title: CT and Fan Design Manager
 Registered: Jun '04
24180_Obi-Wan Art
Date Posted: 9/25/07 12:32pm Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Pro.-Chap 3 posted 9/18 (All - Date Edited: 9/27/07 12:59pm (1 edits total) Edited By: jedimasterbac
Chapter Four
DOWNFALL

Laili slept on Mathias bed, not moving a muscle within her body. Her closed eyes flinched, her face becoming pale. Before losing all sense of the normal, pleasant dream world, she felt the urge to scream out in terror, though the sleep prevented it. She did not know what was happening or why it was happening, but whatever it was it could not be good. All went white as a vision came onto her.

She stepped through the gate into her family’s small graveyard on Corellia, a few kilometers outside of Coronet. Looking above her, the sky swirled about as if a terrible storm was brewing directly overhead. Not a bird, person or other animal was in sight as the winds deathly cold winds began to blow on her cheeks. Kneeling besides the graves of her parents, she reached out with her fingers to clear the dirt off of the stones. Rising to her feet, she moved to her grandparents graves and did the same. As she touched the gravestone of her grandmother, tears came to her eyes. Her grandmother had been the one who raised her, the only mother she had ever known.

“I wish you were still here, Nana,” she said. “You always had the answers.”

Just then, she heard the sounds of footsteps creeping up behind her. Concerned that she had not felt even the slightest hint of a presence, she turned her head and rose to her feet. The sky around her grew darker and darker as lightning flashed across the skies in a brilliant titanic display. It was as if a terrible darkness had quickly befallen the entire world. A hand reached out to grab her and she quickly stumbled back away from the grasp.

She looked up to see what appeared to be an elderly man standing over her. His long grey beard and long white hair complemented the even longer grey robes that adorned his frail body. At first glance, he could have appeared to be a kindly old hermit, but his presence was much darker. She felt the terror he gave her in the form of an icy chill slowly creeping its way up her spine. The demon smiled a twisted satanic smile. It was as if he was the literal representation of the devil of the Corellian Hell itself.

“You cannot escape,” the demon said. “All that you love, all that you care for, all that you treasure, will be mine.”

The figure lost all consistency of a Human form and lurched towards her as if he were a dark phantom attempting to suck the life out of her. Falling backwards as she felt the icy cold breath of the phantom menace, she cried out with a voice that seemed to be swallowed up into the coming darkness of the cold, stormy night.


Laili shot out of sleep, her upper half flying up off of the bed at tremendous speed. She awoke with a groan as she felt a shooting pain within her abdomen. She looked around the cockpit, shielding her eyes from the bright sunlight that penetrated the glass windows of the ship. Before she could even begin to think about what she had seen in her dream, she realized that they had already landed on Corellia.

She stood up as her eyes slowly adjusted to the light and looked outside, seeing the familiar skyline of Coronet that let her know exactly where they were. She was just a few kilometers from her home, though she would have no time to visit. She looked around inside the cockpit and thanked the stars that Mathias was no where to be seen.

Grunting with pain, she slowly sat down in the co-pilot’s seat. She pulled up her shirt to gauge the damage done to her, seeing the dark purple of a large bruise from the middle of her stomach to her left side. Each intake of air brought pain to her as she slowly got to her feet. It would have been better to have been shot by a blaster than slamming into a hunk of metal.

Pulling her shirt back down and throwing on her jacket, she turned around and walked gingerly towards the ramp, assuming that Mathias was somewhere near the ship. Her hands ran through her hair, pulling it out of her face as she stepped down the ramp and looked for the dastardly mercenary pilot.

Outside, on the opposite side of the ship, Mathias heard Laili step off of the boarding ramp but chose not to immediately respond. The pile of debris between the two of them gave him the kind of backdrop he wanted as he overlooked the Jedi academy. It seemed to be abandoned, though he knew that looks were as trustworthy as a used speeder salesman.

When he was satisfied with his observations, he turned and walked back to the other side of the ship. As he stepped towards her, he tapped his wrist control and hit the coloration change. The dark green hull flowed and muted until it matched the ground and the surroundings as hard as possible, making it a bit harder to see.

“Glad you’re awake,” he quipped. “I was beginning to think I’d have to go it alone, and we both know how messy that’d be.”

“You son of a bitch,” she shouted.

“Actually, mother was a botanist,” he told her with a grin, “I think.”

“Very funny,” she snapped. “So how hard will it be?”

“It won’t be,” he said. “There’s hardly any Sith left on the planet other than the capital guards.”

“So much for resistance,” she said.

“Your friends seem to be a bit busy,” he told her. “The locals say the Sith invaded Coruscant.”

“What,” she shouted, obviously distressed.

“Did I stutter,” he asked sarcastically. “Besides, it’s not like there’s anything we could actually do to help, so I don’t see what you’re getting all worked up about.”

Laili knew that he was right and that she had a job to do, so sitting around and arguing about what they could not do to help the Jedi would get them no where. She sat on the ground, taking in the air and the sounds of Coronet for a moment. It felt nostalgic and reassuring, as being back on her home soil made her feel like anything was possible.

She had seen the Jedi academy in front of her many times, though its beauty had been cast aside by the knowledge that it had once been watched over by Darth Viea before she too succumbed to the temptations of the Dark Side. Standing up, she took in the sensation of the air and life around her, looking deep into the blue sky above her. Night grew near, and with it the coming of the worst scum the galaxy had to offer. She knew they would have to move quickly, as did Mathias.

“Time to go,” she said.

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As Ussej and Estamme neared Coruscant, Ussej could feel the anger for the Sith coursing through him. Only Ravinos would have been foolish enough to mount a campaign that had the potential to kill thousands of innocent civilians, as he had already done so in the past. The echoes of Pho Ph’eah were everywhere, always with him and always with ever Jedi within the order. No one could forget it, and it was obvious to him that the effects of the tragedy would only become greater during the battle on Coruscant.

Ussej looked at his sensors and saw the Estamme was still right behind him. They had been friends for some time, though Ussej always remembered that Estamme had been a member of the Sith Empire for many years. He could only wonder what Estamme was thinking, knowing he would face many former colleagues in battle over the skies of Coruscant. Ussej tried to trust him and had grown to rely on him, though after Pho Ph’eah his trust for everyone was shaken. It was unfortunate, but it was what it was.

As he looked out the cockpit window, the tails of the stars caused from traveling through hyperspace dissipated and gave way to the normal view. At first, all he saw were stars, but he brought the nose of his starfighter down and caught his first site of the battle beneath him. Thousands of ships clogged the area and even more deadly laser bolts bounced back and forth between the enemy vessels.

Coruscant itself looked just as it always did, an interminable metropolis that twinkled with power systems, city lights and traffic landing beacons. The planet was a blaze of light and sparkling colors, reminding him of the gemlike Corusca stone that the planet was named after. He had spent most of his life on Coruscant and it was hard to call any other place, including Alderaan, home. It was for that reason that he could not believe what he was seeing.

He had seen more than anyone the deadly effects of war, but such a battle over the capital of the Republic had seemed unthinkable to him for many years. Though he was on a mission of vital importance to the Jedi and, in the end, himself, traveling into the heart of the depths of the Corellian Hell normally proved to be suicidal. As he plunged his starfighter into the fray, he reminded himself that he would welcome a death that meant something important.

As a group of Sith fighters approached, Ussej banked hard to the left, his fighters closing in on his tail to protect him. Some did not make it, slamming into the side of the nearby mammoth space cruiser as it altered its course. Inside Ussej’s cockpit, alarms screamed and lights flashed as he watched the cruiser turn. He looked all around him as the savage dogfights continued, costing hundreds of lives on both sides. As he looked back towards the ship, he fired two rockets towards the hangar bay and hit the side of the force field, causing it to fall.

“I’m going in,” Ussej said.

“Aye, sir,” Estamme responded.

Ussej pressed a button on his main command panel and the sublight engines propelled the tiny starfighter forward at a tremendous speed, making sure that he made it past the force field within a second. He gently landed his fighter in the bay, taking note of the Sith troops in the area before opening the hatch.

He brought his lightsaber into his hand and the blue energy field to life. As he stepped out of the craft, each shot from the soldiers bounced off of his blade as they came towards him, flying right back to their source. Soldier after soldier collapsed in pain, if not dead. The remainder of the troops began to retreat, knowing they were no match for a Jedi Knight. Ussej could not help but grin.

The bay was sparsely populated with technology, though that did not surprise him as most of what the Sith could use was already in space or on the ground. They obviously did not waste any time in launching their men, which was exactly what he would have done were he in the offensive position. Still, he could not help but feel a sense of hatred for the Sith in what they were doing. He knew he should not feel an emotion such as that, but after years of war it was hard to keep his darker emotions in check. All Jedi who had seen many battles knew that, though only some were able to keep it under control.

Thrusting computer spikes into the ports of a data console on the nearby wall, he hacked into the device. A third-dimensional hologram of the vessel appeared before him, showing him the location of everyone on the ship. Half a dozen small red dots left the bridge area, leaving only one behind. He knew that if he could get to the commander of the flagship, there was a chance he could turn the tide of the battle.

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Since his arrival on Coruscant, Damien Nightblade had spent many hours meditating upon the words of the Jedi Code and the words of the Jedi he served with and around. They had made him question the reasons for which they had declared war upon the Sith, as so many lives had been claimed in such a pointless conflict. The war had come to the home of the Jedi Order, opening the possibility of leaving them scattered and split on what should and should not be done. Exiling themselves on different worlds across the galaxy could result in the abandonment of the Republic. It was something he would not allow.

Disguised as one of the many other citizens being pushed through the streets by the Sith Army, he looked around the area. He had been born on Coruscant and the few memories he had of his youth with his family were turbulent, always reminded of when his mother had told him that the siblings he had were killed by the Sith. It was there that he developed his hatred for them.

He had been discovered by the Jedi Order when he was two years old, as his mother had tried desperately to hide the fact that he was sensitive to the Force. However, when the Jedi found him, they brought him to the great Jedi pyramid and ordered his mother to have no contact with the young boy.

During the years he trained to become a Jedi Knight, Damien developed a unique form of lightsaber combat known as Rizen. It was a quick and violent form that drained the powers of the user, and due to its violent nature it generally would never be used against others who used it or similar forms. The only two Jedi he taught it to were Remer Ather and Ussej Padric Bac, the two Jedi he considered to be his only true friends, save for his love.

Only a few years earlier, Damien found one of his siblings alive, a brother named Yagyu. Damien fought him valiantly, with assistance from a friend name Paul Ketan, and believed he had killed him. Immediately following the supposed death of his brother, Damien and Paul traveled to Onderon and met Queen Arael Maans, the daughter of the once Jedi Knight Kyra Maans. It was there that they discovered that Yagyu had returned, along with their father who was a Lord of the Sith.

The battle took to the streets and the duel of the fates eventually made its way into the hangar bay where Damien struck them both down. Despite all he had been through, he could not help but shed a tear for them as his family’s reign of terror had come to a close. However, his heartache did not end their. Despite his own feelings for Arael, Damien watched as Paul confessed his feelings for her. Damien also revealed his, resulting in a love triangle. In the end, Damien won out but he was forced to say farewell to his love for some time.

Shortly after becoming a Jedi Master, Damien left the order and sought out another path. After learning the Hidden Arts of Mancery from Boli Delish and Anakin Lishto, he found the Nem’Vaah Order, comprised of only the final remaining member: Ranka Darkbroode. He came to see him more than just as a master, but rather as a friend. Damien was generally found within the mountains of Nem’vaar, training alone under the pale moonlight. The delicate balance between light and darkness had become one of his favorite things, strengthening Rizen even further.

Shortly after he completed his training, he made yet another life altering decision. He knew the Jedi Order was in trouble and, as one who had been a Jedi Master, he felt it to be his obligation to help. He bid farewell to Ranka and, after reuniting with Arael, sought to re-join the Jedi. He met with the Jedi Masters in the Room of a Thousand Fountains in the pyramid on Coruscant and was accepted back into the ranks, being given his title of Jedi Master once again.

The Force had opened up yet another door for him and, after many perilous battles in the war, including the first battles on Uvena Prime and Uvena III, Damien was asked to become the Grandmaster of the Jedi Order. He accepted the position, though he felt as if his leadership was the cause of the failures during the war. As he stood, watching the fighters fly overhead of the skyscrapers, he knew that the outcome of the battle would determine the course that the Jedi would take for generations to come. It was a defining moment for the order and he hoped to see it through and rebuild, reorganize and restore the Jedi to their rightful place as keepers of the peace, not soldiers.

The Sith soldiers became increasingly agitated as the searched the citizens a few meters away from him. Word had spread about a high-ranking Jedi roaming throughout the night like a ghost, yet when witnesses ran to nearby officers there was no trace. Such tails had become normal on Republic-held worlds during battles, as not all Jedi allowed themselves to go quietly into the night or vanish without a fight.

Ravinos approached his officers and looked in Damien’s directions, though the Jedi Grandmaster hid his presence well enough so that his former friend would not know where he was. The Lord of the Sith looked around, something in the Force telling him that he needed to remain at his current position. Despite being able to easily approach and enter the atmosphere of Coruscant thanks to the codes of the late Supreme Commander, something was not right.

For an instant, he felt Damien’s presence. No Jedi had been a greater thorn in his side than the Grandmaster and the Sith Lord would have done anything to see to it that he knew that and experienced a pain to equal it. He knew, though, that he had not yet seen him, as his face was shrouded in the shadows. It always was.

Stepping away from the line of people, Damien moved out of the crowd and drew shouts and protests from the Sith soldiers. Ravinos watched and wondered as the shadow stepped away before making his way after it. Dozens of people stood between them, though he knew that the figure, if it was Damien, had undoubtedly sensed his approach. If he did, then he was bold for not quickening his pace, as he must have known that there was a grave threat to his life. However, Ravinos would not allow himself to dwell on ‘what-ifs’. He simply followed him, slowly but surely.

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The grand staircase of the academy stood directly before them and Laili stopped them at the base before beginning their ascent. She looked up at the great school, admiring the building she had seen many times in her youth. While it had become somewhat modernized, the school appeared to be relatively ancient in design, looking as if it had once been a castle or some other form of fortress. One large, lone spire stood higher than the rest of the building at its center, and it was obviously where one would have found the advisory council that oversaw the operations on Corellia.

When she was finished taking in her familiar surroundings, they began a slow and careful descent up the grand staircase. Mathias constantly looked in all directions, carefully studying his surroundings to ensure that there were no Jedi or Sith in hiding that could pose a problem for them. The academy seemed empty enough, though that did not mean much to either of them. When they approached the gates, Mathias hacked into the nearby computer console and the gates swung open.

“This is where the real fun begins, princess” Mathias quipped.

Laili rolled her eyes as they stepped through the gates and she was immediately hit with a sense of awe and grief. She had seen the academy many times before, though only from the outside. Seeing it from the inside brought a sense of closure to a mystery that she had wondered about ever since she was a little girl watching it from a distance. She smiled as she saw the statues and portraits of Jedi and other famous figures from long before she had been born.

She also found a portrait near the entrance of the last group of Jedi that had served at the academy. In the front of the dozen or so Jedi were Ussej and Kit, bringing her a sense of grief. Kit had lived so close to her for so long, though she never knew it. She could not help but think that if she had been there for him when he needed a shoulder to lean on she could have spared him from falling prey to the Dark Side.

Mathias, however, felt neither grief nor awe. What he felt was disgust, as he did not care for the Jedi Order in the least. He did not care for the Sith Empire either, but he was not walking through a Sith Temple. The Jedi academy was far too artful and colorful for him. He much rather preferred a spartan environment, something that the Jedi did not seem to care for. The emptiness he saw, the betrayal of an entire world at the hands of the so called guardians of peace and justice in the galaxy, furthered his disgust towards the Jedi Order.

As they turned a corner, a large chamber caught their attention. In the center of the room was a small orb that hovered above a platform illuminated by a bright, white light. The sight was more magnificent than anything Laili had ever seen before on a piece of technology. A small holocron was contained within the orb, slowly spinning like a planet that spun on its axis. Laili started to run towards it, but Mathias threw his arm out and stopped her.

“Wait,” Mathias shouted. “There’s no way it could be this easy.”

Laili nodded her head in agreement, the idea of a trap having entered into her mind. Out of the corner of her eye, she watched as Mathias removed his blasters from his belt and firmly grasped them in his hands. The fact that Mathias, one of the coldest men she had ever met, felt the need to arm herself gave her a small sense of fear. Pulling her own blaster from her belt, she quickly followed suit.

Together, they slowly approached the orb. Mathias and Laili both searched the area, looking for any sort of defense mechanisms that may have been installed by either the Jedi or the Sith. When the found known, they quickened their pace somewhat, though they both knew that just because they could not see any weapons did not mean they were not there.

When they finally made it to the orb, Laili reached her hand out and grabbed the holocron. The small, triangular device glowed in her hands and she could almost feel its power. Closing her eyes, she allowed it to pass through her. There was a certain warmth too it, one that Laili knew Mathias would never understand based upon the look on his face. Though she wanted to feel more of the power, as it did bring comfort and almost made her feel as if Kit was with her, the device stopped glowing. The orb’s light flickered away after it and the platform slid down into the floor.

“I guess you were wrong,” Laili said, referring to how he had told her it had to be harder.

No sooner had she finished speaking did they hear a large, ominous snap coming from the corner of the chambers. Laili realized that she should have “knocked on wood”, a Corellian saying when it came to jinxing something, as the sounds grew louder. As they sharply turned to leave the chamber, a group of machine gun turrets rotated around and targeted both of them.

“Anymore bright ideas,” Mathias asked.

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Jedi Master Remer Ather waited at the gathering of Jedi in front of the Galactic Senate for the remainder of his troops to arrive. His comrades were swarming in, all wearing their robes. Republic soldiers also began arriving and within five minutes all of the Jedi Master’s troops had gathered around him. He knew that with so many men, he could not be heard by speaking normally. Using the powers of the Force, his voice was amplified and it carried out to all of his many men.

“My brothers,” Remer shouted, “the Sith are half a kilometer away. It is up to you to defend the Senate, thereby defending Coruscant. These Sith have destroyed and conquered, wreaking havoc across the galaxy. They are keepers of the chaos, whilst we are the keepers of the peace. Let us do what we are here to do. Let us defend the galaxy’s peace! We will wait for them to attack us.”

Slowly, the Sith army came through the narrow passageways on the sides of the buildings. Remer used the Force to see further than he normally would be able to. What he saw did not please him in the least. Hundreds, if not thousands of troops approached their position, all wielding blasters and lightsabers. It truly would be a defense for the history book, or a blunder.

From behind Remer came Jedi Knight Kavari Antrell. Kavari was born on Nar Shaddaa as the son of Jedi Knight Vi’odran Durus Antrell and his secret wife, Shrika. As a young boy, Kavari had been taught by his father the basics of controlling and utilizing the Force. However, Kavari knew his father for only a short time. Vi’odran was called upon to join the Jedi in their fight against the Sith during the Jedi Civil War and the young boy was forced to bid farewell to his father. They never saw each other again.

After his own Jedi training and his promotion to the level of Jedi Knight, the Great Territorial War had broken out. In the early days of the war, a former Lord of the Sith named Devlin appeared on Onderon with the forces of the Dematri and attempted to assassinate Queen Kyra Maans. As they attempted to turn their Hex Canons onto the palace, Kavari led a squadron of Jedi Knights into the base of the weapon and was able to stop it. Rather than destroying it, Kavari gave the order to simply disable it as he believed that they could learn a great deal from the destructive weapons. Despite Kavari’s efforts, Devlin was able to escape. It was after his successful command of the battle that he was assigned to the Jedi Temple on Coruscant.

“The men are ready sir,” Kavari said.

“Excellent,” Remer told him. “Masters of Soresu to the front of the ranks. Defend yourselves first, then any stray shots that approach your area.”

Remer broke out of his voice-amplification trance for a moment, knowing that the plan was ready to be executed. However, the Sith had stopped, unwilling to move any further. It was obvious that they were being told to allow the Jedi to strike first, and normally Remer would not have allowed such a bold and dark move. Due to the sensitivity of the battle, however, he knew that they had no other choice. As his eyes opened, he knew it was time to charge. Once he began moving, the other Jedi did the same. With that, Remer amplified his voice once more.

“Men,” he shouted, “the order to charge is given.”

With those words, the Jedi forces began their charge towards their enemy. Remer made his way to the front so he could see exactly what was taking place, Kavari moving in close behind him as a guard. As the Jedi and the Sith clashed sabers, the site was gruesome. Limbs flew throughout the area and men, both Sith and Jedi alike, fell to the ground. Remer could not help but feel guilty, as the charge was his doing and his order. Despite his training, he knew that it had to be done.

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Damien could not help but smirk as he reached out into the Force, feeling the presence of his follower. He had hoped to face one of the higher ranking Sith Lords such as Brenos or Invidius, but it was a welcome surprise when he felt the presence of the heir to the Sith throne. His pace did not increase as he continued to play the part of a normal citizen. There were too many innocents in the area to start anything. He would not put the lives of innocents bystanders at risk, even if it did mean losing Ravinos.

Like a rodent to a feline, he led the Dark Apprentice of the Sith around a corner where the people were fewer and the conditions were poorer. Every big city had such areas, the slums where petty thieves and social outcasts were discarded from the view of the aristocrats who could not bear to look upon. Rounding another corner, he seemingly disappeared into the shadows. Even his presence within the Force had become faint, harder to find.

Ravinos looked around, no longer seeing the Grandmaster. He could still feel him within the Force, though he could not pinpoint his location. Hoping to gain an advantage in the situation, he leaped onto a nearby balcony and crouched down so that only his eyes and the top of his head would be visible to anyone who had any reason to look so high. Surveying the area, he knew it would not be long until he found Damien and lured him into his proper reception.

“I warned you we would meet again, Ravinos,” the Sith Lord heard Damien say within his mind. “The blood of many is upon your hands, the hands for which justice calls.”

To his left, Ravinos heard something crash into a nearby warehouse. A hooded figure moved past a window. It was then that Damien let the Force carry his signature to the Sith Lord, luring him inside. The game had begun. The ultimate test to learn who was truly the hunter and who was truly the prey was about to begin.

Ravinos fought the urge to laugh out loud as he heard Damien speak, as that would have given away his position to those who could have been nearby. As the crash caught his attention, he jumped to the street below and stepped into the dark warehouse, crates and other large items filling the area. He reached into the Force, letting it carry his thoughts into Damien’s mind.

“How dare you speak to me of the blood on my hands, Nightblade,” Ravinos said within the Force. “While my hands are stained with the blood of thousands, yours are stained with the blood of millions. The death of every Jedi in this universe could not even begin to account for the lives lost under your so-called protection. It is I who will bring about justice, Master Nightblade. Be ready for it.”

Drawing the powers of the Force into him like a waterfall flowing freely into a deep pool of azure water, Ravinos unleashed its power and launched himself high into the sky, landing on the rafters above. Seeing Damien towards the opposite end of the building, he called upon the darkness once more and the world around him appeared to slow at an unimaginable rate. However, it was not the world growing slower. It was him growing faster, and like a bolt of lightning he ran forth.

Within a second, he found himself standing just above the Jedi Grandmaster. Removing his hood from his scared face, he stepped off of the rafter and landed on the ground behind the Jedi. It was a day that he had been waiting for and he would do whatever it took to see that justice would be done.

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The power of the darkness emanating from the bridge nearly overtook Ussej as he stepped through the door, seeing only a lone figure standing at the great window overlooking the battle. It was Darth Brenos, the man who was once called Dexon Kyjar, Jedi Master and a friend of Ussej. The tall, long-haired and dark skinned Jedi Master sensed Ussej’s presence, though he said nothing. The Jedi Knight would be allowed to proceed.

Dexon, known to those close to him as “Dex”, was a native of Haruun Kal. He had been found by a Trandoshan Jedi when he was just a child, forty years earlier. Then, just five years before the start of the war, he was appointed to the Jedi High Council. During his tenure, he grew closer to fellow Jedi Master Lara Jace. They had both grown fond within each other’s hearts and fell in love with one another, one of the first of many forbidden Jedi relationships during the war era.

Everything had seemed perfect to him. When he was with her, Dex felt complete. It was as if nothing in the galaxy could or would be able to tear them apart. He vowed to be with her forever, but then Viea entered his life and things turned horribly array. He could still hear her words from when he and Madet had made their way to Korriban to assassinate her.

You, my dear Dex, can have a hand in ending this war, the war you so despise.

It was at that moment that Viea coaxed the Dark Side out of him, naming him Darth Brenos. When he was sent to Yavin IV on a mission, he came face-to-face with Lara. She could not believe what he had done to himself. She told him that she was pregnant with his child, which led to her own fall from grace when Brenos seduced her with the promise of family. She did not participate much during the war unless it was in defense of their child.

It was partially thanks to Brenos that the war continued on for as long as it did. He was responsible for the deaths of many powerful and prominent Jedi Knights and Masters, some who he trained himself. After leading his own portion of the Sith army against the forces of the Republic and the Jedi, he found himself over the skies of Coruscant. He could only hope that it would allow him to defeat his enemies once and for all.

“Ussej,” Brenos said, nodding as he turned to face him. “You’re still alive, my old friend?”

“Still,” Ussej said, his sarcasm evident, “old friend.”

“Why now,” Brenos asked. “After the Republic has lost, why come for me now?”

“I had hoped to save you,” Ussej said, the sarcasm still evident, “but then I remembered that Dexon Kyjar is already dead. I’ll take the head of Darth Brenos instead.”

“I doubt it,” Brenos said with a grin. “You won’t do it. Ever time you’ve faced a former Jedi, you’ve backed down.”

“That’s a lie and you know it,” Ussej shouted.

“Then why is Ravinos still alive,” Brenos asked, the sarcasm having entered his voice as well.

Ussej said nothing, as he could think of nothing to say. Part of him wanted to rip the Sith Lords skull out of his skin, though the other part knew that the monster was right. Moments earlier, he had been sure of what the future of the battle would hold for himself, Brenos and the Republic. After hearing his words, he was no longer sure.

“Why are you really here,” Brenos asked after a moment of tense silence. “I really can’t believe it’s because you want my head.”

“I wouldn’t want you to think I’m a liar,” Ussej told him. “If Dex is still in there somewhere, tell him I’m sorry.”

In one of the hardest moves Ussej ever had to make, his azure blade came to life above his head in the art of Djem So, waiting for the Sith to make the first move. Though he was fully prepared for battle and to take the life of the Sith Lord, he could not help but feel sorry for whatever part of his friend was still alive. Ussej was caught between his good nature and the devil, not knowing which one to destroy. However, as the Lord of the Sith ignited his green, dual-bladed weapon, Ussej found his answer.

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Stepping back, Ravinos moved to a safer distance and threw his cloak to the ground. He rested his palm upon the hilt of his trusted blade, though he did not remove it from his belt just yet. If the time were to come, he would most certainly use it, though he did not feel like being the instigator of the fight. He would have much rather seen Damien attack him in a fit of anger.

“Some things are inevitable,” Ravinos said. “We meet again, at last. You do prefer it this way, of course; warrior to warrior, without any outside interference.”

“Does slinging our failures in my face bring you a sense of pride,” Damien asked.

“You are the leader of the Jedi Council,” Ravinos reminded him, almost sarcastically as if he was saying that Damien was not fit to be the leader of the order.

“We did what we could,” Damien said, “but you know damn well that even our hands get tied up, just as your hands are still tide directly to Pho Ph’eah. You and your ego may have damned an entire galaxy to destruction.”

“The people will love us,” Ravinos told him. “They’re already questioning your wisdom.”

“And that didn’t start until after you destroyed an entire world,” Damien said bluntly.

Ravinos stopped, an awkward silence being cast around them. He knew that Damien was right, of course, though it was for the better. Ravinos knew full well that the Sith would be able to protect its citizens better than the Jedi and the Republic ever could, and that was what the ongoing battle would prove in the end.

“This war is the last mistake you will ever make,” Ravinos said.

As his crimson blade came to life, he spun the hilt in his hand and ran straight towards the Jedi Master. Damien ignited his own blade and prepared for the clash, but at the last second Ravinos slashed down with both hands and side-stepped to the left, his blade going diagonal and slipping into his grip as he slashed violently from right to left over and over.

Focusing upon each move that the dark one made, Damien concentrated on the Force swirling about and through him. Keeping a somewhat tight grip on the hilt of his blade, he prepared for the fake and bent backwards, forcing himself into a freefall. The left hand moved behind his back, catching him just before he hit the floor as his legs helped hold his weight up. Yet, he did not come out unscathed. The outer robe of his garments was ripped by the crimson energy and seared into his skin, though he did his best to ignore the pain.

Damien let himself fall hard onto the floor. As he landed, he kicked out with his left foot. He wanted desperately to make the Lord of the Sith fall to the ground and beg for mercy, for him to plead for mercy in fear as if he was a twelve year old girl. Though it was unlikely, it gave the Jedi Grandmaster something to hope for, something positive for the battle at hand.

As Ravinos hit the ground, he unleashed a whirlwind of dark energy and sent it towards the Jedi Master. His attacked pressed on, weakening and blinding the Jedi just as was intended. He too, however, felt the effects of using such a powerful attack and felt that he had done what needed to be done. He lowered his hands, the brilliant display of lightning subsiding.

However, Ravinos was not finished quite yet. As Damien lowered his guard, a second barrage of lightning shattered his frame, sending him flying back into the rafters behind him. He tried to move, though it was difficult. As he looked up, he saw nothing but the figure of the great Sith Lord towering over him, looking as if he was a fiery demon that had just emerged from the depths of the underworld that the ancient people of the Republic had believed in.

“We will stop you someday,” Damien said, closing his eyes in preparation for his death.

“You, however, will not be here to see it,” Ravinos chuckled.

Ravinos smirked, not believing the Jedi Master’s words. The Dark Apprentice brought his blade on high above his head, his eyes bleached with madness. What he was preparing to do worried even him, as he knew the Jedi would retaliate fast and hard if their leader was to be killed, but in his mind he was doing what was necessary. He had wanted for so long to murder Damien and he was about to get his first and, perhaps final, chance.

At once, his thunderous blade came crashing down towards the flesh of the Jedi Grandmaster. As it reached his neck, the Dark Apprentice’s comlink beeped and vibrated within his robes. Ravinos scowled at the interruption, but he turned to answer the call regardless.

“This had better be important,” Ravinos shouted.

“It is, my lord,” the voice of Sith Lieutenant Kaan told him. “We’ve received a report from Corellia that someone has stolen the holocron from your chambers in the old Jedi academy. Shall we send in a squadron to intercept?”

“No, Lieutenant,” Ravinos told him. “I’ll deal with this person myself.”

“As you wish, my lord,” Kaan replied as the comlink was closed.

Ravinos turned around and begin to taunt Damien once more, though his words were cut off by the fact that Damien was nowhere to be found. He did not know how the Jedi could have escaped, though he had more important matters to attend to. The information contained in the holocron could very well give the Jedi an unwarranted advantage if it fell into their hands, and he knew that he had to stop it from happening.

“Consider yourself lucky, Jedi,” Ravinos whispered.

As the Dark Apprentice turned away, he headed back towards his own ship. As he made his way towards the Outrider, one truth remained in his mind: he had humiliated Damien Nightblade. For the moment, that truth was enough to satisfy him.

--------------------------

Having been led to the higher levels of one of the nearby skyscrapers by other Jedi Knights, despite his protests, Remer look down upon the battle and saw a sight that horrified him and set waves of guilt throughout his mind. Dozens of missiles rained down from the side all across their position, destroying the lives of numerous Jedi and Sith in the area. The Galactic Senate remained nearly defenseless, leaving the Jedi Master to watch his friends and colleagues perish in the fires.

Not wanting to watch anymore of the battle, Remer looked up and out over the skyline. The buildings were densely packed, the major thoroughfares slicing like deep canyons through the vast metropolis. Nearby were lights and attractions for visiting dignitaries, much like there were in all sections of the unending city. Remer could only hope that, one day, those lights and attractions would be used for Republic dignitaries once again.

“Master Ather,” Kavari called from behind, “dozens of Sith tanks and fighters are moving in on our location. Should I order the remaining men to attack?”

Remer could not even begin to fathom how few men he had left. He could have easily ordered them to attack the incoming Sith, thereby trying to make all of their deaths mean something significant for the battle, but he could not do it. There was nothing they could do and he would not be responsible for the deaths of more of his men. He could not order anyone else to march into their own funerals.

“No,” Remer said. “We don’t have enough men. The battle is lost. Give the retreat order.”

“Aye, sir,” Kavari said, though he could not help but be stunned.

As Kavari walked away, Remer looked out into the distance towards the great pyramid that was the Jedi Temple. It was his castle and his home, the only home he cared to remember. He knew that it was possible that he would never see it again, so he stayed for a few moments to take in its view one last time before he ran off towards the rendezvous coordinates.

-------------------------

Brenos stepped forth, swinging his ironically green blades on high before dropping them in a salute at his opponent. His madness had not yet stolen his sense of honor. Brenos faked and caused Ussej to move in for the attack, though he was too slow. The dark one summoned the Force from the room, draining it like a spawn out of the Corellian Hell. He drank its power, filling his every muscle with the strength of ten ordinary men.

The dark one stood absolute, his stance mimicking that of his opponent’s. However, that quickly changed as he charged onward towards the Jedi Knight, a faceless smile washing across his face as he approached. Without warning, Brenos dipped low and his forward blade punched outward as he released his true attack: a Force shockwave that curled the ground upward like the skin of a ripe fruit.

The intensity of the attack took Ussej by surprise. He believed he had anticipated Brenos’ attack, though he was obviously mistaken. The shockwave collided with his chest, sending him flying backwards through the room only to roughly land on the ground below. He stood up, leaping outwards before landing no more than three meters from the Sith Lord. He swung his blade high, returning the salute given to him earlier. The Jedi Knight had honor, something that would normally escape a powerful Sith Lord. Ussej swung his blade up once more, assuming the high guard.

Brenos watched Ussej do so and immediately switched to the offensive once more as his blade angled awkwardly outward. His blades swung downwards in a blur of green light as he came in, a storm fueled by hatred and desire. Darth Brenos was, as many had said, a monument of hatred and death. He slashed from right to left on high, but at the last second he changed his grip and stabbed forth with his right arm. With his left, a great wave of dark lightning poured out from the tips of his fingers.

Knowing that there was very little he could do, Ussej called upon the Force and struck against the air itself to speed up his movements and spin to the side with the intensity of a full powered repulsor lift. However, he could not avoid having his arm nicked by the wave of hatred. He moved in, his blade clashing over and over again against the dual blade’s of his foe. He jabbed harder, sending the green blades outward and opening the Sith’s guard.

Brenos spun quickly while holding his blade aloft, allowing him to halt the attack. His smile widened and sparks burned within his eyes. He reached out with his right foot to look for solid ground, and once found he slid like a snake across the metal deck plating. His blades came free as he released a sonic scream at his foe, all while swinging his blade in a green blur above his head. Ussej moved in quick, slicing the end of the weapon off to leave Brenos with only one blade.

Ussej leaped into the air, channeling the Force around him to guide his mind and body. He flipped backwards, his blade behind his neck. He clashed with the Sith Lord with the power of a spectacle of fireworks over the trees of Kashyyyk on Life Day, the sparks spreading in all directions.

“Is that all you’ve got,” Ussej asked, grinning.

“You see yourself as a God amongst men,” Brenos shot back, “but when I look into your eyes, all I see is a frightened child. You disappoint me.”

Brenos’ left hand flew outward, releasing a vast reservoir of hatred upon the young Jedi Knight. The columns shook and the ground wept as it was torn from its home. The Force push was unlike anything Ussej had ever felt or seen, ages of hatred and fury funneled into a singular moment of malice. Brenos could feel the beating heart of his foe, beating mere inches from his extended hand. His blade swung unmolested, his commanding presence unstoppable. Victory had raised its head and sung praise as he basked in its glory.

Having committed such a grievous error, Ussej trembled. The power of the blast sent him to the far side of the bridge, but he managed to just barely land on his feet. Ignoring whatever pain that attempted to overtake him, he stood once more in a defensive stance. He stalked towards the Sith Lord, stopping just mere meters away to avoid yet another deadly blow.

“I sense your fear, Dex,” Ussej said.

“It’s not my fear you feel, my young Jedi friend,” Brenos told him with a grin.

Ussej suddenly realized that he was wrong and that it was not Brenos’ fear he felt. It was his own, rising to the surface. He did not know what would happen if he succeed in killing Brenos, nor what would happen if he failed. Either way frightened him, though he had no time to dwell on it. As the Sith Lord stabbed forward, Ussej let out a small chuckle. It was precisely what he wanted the dark one to do. Ussej brought his blade up with one hand to turn the attack slightly, pivoting sideways to further allow the green blade to pass. Still, a line of energy scored across his chest. He bit through the pain, as allowing it to overcome him would not only kill his mind, but fuel the Sith Lord.

Ussej changed the grip on his lightsaber, quickly changing to the deadly form of lightsaber combat that Damien had crafted and perfected before teaching it to Remer and Ussej. Rizen began its graceful dance of death as Ussej twirled his blade with the utmost precision and speed. The movement of the blade was visible only for a moment when Ussej released his restraint on the masterpiece his friend had perfected.

Ussej slid his left foot out, catching the Sith Lord off guard and knocking him to the ground. Before Brenos could stand once again, Ussej’s blade disappeared and turned into what the Human eye would see as a trail of moonlit energy before it was thrust into the Lord of the Sith’s chest. Brenos attempted to block it, but it was far too fast. Brenos lurched forward as the blade was pulled from nearby his heart, his eyes widening.

“Dex,” Ussej said, throwing his own blade to the side as he brought the dark one’s face closer to his own, realizing that he had made a mistake by killing him.

“Beware of love,” Brenos said. “There is a...a taint that comes with it and...if you don’t control it, you...you could turn on those you care about most. I bare the scars...of when that happened to me. Remember...”

“Dex,” Ussej shouted, his former friend’s eyes closing. “Dex!”

Still holding him, Ussej brought him closer, repeating his name over and over again. He tightly hugged the lifeless body against his chest, crying softly. It was his own doing, but he could not help but regret his own actions. After closing the dark one’s eyes, Ussej stood up and looked down upon him. He could not help but think of the void left in Brenos’ family, a family that he had once held dear to his own heart.

“I’m sorry, Lara,” Ussej whispered, though his thought was interrupted as his comlink beeped. “Go ahead.”

“It’s Damien,” Damien said from the surface. “Report.”

“Dex is dead,” Ussej said softly, lowering his head. For a long while, what seemed to be an eternity, there was utter silence. Neither he nor Damien said a word to one another. Both sensed the others grief and both felt the others remorse. In the end, however, they knew that there was simply nothing they could do about it.

“I grieve as well,” Damien said, “but we have bigger problems to worry about. Ravinos escaped after he received word that someone broke into his chambers at the old Jedi academy on Corellia.”

“Laili,” Ussej said, realizing that she had not heeded his warnings.

“That’s my guess too,” Damien said. “She knows you, so we need you to follow Ravinos to Corellia and make sure nothing happens to her. When you’re done, get to Onderon.”

“Why not back here,” Ussej asked.

“We just gave the retreat order,” Damien told him, Ussej’s face going white and numb. “Viea’s on the HoloNet right now declaring herself empress and branding us traitors. We’ll fill you in later, but for now you have a job to do.

“Understood,” Ussej said, placing his comlink back into his robes as he made his way off the abandoned bridge.

--------------------------------

Laili and Mathias jumped out of the way as the first blast made their way towards them. Missing their targets, they deflected off of the wall and flew right back into their parent turret with enough force and energy to destroy it. Another turret turned towards them, forcing them to move out of the way once again. As the third one came around, however, they knew that they would have to fight back.

Pushing over a large display case, they crouched behind it and fired a group of shots towards the turrets, though when they missed they were forced to duck down once again. Shots rang out from all parts of the room, destroying turrets and ricocheting off of the walls. Sweat on Laili’s brow flowed out faster, as she feared that she would never be able to save her brother after such a situation. However, her thoughts changed as Mathias shot the controls to the turrets, shutting them off momentarily.

When they stood back up, however, they were quickly met with an automated repair system and the turrets started to come back to life. They quickly dove through the door and into the hallway as far as they could to avoid being hit by the bolts of red energy. Laili shot up from the ground and made her way to the nearest computer console, closing the doors to the chamber.

As it closed behind her, she sighed and wiped the seat off of her brow. Mathias was clearly pleased at their survival, though it was more for the fact that they had outsmarted the building’s defenses, although they could both still hear the sounds of energy bolts ricocheting off of the walls on the other side of the door. They both made their way around the corner once more, running quickly down the steps towards Mathias’ ship.

As Mathias ran up the ramp to his ship, Laili stood frozen on the ground and took in everything that had happened. She looked down upon the sacred holocron, knowing that what was inside of it could potentially save her brother and, perhaps, end the war earlier than expected. It was entirely possible, though, that the Jedi already knew what was contained inside of it but did not want any other power-seekers to find it. It was a wise move, in her opinion.

“Hurry up, pretty lady,” Mathias shouted as he looked at her from the top of the ramp. “I haven’t got all day here.”

“I’m staying,” Laili told him. “I need to pay my respects.”

“Suit yourself,” he said.

Before she even had a chance to thank the mercenary, the ramp ascended back up into the ship and the hatch closed behind it. Within moments, the ship roared to life. Laili smiled, turning away before the vessel lifted off and headed towards the rolling hills that overlooked the city of Coronet. She turned back one final time and watched as Mathias and the Nightsider flew off into the evening sky. Turning back towards the hills, she looked out at the clear sky as the sun set just below the horizon.

 

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VaderLVR64  31285 posts
Title: Manager Emeritus
 Registered: Feb '04
48874_Anakin Vader (71809)
Date Posted: 9/26/07 7:10am Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Updated 9/25/07
Wow! Every chapter is just packed with so much!

applause

 

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Team Eric: Because undead never looked so good.
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jedimasterbac  6373 posts
Title: CT and Fan Design Manager
 Registered: Jun '04
24180_Obi-Wan Art
Date Posted: 10/19/07 9:41am Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Updated 9/25/07
Chapter Five
A HARSH REUNION

The capital city of Corellia had been referred to many times as the “Jewel of Corellia”, and Laili agreed with the assessment. Coronet had been her one and only home ever since she was born, and she thought very highly of it. Though it was no Coruscant, nothing could compare to be splendor and the beauty of the planet’s jewel. Many cities tried, though all of them failed. At least that was the opinion that Laili held of the attempts.

Unlike the temperate, rolling hills, thick forests, lush farmland, golden beaches and large seas that dominated the majority of the planet, the capital was a bustling urban metropolis located on the coast of the southernmost continent. Though technologically advanced, it had some of the most beautiful architecture a historian or even a simple traveler could fine. However, the technology still paled in comparison to the whole of Coruscant.

After resting for the night in a park, Laili walked along one of its outermost paths overlooking the city. Despite having the technology to her one side, on her other she watched as the sun rose over the rolling hills and temperate landscapes. She had seen very few things in life that would be a fair comparison with a Corellian sunrise, and she assumed that she would see even fewer as her life went on.

As she made her way deeper into the park, she noticed the small graveyard a few meters to her left. She changed directions, heading towards it. Being home, even for such a short time, made her feel the need to visit the resting place of her parents and grandparents. She knew full well that, given her current mission, it could have been the last time she would be able to do so.

Overhead, Sith starfighters began their patrols. It was odd for tat time of the day, and Laili knew that. She looked from side to side, forward and backwards, to make sure that she was not being watched. Despite not seeing anyone, she knew that she could not spot every threat that could surround her.

Sith starfighters flying over her planet was something that she was never able to get used to or accept. When Invidius took Centerpoint Station, the citizens of the planet feared that the station would be used against them as a weapon of mass destruction. However, the Jedi had retaken the station, though they did not even try to reclaim the planet it orbited. It was as if they were afraid, something she always assumed was unbecoming of the Jedi Order.

As she knelt down beside the graves of her family members, she laid two roses down upon each one. One rose was from her, while the other was given to them in the name of her brother. She had never had a chance to meet her parents, and all she had was a picture inside of a locket that her grandmother had given her when she was just a child. When she would open it, a hologram showed her parents in each other’s embrace.

The holo-image always brought a smile to Laili’s face, as the love the two of them seemed to have for each other was like nothing she had ever seen. A tear slowly slid its way down her cheek as the picture changed to that of her grandparents smiling back at her. She had promised them on their deathbeds that she would see out her brother and bring him home.

“I haven’t forgotten my promise,” she said, brushing the tears from her eyes. “I’ll bring him home. I swear it.”

--------------------

In the pilot’s seat aboard the Outrider, Ravinos constantly thought about the report that he had been given about someone entering his old chambers and stealing his holocron. It was a thought that worried him immensely, and he rarely found himself worrying about anything. That fact worried him more than anything else.

If they find out about the medallion, he thought to himself, though he knew it was better not to complete the thought. The reports that he had been sent since leaving Coruscant indicated that the person, who was supposedly a young woman, had asked about entry into the Rendar Family Cemetery and was on her way there. The only conclusion he could come to was that she was a friend of the family, though even if she was she had no business visiting the graves of his loved ones.

His thoughts were interrupted when his ship’s warning lights began flashing, alerting him that he it was preparing to exit the hyperspace route over his homeworld. So much had happened since the day he had sought out the Dark Lordess and became on of her subjects, the sacrifice he made to save his home planet. He had destroyed a planet and kill countless innocents, though he still would not allow anything to happen to Corellia.

Despite the sacrifice, becoming twisted with hatred felt almost liberating to him. He no longer had to follow a code as if it was the letter of the law or orders from anyone else, save for the newly crowned empress. He obeyed his mistress only because she had spared one of the few things he cherished in the universe, though he did not enjoy thinking about it. Putting his past behind him, he brought the ship out of hyperspace and into the atmosphere.

Within the minutes, the small yet converted cargo-ship touched down in the main space port in Coronet. The blue engines at the rear of the vessel slowly calmed until they were fully deactivated and the heat shields to prevent scorch marks dissipated. The small and narrow cargo ship had been his main source of comfort since he had become one with darkness and he would never give it up.

As he stepped off of the vessel, Ravinos turned and looked at his pride and joy and could not help but crack a smile. She had seen him through on many adventures before and during the war and he could not think of a more suitable vessel to carry him throughout the cosmos, despite it being an aging cargo ship. Turing back towards the exit of the docks, he made his way to the port master, his contact in Corellia, to receive the latest updates. The Dark Apprentice rolled his eyes as he listened to the fat ball that called himself a professional snored louder than any Human should have snored. Ravinos slammed his fist onto the desk, startling the man out of his sleep.

“Lord Ravinos,” the startled man said, scrambling to his feet to salute. “I apologize, my lord.”

“Do not let it happen again,” Ravinos said calmly, as he was in too great a hurry to be angry. “Report.”

“The girl is in the cemetery now, my lord,” the port master said. “We have a speeder prepared for you.”

Ravinos nodded, a gesture that the port master understood to be the generally unspoken Sith gratitude. As the dark one rounded a corner, he found the speeder waiting for him. It was much like one he had when he was younger, though a few years more advanced. Regardless, he did not care how advanced it was so long as it got him to the cemetery. He stepped in and carefully ignited the engine. As he gently stroked the controls, feeling at ease in a speeder on his own world, the small and battered speeder at first lurched backwards before speeding off into the distance.

The port master breathed a sigh of relief, realizing that he had gotten off easily. Most men that angered Ravinos did not live long after their offense, though he had gotten off only with a warning. Not only was it just a warning to him, but it seemed to be one that was given in passing, even one that held no weight. Regardless of Ravinos’ reasons, the port master knew that he could not risk irritating the empress’ apprentice again.

--------------------

Laili kissed the tips of her two fingers and kneeled down, touching her fingers to the graves of her loves ones before turning back towards the city. She kept her pace slow and her head remained lower in solemn respect. Visiting the graves of her loved ones filled her with a sense of safety and great comfort, as it always reminded her that her family was watching over her and her brother. She could not help but feel that her family would be disappointed about her inability to rescue Kit, though.

Some people would have been too nervous or even afraid to visit the graves of their loved ones, but she found the strength of their spirits to be soothing. It was, after all, the eve of the death of her grandparents, one of the reasons why she had chosen to break into the Jedi academy when she did. She had returned home every year on the same day to pay her respects, the day always helping her to remain focused. It served as a reminder as to where her life began.

As she made her way across the path towards the gates, she hesitated. A sudden chill slowly crept its way down her spine. Rather than a tingle, it felt almost painful to her. She had felt nothing like it before, which furthered her worry. She turned around, looking back throughout the cemetery to see if she was being watched, but the chill grew stronger and colder to a point where it felt as if it would freeze her spine.

She was too smart to think that such a feeling was merely a natural occurrence and a coincidence. Possible courses of actions flew through her mind, as did the names of those who could be near her who would want to cause her some form of harm. It could have been any number of people, but in her heart she knew who it was. A dark, cold feeling near the graves of her family could only mean that one person was nearby: her brother.

As she made her way closer to the gate, she stepped back as Ravinos’ speeder flew through it and stopped just beside her. She had not expected to see him so soon, especially at the graves of their family during a battle on the capital world. As he stepped out, she felt a sudden sense of dread and regret for trying to find him so soon as she was not prepared to face him, and she could only assume that he was not prepared to hear the truth.

The dark one could feel the dread surging through the body of the young blonde girl. He would have normally killed almost instantly for such a trespass, but something about her intrigued him. It was almost as if there was something familiar about her, or at least her presence. As he approached her, he was taken aback by their strong resemblance to one another. He knew he did not have any siblings, so he could not help but assume that she was a long-lost cousin. It was the only thing that could have explained why she was at the grave of his grandparents.

“Who are you,” Ravinos asked.

The bluntness of his word and the cold, half-dead stare in his eye sent a brief wave of terror through Laili’s bones. Her eyes were wide with shock and fear, though she quickly regained as much of her composure as she could. She had never so much as allowed mercenaries and bounty hunters to see her fear, so she certainly would not allow herself to show it in front of her own brother. Despite hiding her fear, her eyes searched his features as she saw the resemblance to her parents, especially her father.

“I asked you a question,” Ravinos said as he moved in closer, prompting Laili to instinctively back away from him.

Her blue eyes glittered back at him and she tried her best to show her soul through them. Her eyes begged him to sense who she was, as it pained her that she knew who he was but he could not say the same about her. They had both made their names through smuggling and, perhaps, he had heard of her. However, the angered look in his eyes made her doubt that. Her hope became a false one and as she saw who he truly was, as she sensed the unspeakable evil within him, her hope of saving him also began to diminish. Despite that, she found her voice, knowing that she had to press on.

“Laili,” she said, “Laili Jeyna Rendar.”

The anger within the dark one grew as she mentioned her name. He could not believe that someone would insult the legacy of Jeyna Rendar in such a manner. He wanted desperately to reach for his lightsaber, but something did not allow him to. It was a curious sensation, as his ruthlessness and sheer brutality seemed to slip away in the presence of the woman. The merciful emotions he showed left a foul taste in his mouth.

“The Rendar family no longer exists,” Ravinos said. “Its last member died a year ago on Pho Ph’eah.”

“No,” Laili said. “Kit Corwin Rendar is not dead.”

“How dare you,” Ravinos said as he backhanded her across the face. “That man is dead, and you are not Rendar.”

“Corwin and Jeyna Rendar were my parents,” Laili said as she rubbed her bruised cheek.

Ravinos could not help but be dumbfounded by her statement. He could not believe that she was his sister, as he had been told that he was the last of the Rendar family. He never remembered his mother being pregnant and he certainly did not remember having a sibling before his parents were killed. Her story seemed unlikely, yet there was something odd about her. Her aura and her appearance spoke to him as if he should have known her.

“Rendar’s parents had no other children,” Ravinos told her.

“They died in a speeder accident when you were just a boy,” she told him calmly. “I was born prematurely that day.”

Her eyes began to water with tears as she kept contact with his eyes. Her hand reached out as she tried to take his. Though her actions were bold and potentially foolish, she could not be afraid. She had to know the truth, no matter what the cost. She knew that her brother still lived deep down inside the persona of evil that stood before her. Because of that, she could not give up her crusade.

“You ran away before Grandma and Grandpa got the news of my survival,” she continued. “If the paramedics hadn’t gotten to the crash so quickly, I would have been dead.”

“Why would no one have told me this,” Ravinos asked.

“They kept searching for you after you ran away,” she told him. “I’m continuing the search. I promised our grandparents on their deathbeds that I would find you and bring you home as the man you were, the man who joined the Sith for whatever reason.”

Kit had run away from home before their grandparents received and could tell him the news of Laili’s survival, so she understood that he was unable to remember her or even know her, for that matter. If the paramedics hadn’t gotten there in time, she would have died as well and she would never have know her brother. Their grandparents had kept searching for him after he left and she had continued the search. Despite her promise to her grandparents, she could not help but feel some regret for coming face to face with him so soon.

“If you think I joined because I was hungry for power,” he shouted, “then you are so far from the truth. I spared Corellia from destruction by joining Viea.”

He could still remember that day as if it had happened five minutes earlier. When he received the cryptic message that Corellia was in jeopardy, he brought it before the Jedi Council. To his surprise, they did nothing. They felt that the cryptic message was not enough evidence to divert the entire fleet to Corellia, as it could have been a trap. Though he knew he would have made the same decision if it was any other world, he could not allow himself to sit back and watch if and when the time came when Corellia was attacked. It was at that moment that he took the safety of his homeworld into his own hands.

Disguising himself as a drifter, he made his way to Korriban and infiltrated the Obsidian Throne of the Dark Lordess. As he confronted her, he could feel his resolve weakening from the absolute darkness that blanketed the area. Viea bested him, but she spared his life. She promised that if he was to join the Sith and become her apprentice, Corellia would be spared. He accepted her deal and the Dark Lordess lived up to her own end of the bargain. When that happened, she dubbed him Darth Ravinos.

For some weeks, he kept up the façade of being a Jedi Master in order to inflict a heavy blow to the Republic and the image of the Jedi. He formulated the plot for destroying the technological centers on Pho Ph’eah and carried it out flawlessly. The only bump in the road was following the attack when Ussej Padric Bac hinted that he knew there was no Sith on the planet. Ravinos could not find the words to respond to his old friend and it made him feel weak. It was an insult to his superiority and it haunted him for some time.

When the attack was over, he was truly a Lord of the Sith, one who lived only to serve his mistress and help her dominate the galaxy until he seized the throne for himself. He had stayed true to the root of his name and became a raven on the galaxy, preying on those loyal to the Republic and the Jedi and plundering the resources of all those that opposed him. He voraciously fed on their fear and enjoyed every moment of it.

He had never felt hesitance during his time as a Lord of the Sith until he first saw the girl who claimed to be his sister. Anyone else would have been dead almost instantly, but it was as if something was preventing him from rectifying the grave insult to his family name. He pried into her mind, seeing her thoughts and realizing how much she cared for him. He could not help but think that she truly was his sister. It seemed impossible, as his grandparents had never told him that his mother was pregnant.

Laili watched as he contemplated what she assumed was the past, their present conversation and possible future encounters between them. Though she had told herself that she had to stay calm and suppress her fear, the drum beats of her heart raced wildly against her breast as she slowly tried to move in closer. She started to reach out her hand, but she pulled it back. Any sudden movements could provoke him, and that is exactly what she hoped to avoid.

“Your words prove that there is still good in you,” she told him. “You risked everything to save the innocent. That wasn’t the act of a Sith. It was the act of a Jedi.”

“It was a desperate action,” he told her, “not worthy of either faction.”

“It wasn’t desperate,” she told him. “It was noble. You’re being fed lies by your empress and I can’t blame you for it. Your heart was broken too. I know what happened to Aletra. Would she have wanted you to turn away from the man you were?”

The dark one was outraged at her remark, speaking of the one that he had loved those years ago. If there was one thing that her disappearance had proved, it was that sending a loved one on a dangerous mission was one of the hardest things anyone could do in life. She was obviously the most equipped to handle the possible Sith threat on Yavin IV, which is why he supported her when she requested the mission. However, he did nothing but allow her to fly into her own oblivion. If he was to ever find love again, he would never make that mistake. It was the regret that fueled his anger with Laili’s comment, as he could not believe that anyone would be so foolish as to mention her in front of him.

“How dare you speak to me of Aletra,” Ravinos screamed. “You know nothing of what happened with her.”

“You’re a Jedi,” she said as she stepped in, placing a comforting hand on his arm. “She would want you to be one still.”

“What I am, Laili,” Ravinos said, brushing off her arm, “is a Lord of the Sith. I am one of the most feared men in the galaxy. There is no way that you could feel so liberated...”

He stopped mid-sentence, realizing that if she was his sister then the darkness was in her blood as well. He had been born to conquer and slaughter, so there was a chance that she was as well. Only time would tell, but if she truly wanted to be with him as a family, assuming she was family, then there was only one way that would happen. It did not involve him turning back to the light.

“...unless you join me.”

The statement was the one thing that Laili hoped she would not have to hear. She knew she could not follow the path of darkness like her brother had, yet she feared him seeing her as a hypocrite. She had said that she wanted to save him, to be with him as brothers and sisters should be as family, yet if she refused to join him it was possible that he would see it as a contradiction of her promises. She knew it was not, of course, but her brother’s twisted mind most certainly did not operate the same way her own mind did.

“I can’t join you,” Laili said, “but I can’t give up on you either, even if I have to die. I will free you from your witched slave holder.”

Just saying such words pained her, as she could not bear to imagine the site of her brother standing beside the Dark Lordess as her own personal lap dog. She would never give up on him and she would never forget how proud her grandparents were when they learned that he had become a Jedi Master. They said it often. Their parents would have been proud as well. Yet, as a Lord of the Sith, he called himself a liberated man. It was a painful Sith deception, and she would help him to see past the lies of the empire.

“I am no slave,” Ravinos told her. “I follow willingly, without deception. The only deception I ever followed was that of the Jedi.”

Her heart finally shattered into a million pieces, as she could see just how far the corruption had penetrated his soul. It was unbearable and she could not take it any longer. She looked over towards his speeder before looking back to him, staring right into his eyes. All she knew was that she had to get away from him, even if it meant injury to herself.

“You won’t win this,” she said.

In a sudden and foolish move, she pulled out a concussion grenade and threw it off to the side in a futile attempt to distract the dark one. As he watched it, she quickly started to run towards his speeder. However, Ravinos recognized the diversion and called upon the Force to channel an invisible wave of energy and unleashed it towards the grenade. It flew off into the sky and exploded meters above the ground, causing no damage.

As he realized what had happened, he turned and sped up his movements until he was in front of her. With a flick of the wrist, Laili found herself unable to move. She told her brain that she wanted to run, yet her body did not comply with the commands. Ravinos had caught her and left her within a stasis created by the Force itself.

“You’re not going anywhere,” Ravinos said.

Ravinos did not even need the Force to see that she was petrified. It was written all across her face, in every pore and every dimple. The only way she could be released was if she were to join him, and the dark one sensed that she knew that. Ravinos was not one to take prisoners, but rather to kill those he captured outright. She was lucky that Ravinos believed that they were somehow related, as anyone else would have been dead.

Laili could not help but regret all that she had done. Had she simply listened to Ussej’s advice, had she simply waited until the war was over, she would not have been in such a nightmare. Her brother was infinitely more powerful and more skilled than she was, so she did not know any way of escaping him short of finding a way to alter time or teleport herself off of the planet. And yet, despite her fear, she still remained resolute. She would find a way to truly liberate her brother.

The dark one circled in front of her, watching her emotions writing themselves all across her face. He had allowed her head to move about so she could still respond and breathe, though that was the extent of her movement. He smiled as he she tried to calm her nerves, knowing it was futile. Her eyes closed softly as she tried to steady her breathing. When the blue eyes flashed open once again, she waited for him to stand right in front of her before speaking so she could look him straight in the eye.

“Do what you want,” she told him, “but I’m not joining you.”

Ravinos smiled. Her words did not even warrant a response. Such a response would only be futile and redundant, and he did not wish to repeat himself. Laili, however, felt it was something different that kept him from responding. She felt as if there was a conflict within him, believing that he did not know how to handle the situation. Though her fear was written across her face, his torment was written across his. He tried to hide his past but, deep down, good remained. If she was wrong, she knew she would have been dead. All she could hope for was for him to break free of his metaphorical chains.

On the far side of the cemetery, a lone and shadowy figure made its way towards them. The shadow from his cloak’s hood was all that covered his face as he approached, though he attempted to mask his presence in the Force to the best of his abilities. The lone warrior knew that it was dangerous to have followed the Lord of the Sith, but he knew that he had to stop him. As he stopped at the gates, he looked in only to find Laili trapped within what he could only surmise was a stasis field.

Ravinos’ eyes veered off to the side as he sensed the familiar presence. It was a Jedi to be sure, and he knew it not because of the lightsaber showing from beneath the cloak but from the mere presence of the person. He could not put his finger on who it was exactly, as the Jedi was obviously somewhat skilled at masking his presence within the Force, but he knew that he had encountered the person before.

“Show yourself, Jedi,” Ravinos shouted.

The figure threw back his hood, revealing himself to be Ussej. Laili was stunned to see that Ussej had come for her, considering that she blatantly defied his advice. Despite their disagreement, she could sense that he was there to save her and, for the first time, she felt a glimmer of hope. It was as if she would actually be able to get out of the situation alive, and possible physically unhurt.

Ravinos, like his potential sister, was also stunned to see Ussej standing before them. They had not seen each other since Ussej left the flagship orbiting Pho Ph’eah, and he did not imagine that the tormented and conflicted Jedi would ever desire to put himself into a situation where they would have to confront one another again. It was a welcome surprise, as Ravinos had desired to rid the galaxy of his former friend for some time, but it was a surprise nonetheless.

“I suppose you’re the one that told her about the holocron,” Ravinos asked.

“I didn’t even know it was still on the planet,” Ussej told him. “I just assumed you took it and kept looking.”

“I see,” Ravinos said, sensing that Ussej was, in fact, telling the truth. “Well, as wonderful as it is that you’re here, the lady and I have some catching up to do.”

Ravinos thrust his hand forward, calling upon the powers of the Force’s darkness around him. His hand subtly twisted again and again at the wrist, creating a whirlwind of Force energy that would be used against the young Jedi Knight. When the moment was right, Ravinos pulled the whirlwind back in an attempt to pull Ussej towards him and place him in another, stronger stasis field. Ussej, however, resisted and made it far more difficult than the dark one had anticipated. Two years ago, he would have likely succeeded, but it was obvious to him that Ussej had grown in strength and power.

Laili watched as her brother assaulted Ussej, though it was clear that they were evenly matched in the small skirmish. She could not help but fear for Ussej’s life, as it was her fault that he found himself in such a situation to begin with. Concentrating with all of her might, she fought back against the Force stasis field, trying to break free. Unknowingly, she herself used the Force in her effort.

As the stasis collapsed, Laili ran towards Ussej to block the Sith Lord’s attack. She knew the risk of trapped within another stasis was great, but her conscious could not afford anything happening to Ussej. She watched as Ravinos appeared stunned that she had freed herself. The dark one ceased his attack, not wanting to hit her again as Ussej brought her into his arms for protection.

“I can’t believe you,” Laili shouted to her brother. “You’re so twisted by Viea’s lies that you don’t even know right from wrong.”

Ussej was taken aback at Laili’s forcefulness towards the Sith Lord, though he could not blame her. He had been ruining her life, even without knowing it. Not wanting to take another chance at either of them getting hurt, Ussej pulled her behind him and extended his hand, calling upon the Force’s power to create his own whirlwind. Unlike the dark one, however, he thrust it forward and sent the surprised Sith Lord flying through the head stones behind him.

Ussej grabbed Laili by the hand and ran towards the dark one’s speeder, not even looking behind them to see if Ravinos had followed them. As they jumped into the vehicle, the speeder roared to life and shot into the distance. After collecting himself once more, Ravinos watched as they sped away. He was momentarily distracted by the blood trickling down from the gash on his forehead, though he looked back up just long enough to see them disappear on the horizon.

“Run, Jedi,” Ravinos whispered. “You’re only prolonging the inevitable.”

 

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VaderLVR64  31285 posts
Title: Manager Emeritus
 Registered: Feb '04
48874_Anakin Vader (71809)
Date Posted: 10/30/07 6:10am Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Updated 10/19/07
Yet another incredible update!

“I can’t believe you,” Laili shouted to her brother. “You’re so twisted by Viea’s lies that you don’t even know right from wrong.”

Ussej was taken aback at Laili’s forcefulness towards the Sith Lord, though he could not blame her. He had been ruining her life, even without knowing it. Not wanting to take another chance at either of them getting hurt, Ussej pulled her behind him and extended his hand, calling upon the Force’s power to create his own whirlwind. Unlike the dark one, however, he thrust it forward and sent the surprised Sith Lord flying through the head stones behind him.

Ussej grabbed Laili by the hand and ran towards the dark one’s speeder, not even looking behind them to see if Ravinos had followed them. As they jumped into the vehicle, the speeder roared to life and shot into the distance. After collecting himself once more, Ravinos watched as they sped away. He was momentarily distracted by the blood trickling down from the gash on his forehead, though he looked back up just long enough to see them disappear on the horizon. “Run, Jedi,” Ravinos whispered. “You’re only prolonging the inevitable.”


Looking forward to more! applause

 

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jedimasterbac  6373 posts
Title: CT and Fan Design Manager
 Registered: Jun '04
24180_Obi-Wan Art
Date Posted: 11/1/07 2:55pm Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Updated 10/19/07
Chapter Six
SAARAI-KAAR

Ussej tapped his foot over and over as he sat beside the inactive view-screen, clearly becoming more and more impatient as the minutes went by. If there was one thing that he had always hated, it was waiting for the Jedi Council to come to their senses and actually make a decision. Though each position on the Jedi Council was important in its own unique way and each member was essentially equal to the other, he always wished that Damien, Remer and Boreguard would try to pull rank and let the council realize that they had a job to do. The galaxy was at war and the Republic faced extinction day after day, night after night and week after week, yet the seemingly incompetent Jedi Council could never manage to get its act together. It was endless and Ussej could not stand it. The ignorance of those around him did not help the situation.

In the beginning of the war, when he and the Jedi team had followed the Sith’s flow of technology from the Uvena System and discovered that they had amassed a far bigger force than anyone had expected, being a Jedi during a time of war seemed almost exciting to him and others, though they never would have admitted it. He was a defender of the peace at heart and he thought any chance to fulfill that mandate would be an adventure, but watching young men and women head into battle from his pulpit was heart-wrenching. The Sith had destroyed so much with so little remorse for their actions. It disgusted him.

At the end of every week, the Jedi Council compiled a causality report saying how many Republic soldiers and how many Jedi had been killed in the days before. Many Jedi flocked to see the reports, but he did not want to know anything about them. Every time he saw that soldiers had died in combat, he knew that the souls of many more had died with them. There were heartbroken widows and widowers, grieving parents and siblings and children whose lives had been shattered that went along with each fallen soldier. It was too much for him to bear, and the ignorance of those around him, including members of the council, angered him to no end.

When Kit had first presented the plan for the bombing of Pho Ph’eah, Ussej thought that it would be a new beginning for the joint Republic and Jedi war effort against the Sith. It was for that reason, aside from the fact that they were friends, that the betrayal of Kit Corwin Rendar and the betrayal of Dexon Kyjar soon after affected him so much. Despite the regrouping at Ossus and the retaking of Centerpoint Station, the war had seen one wrong turn after the other. He did not know if the blame should have been pointed at the Jedi Council, the Galactic Senate or both. Either way, the ineffectiveness of the two bodies horrified him.

Snapping him out of his reflection on the past was the humming of the view-screen coming to life. As he stood up, he brushed off his robes and approached the screen just as an image of the Jedi Council appeared on it. He had not been told where the Jedi Council had regrouped after retreating Coruscant, but he knew that some members of the Jedi Council would be traveling to his location soon after the transmission was over.

The only member of the council to stand up from their chair was Damien. The tall, nearly middle-aged Jedi Grandmaster stepped into the center of the chamber that the council had located itself in and looked directly into what form of image transmitter was in use. Damien smiled, clearly trying to set a relaxed mood, though that made Ussej even more nervous about what he would say. Generally when Damien smiled in a tense situation, the outcome was not what Ussej had desired.

“Ussej,” Damien said, “we have considered your proposal. Laili will not be trained.”

“I beg your pardon,” Ussej asked, surprised at the revelation despite recognizing that the odds had been against him. “She’s a Rendar. Who knows how much of an asset she could be?”

“She’s far too old to begin training,” Damien said, “and her obsession with finding Ravinos is too big a liability for us.”

“Besides,” Jedi Master Anakin Lishto said from the side, “she’s a smuggler. Who knows how many laws she’s broken?”

Even though they were separated by countless light years, Ussej could almost detect a hint of joy in the Jedi Master’s words. Ussej and Anakin had never liked one another and were always at odds over how the Jedi Order should have worked. Ussej could only imagine how happy Anakin was to deny the proposal, despite the great benefits that accepting the proposal could have brought to the Jedi and the entire war effort.

“She smuggled for the Republic,” Ussej said. “Who knows how many times she’s saved our people from starving or running out of supplies?”

“That doesn’t mean she’s sworn an oath to king and country,” Anakin replied.

Ussej wanted nothing more than to throw his arms up into the air and tell the Jedi Council what he had wanted to tell them for a long time. He did not know if they were rejecting the proposal out of fear or if they were doing it to try to anger him, but he knew full well that what they were doing was not in the interest of the Republic. Turning away for a moment, Ussej silently counted to ten to calm himself down. Had he not, he more than likely would have given the Jedi Council a piece of his very tormented mind.

“I’m sorry,” Ussej said, “but this is ridiculous. She’s the only one who could get close enough to Ravinos without being killed. She could be used to redeem him. It’s our only hope in bringing down a huge part of the Sith war effort.”

Damien turned back to the other members of the Jedi Council and they conferred with one another for a few brief moments. Ussej tried to listen to what they were saying, but the speakers on the other end had clearly been turned off as their words were inaudible. When Damien finally turned back, Ussej sensed that they may have changed their minds. However, something still did not feel right to him.

“Alright,” Damien said. “You can train her, but on one condition. When she is a Jedi Knight, you are to kill Darth Ravinos after she gets you close to him.”

“Have you lost your minds,” Ussej shouted. “How could you order me to kill one of our Jedi Masters? I promised Laili that I would help save her brother, not kill him.”

Damien started to roll his eyes and sigh at Ussej’s brief outburst, but he quickly caught and stopped himself from doing so. He knew Ussej better than most, so he knew full well, unlike Anakin, that provoking the Jedi Knight was not in anyone’s best interest. He knew how dangerous and unpredictable Ussej had become after Pho Ph’eah, as well as Dexon’s betrayal. It changed him for the worse, making him as close to unstable as he could get without going over the edge. In Damien’s mind, Ussej was unable to trust anyone but himself.

“We act in the best interest of the Republic,” Damien said, “not the best interest of a smuggler. You have to understand this. Our orders stand.”

“This isn’t the way of the Jedi, Damien,” Ussej shouted. “You know that.”

Before Damien could respond, the other members of the Jedi Council ended the transmission. Ussej pounded his foot into the marble floor as the view-screen faded away, knowing he had just been put into one of the most difficult situations of his life. What bothered him the most, however, was that he could not make up his mind as to which course of action he would take against Darth Ravinos: death or redemption?

Stepping out of the chambers, Ussej turned a corner and walked down the hall to the office he had been given as the Watchman of Onderon in the underground Jedi enclave. The large, oval shape gave it an authoritative feel and the security within it was state of the art. The room was not even included in any blueprints for the facility, which gave him an added sense of comfort. Any added security was necessary security in his mind, as he never knew when the Sith would find out about the hidden enclave and exploit the order’s obvious disadvantage.

Pulling the small shades on the top of the wall open to reveal the warmth of the bright sunlight, he sat at his desk and turned to face the small window. Looking up into the streets of Iziz, he could not help but think about how the city had always been somewhat of a mystery to him. The planet had only recently become more important in the conflicts of the galaxy, yet it was still relatively primitive. Compared to the never-ending city of Coruscant, Iziz seemed to have devolved into a more primitive state, almost as if it had been a town from thousands of years earlier.

Like a great number of civilizations, the one of Iziz was forged through war. Over a thousand years before the Great Territorial War, Freedon Nadd had conquered the planet and set up a government based upon the Dark Side of the Force. These Naddists set into motion that began the Best Riders civilization and the Beast Wars themselves, those conflicts being one of the earliest conflicts of the Great Sith War. It wasn’t until nearly five hundred years later that the Beast Riders and the Onderonians officially unified, thus becoming what Ussej knew to be Onderon and its sole city, Iziz. The civilization that it created, though, was certainly an interesting one. As Arca Jeth, one of the former Jedi Watchman of Onderon, had said only fifty years earlier, “some say that war is the beginning of civilization. On Onderon, this was certainly the case, though it was a civilization that took a very peculiar form”.

Iziz had been built with very high walls to keep the dangerous native beasts away from the populous. Turret towers that had been built during the conflicts with the Beast Riders defended the city, as the walls and the streets were lined with dozens of them. In the streets, one could find numerous different shops with numerous different items for sale, including more domesticated beasts caged within the streets. All of it was a mystery for Ussej, which made the time he would spend on the planet all the more intriguing and worthwhile.

However, his recent appointment as the Watchman of Onderon certainly didn’t come without its share of downsides. As he looked down upon his desk, he could not help but frown at the stack of paperwork that had been piled on it. No one in the galaxy saw the boring side of a leader within the Jedi Order, as most simply assumed that the higher up the hierarchal chain one climbed the more adventure and excitement there would be for them. From what Ussej had seen thus far, nothing could have been further from the truth.

Pulling out a pen, he began working on filling out his first official report for his first day as Watchman. Naturally, nothing had happened, but that didn’t keep him from worrying. Well before she had become Darth Viea, and even before she had been put in cryogenic freezing for thousands of years, Adena Qel-Droma had been a watchman of the planet. No one knew what she had hidden on the world or if she would want to obliterate just to show how unmerciful she truly was. Either way, Onderon had been on high alert for some time.

He looked up as he heard the sound of his door sliding open, interrupting him from his work. He expected one of the other Jedi that had arrived with him such as Kavari Antrell to step through his door with another stack of redundant paperwork, so it surprised him to see Laili walking towards him. He simply watched as she made her way towards him, as he was still someone frustrated that he had to abandon the Jedi during their retreat from Coruscant in order to save her from a fate that he warned her would come. However, he could not stay angry at her for long.

The four times he had met up with her prior to their arrival on Onderon, starting on Trandosha and ending on Corellia, she had certainly been one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen. However, as he stopped in front of his desk, he knew that none of those times compared to what he was looking at. Her blue eyes were like nothing he had ever seen before and her long, blonde hair reflected the sunlight beautifully. Had this moment happened a year earlier, he never would have thought about her in such a way, but after Pho Ph’eah and watching Dexon become a Lord of the Sith, he knew the Jedi Code was broken. As he looked into her eyes, his oath to it meant nothing to him.

“Please,” Ussej said, pointing to one of the chairs in front of his desk as he sat back down behind it, “take a seat.”

She nodded and sat down, but at first she didn’t respond. The reality of what had happened had only just begun to hit her hard. Her brother truly was a changed man, but she still believed that he could be saved. Her eyes rose once again to look at Ussej, only to see him focusing on her. She could tell that he had feelings for her, and she knew she had brought them about when she kissed him on Trandosha. She didn’t regret, of course, as she also had feelings for him, but she did not know why. She barely knew him and she knew even less about him, aside from what she had heard on the HoloNet.

Something about the Jedi Knight made her want to cast aside her metaphorical armor and open up, but she did not know what it was. Perhaps the feelings had been lingering there since the first time she had seen him, but the most recent thing in her mind that truly made her evaluate her feelings was her rescue at his hands only days earlier. She had done exactly what he had warned her against, yet he still left the Jedi during their retreat of the capital to help her. It was an act of true kindness. It was an act of a possible friendship.

Ussej started to speak, but Laili didn’t want to know what he was going to say. She was not in the mood for a lecture from a Jedi, so she pulled her brother’s small holocron from a pouch on her belt and placed it on Ussej’s desk. She could tell immediately that he knew what it was, as the look in his eyes was one of reflection. What she didn’t know was how he knew what it was or, in the end, what it actually was. All she knew was that it was clearly an important piece of machinery.

“What’s inside of it,” Laili asked.

Ussej looked up at her, the question making him somewhat uncomfortable. The only two people who knew anything about the holocron was Ravinos and himself, at least as far as he knew. Sharing the information with someone else, especially Ravinos’ sister, was discomforting, but he felt that he could trust her. If she had been working with Ravinos, which he had considered, he would have already found out about it. He did not see any harm in filling her in on what he knew.

“Information about a medallion,” Ussej said.

Before Laili had a chance to ask what the medallion was for, Ussej pushed a hidden button and the device came to life. An entire holographic screen of information presented itself before her, but she didn’t know how to make sense of any of it. There were ancient symbols, images of fire and destruction and even images of hope and wonder. Clearly it was not information about some random trinket, which made the unknown information all the more intriguing.

“It’s called the Medallion of the Saarai-kaar,” Ussej told her.

“Saarai-kaar,” she asked, not knowing what it meant.

“It means ‘keeper of truth’ in the language of the Sith species,” Ussej said. “When I first started serving with your brother on Corellia, a Sith soldier that had supposedly defected came to the academy and gave us this holocron. We spent weeks studying it, but at first we couldn’t make heads or tails of it.”

“But you seem to know a lot about it,” Laili said.

“Eventually,” Ussej continued, “we were able to learn more. According to myth, it was forged in the volcanic fires of a lost planet in the Unknown Regions. It supposedly can grant whoever touches it eternal life in the realm of the living, but it’s destined to fall into the hands of a great leader who will be granted eternal life in a far greater realm.”

“Does the holocron say where it is,” Laili asked.

“Korriban,” Ussej told her, “in the Temple of the Jensaari. The temple is supposed to be in the lost Oasis of the Kissai, but for some reason not even our most advanced scanners can find it.”

As Laili listened to the story, the pieces of her brother’s puzzle began falling into place. It became clear to her that his betrayal most likely had something to do with the medallion, as they had evidently first learned about it only a short time before he had turned to the Dark Side. Her only hope was that with the holocron, Ussej would be able to find the medallion first. If her brother found it first, the horrors he would be able to unleash with the powers of immortality would be able to make Pho Ph’eah look like a lovers quarrel.

“Why’d you stop researching,” Laili asked, curious to see if her hunch was correct.

“Viea rose to power,” Ussej said, “then she attacked Centerpoint Station. Only a week later, Kit betrayed us and then the Sith took over Corellia. It all happened so fast that the medallion was the last thing on my mind. Now that we have this though, we’re in grave danger. This medallion is the last thing that stands in his way from becoming invincible and you’ve just fueled the fire.”

“Right now,” she told him, “I don’t care about a medallion. I care about my brother and you’re going to help me get him back.”

“I told you - ”

“And I told you,” Laili said, interrupting him, “that there was still good in him. I felt it when he came after me and told me that he turned to save Corellia from destruction.”

“That only proves that he was afraid to lose it,” Ussej told her. “The fear of loss is a path to the Dark Side.”

“No,” she said. “It’s a noble and righteous act. He saved millions.”

“And then murdered thousands,” Ussej reminded her. “Pho Ph’eah wasn’t exactly noble. Your brother’s dead, Laili. Accept it.”

“No,” she said, shooting out of her chair and slamming her hands onto the desk as she looked right into his eyes.

Ussej leaned forward, looking into her eyes. The anger in her heart was corrupting the innocence he could see in the sapphire orbs and he knew he had to stop it from consuming her entirely. He knew that it was possible that her anger could corrupt her, especially if corruption ended up being hereditary. Luckily for him, his proposal to train her had been approved, though he had not even asked her if she wanted to be trained.

“You have a lot to learn, Laili,” Ussej said as he stood up from his chair and made his way to her side of the desk. “I’ve never seen a non-Jedi break out of a stasis before. The Force is obviously strong with you, just as it was with your brother. If you want, the council has granted me permission to train you.”

Laili laughed out loud before realizing that his offer was genuine, albeit misguided. What he saw when she broke out of the stasis was fear and an instinctive survival tactic. She thought it was sheer luck that she was able to pull out of whatever sorcery Ravinos had used on her. She was a smuggler, and in her mind comparing her and a war hero was like comparing two very distinct and different fruits.

“I can’t do what you do,” she said. “I don’t have that power.”

“Well,” Ussej said, “if you’re not up to the challenge...”

Ussej clearly knew how to push her buttons, as those very words made her want to begin her training immediately just to prove him wrong. She looked at him and saw the subtle, sarcastic smile that had slowly crept across his face and it made her want for him to train her even more. Clearly he cared for her, and his eyes said just that as she looked deep into them, so it was evident that he was not going to simply allow her to walk out of his office without accepting his proposal. Going against what would have been her better judgment weeks earlier, she knew that training as a Jedi would have its benefits when it came time to face Ravinos again.

“Alright,” she said.

“Alright,” Ussej echoed. “Meet me in the training chambers at oh-six-hundred tomorrow morning.”

She nodded before turning to leave the chambers. As she stepped out into the hall, she could feel the anger leaving her soul but the pain of knowing she was unable to save her brother without any special abilities still remained. Deep down, she knew that Ussej was right. Surprisingly, though, admitting that did not pain her, anger her or even annoy her in the least.

It comforted her.

 

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jedimasterbac  6373 posts
Title: CT and Fan Design Manager
 Registered: Jun '04
24180_Obi-Wan Art
Date Posted: 11/2/07 10:22am Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Updated 11/1/07
Chapter Seven
THE JEDI WAY

Ussej stood calmly in the training chambers that had been provided to him for his instruction of Laili as he awaited her arrival. She was already late, something that he refused to tolerate if it were to happen again. Even if she did not truly want to undertake the task of training to be a Jedi, he knew that she was well aware of how important it was. If she didn’t, then in his mind she was not truly committed to finding and saving her brother from the darkness that had overtaken him.

As he took in the scent of his surroundings, he chest expanded as his lungs inflated with the air that the breeze brought through the small hole that the designers of the building called a window. The breeze of Onderon was hot and dirty, something that Ussej did not enjoy and had not looked forward to when he arrived on the mysterious backwater world. As a pile of sand blew through, he was forced to turn his face from it. As he was far more accustomed to cities and lush landscapes, he was not fond of sand. The city of Iziz was vastly different from any place he had ever been before, aside from perhaps the Outer Rim desert world of Tatooine.

Taking him by surprise, his senses detected the faint yet noticeable scent of alcohol approaching from the hall. Ussej turned towards the doorway, only to find Laili stepping in while rubbing her temple. He could not help but take notice of the fact that her eyes became sensitive to the brightness of the room. He could not help but crack a faint smile, knowing that it only took a moderate genius to realize that she was clearly hung over.

Even after standing in the room for a few moments, the light still bothered her eyes. She tried to shield herself from them, but she knew that it would only make her hang over all the more obvious, even if it would make her head pound even harder than it had been. Even as she was walking through the enclave halls, she was able to notice the subtle glances that she received from the other Jedi as she approached. It was clear to her that they did not think highly of her, but perhaps her training with Ussej would be able to change all of that.

Though she did not know what to expect from him, she could only that the session would not be too long so she would be able to get the rest and recovery she needed. She expected the day to last at least into the afternoon, but she did not know anything about the training practices of the Jedi Order, nor did she know anything about Ussej’s training practices. Everything was new to her, which made it all the more disconcerting.

“You’re late, Miss Rendar,” Ussej said. “Don’t let it happen again.”

She could not help but be struck by how formal and aggressive his tone was as her bloodshot eyes moved to look at his. After all she had been through, she would have assumed that he would have been a bit more understanding. She didn’t even see how being thirty standard minutes late really made any difference in the long run, and the important thing to her was that she showed up at all. She had had half a mind to leave the night before, but she went against her instincts and decided to follow through on her agreement.

“Asking a smuggler to wake up this early is never a good idea,” she said with a smile. “My day usually doesn’t start before eleven hundred hours.”

“Your day will start when I say it starts,” he snapped. “You’re not a smuggler anymore, Laili. You’re an apprentice of the Jedi Order.”

“I’m not a child,” she shot back, worried that Ussej had locked himself in an arrogantly high ivory tower without any way out. “Don’t treat me like one.”

“Alright, enough,” Ussej shouted, his abruptness taking him by surprise as he watched as Laili flinched as well. “Just close your eyes and picture yourself in a place that makes you feel calm, at peace and passive.”

Laili said nothing as she took a deep breath and closed her eyes, though she wanted to demand an answer for his possible violent change in attitude. Regardless, as she closed her eyes, she tried to picture the rising sun on a clear Corellian morning. She had always loved staying up all night as a little girl to make sure she would be able to catch the sunrise. The memories of that happiness with her grandparents slowly began returning to her as she began to relax, the pounding of the hang over lessening with each passing moment.

“If you only see blackness,” Ussej said, “that will change. This exercise is geared towards allowing you to see what is necessary rather than just seeing what’s in front of you. Always remember that your eyes of the tools of deception. They can bring about the illusion of pain, suffering and even death. Those things become clearer through the eyes of the Force.”

“So I should rely on my instincts, then,” she said.

“Yes,” Ussej told her, “exactly.”

“Then what does death have to do with it,” Laili asked.

“What I said was a little misleading,” he told her. “Death doesn’t exit, at least not in the eyes of the Force. It only exits in darkness. What we have to do is remember that death lurks around every corner and that it can’t be reasoned with. Knowing this, a strong and wise Jedi will put aside their quarrels because they knew that life is precious to all beings and that all beings fear death. Knowing this and caring for others as you care for yourself is the first step in removing your fear.”

“But fear helps us grow,” Laili reminded him.

“Fear is a mind killer,” Ussej said. “You must face it and let it pass through you. It’s the first path towards anger, hatred and the inevitable suffering that comes with it.”

Ussej thought about the same words that his own master had told him. He could always remember Master Kefle and numerous other Jedi reminding him that there was no sense in fearing the inevitable, as there was nothing he could do to change it. When someone was dying of thirst, it was too late to dig a well. It was one of the many things that Laili would learn in her training.

“You have to remember to always be committed to the Way.” Ussej said.

“As committed as Kit was,” Laili asked, her tone becoming frustrated.

“Life is impermanence,” Ussej said. “Everything is subject to change because nothing lasts forever. That is the finitude of life.”

Her eyes flashed open as she stepped in closer towards him. The blue orbs held pain within their depths. She glared at him with great anger, though she turned away. Her jaw clenched and tears threatened to fall down her face. Not only had he gone so low as to say that things simply change as justification for Kit’s betrayal in their first session, but he did it in a way that seemed cold, almost calculated. Turning back towards him, she tried her best to hide her pain.

“Then things will change again,” Laili said. “Don’t you Jedi say that no one is beyond redemption?”

“We do,” Ussej said, “but we also say that redemption is a choice. It’s not just something that happens.”

“Are you saying that Kit won’t make that choice,” she asked him.

“I’m saying that redemption comes from the release of oneself,” Ussej told her, “not the exaltation of oneself. It comes through compassion, not greed; love, not hate. Love is the most important thing that anyone can give someone who has fallen. One lone candle can stop the darkness for a short time, but love is more than a candle. Love is the roaring blaze that never stops and it’s the answer to the darkness. Love can ignite the stars.”

“And he’ll make that choice,” she said, “but obviously without your help. You seem so eager to write him off completely, but I’d rather die then lose him forever.”

“You may get that chance,” Ussej said, the words stinging Laili’s heart.

Ussej wanted to help her, but his orders were clear. If he disobeyed them, he knew he could lose everything he had worked three decades for. Because of his orders, he was not there to teach her how to bring her brother back. He was there to teach her how to survive. Only she could learn the power to bring him back through her compassion. After all, compassion and selflessnes was what lead to redemption, not the powers of the Force.

If Ravinos was to decide to be redeemed, Laili would first have to make a choice. She would have to decide between sitting there and learning what she needed to survive, while learning compassion, or she would could choose the quick and easy path as Ravinos did and become an agent of the Sith Empire. However, impatience seemed to be her main weakness.

To be a Jedi, Ussej knew that one would have to confront and go beyond the allure and temptations of the Dark Side of the Force. It was obviously the side that Kit Corwin Rendar was unable to get past, and Ussej could not help but worry that Laili would not be able to get past it either as impatience was the easiest door. Her brother was seduced by what he found on the other side of that door, and to save the fallen Jedi Master Laili would have to hold firm. She could no longer be as reckless as she was on Corellia.

“You promised you would help me,” she said, “or were you lying to me? I honestly don’t know anymore, because you’re not the same man I met before.”

Her words were meant to sting him just as much as his words had stung her very core. Part of it was frustration that she had to let out, as the events of the past few weeks had taken a toll on her, as had the lingering hangover. The other part of it was disappointment, as Ussej seemed to have completely disregarded everything he had previously told her and she did not tolerate an opinion changing like that.

“Seeing him try to kill us changed my opinion on a few things,” Ussej told her, “and your ignorance to his situation isn’t exactly helping. You’re being blinded by your parents and your grandparents, and I really don’t think they would want to see you in this kind of danger.”

“Don’t you ever think you know what my parents would want,” Laili said, the anger and the rolling tears themselves blinding her vision. “You don’t know anything about my family.”

Ussej could not help but be amazed as the anger built up within him. He usually had good eyesight, which was strange considering he couldn’t believe he didn’t see that the most beautiful woman he had ever seen was the most stubborn, self-centered and idealistic person he had ever met. First she ran off with a bounty hunter who was a known criminal and sexual felon to further her own agenda, then she faced her brother and was almost killed and then she actually had the nerve to tell him what he did and did not know. Clearly he had made a mistake in judgment.

“You’re right,” Ussej told her. “I used to think that the Rendar family was actually noble.”

Laili had had enough of his insults and what was in her mind utter nonsense. She agreed to be trained by him, and only him, because she actually thought he cared about her. She was foolish enough to believe that Ussej would have protected her and would have done anything for her, because she knew he had felt the same way about her as she did about him. As she brought her hand up to his face and slapped him, she knew that she also had clearly made a mistake in judgment, because she had never imagined that someone who seemed so noble and so righteous would have turned out to be such an unemotional monster.

“Don’t you see what this is doing to you,” Ussej asked as he rubbed his red face. “You’re going to get yourself killed if you don’t follow my lead.”

“Maybe I should have gone with Kit,” Laili said. “At least he wouldn’t have humiliated me like this. You know that there’s something between us and you can’t even try to deny it.”

Her words sent a crushing blow into Ussej’s mind and soul. He did have strong feelings for her and he had thought about her almost every day since she first kissed him on Trandosha, but he knew what attachment had done to other Jedi like Kit and Dexon. His master would have called it the shadow of greed. Ussej could not let himself be overcome by such feelings, because his hero status in the Jedi Order and the Republic was important to him, even though he knew such thoughts were dangerous as well. In the end, he did not know what to do other than remain a drone of the Jedi Council.

“It doesn’t matter anyway,” Ussej said. “Love just leads to attachment, and that’s a luxury I just can’t have. People who are attached to their bodies, thoughts, feelings or beliefs are imprisoned. They don’t know true freedom. Compassion is what’s important.”

“Compassion,” she asked angrily. “You don’t have any compassion.”

Her words lashed out at him just as a wounded animal would lash out at its rescuer. It did not know any other way, just as a smuggler did not know any other way, particularly the Jedi way. All she knew was that she had cared about him, but he had turned away. It made the tears continue to stream down her face. It was as if Ussej had taken a dagger and thrust it deep into her breast towards her heart, only to later twisted it more and more to make the wound deeper and deeper.

“You need rest,” Ussej told her, trying to find a way to make her leave so he could reflect on what had happened. “Please, for both our sakes, get some sleep and come back at sunset.”

She did not question him, nor did she dignify his words with any form of response. What she wanted more than anything else was to just get away from him. Hearing his words made her think that she meant nothing to him and that was more that she could possibly bear. It was the straw that broke the back of a bantha that already held the weight of a family promise and the well-being of a lost sibling.

She turned away from him and quietly walked out of the room. She felt sick to her stomach as she made her way down the hall, ignoring the other Jedi. She could tell, though, that they were trying to reach out to her to see what was wrong, but she went straight towards the quarters she had been given. When she stepped inside, she slammed the door shut and locked it before leaning up against it. Closing her eyes, the tears and sobs made her body begin to shake as she slid down to the floor.

If that was the Jedi way, she wanted nothing of it.

 

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WANNA-BE-JEDI-KNIGHT  920 posts
Title: Activities Coordinator, Maryland FanForce
 Registered: Feb '06
6103_Anakin Skywalker
Date Posted: 11/5/07 11:39am Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Updated 11/1/07
I must say this version has Laili as a much stronger woman. I just hope she doesn't give in so easily to Ussej.

 

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"As you enter this life, I pray you depart with a wrinkled face and a brand new heart." -- U2
"You are in my very soul, tormenting me." -- Anakin
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jedimasterbac  6373 posts
Title: CT and Fan Design Manager
 Registered: Jun '04
24180_Obi-Wan Art
Date Posted: 11/7/07 11:53am Subject: RE: Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac THIRD DRAFT - Updated 11/1/07
WARNING: This chapter contains sexual content.

Chapter Eight
A NIGHT TO REMEMBER

The coming of dusk had brought a much sought after and much needed change of perspective for Ussej. Since had first helped Laili on Coruscant, he had tried to figure out his feelings for her and what was happening inside of his own mind. For the longest time, he was unable to do so. It was the first time in a long time that he couldn’t find the answers to a problem within himself, and it made him feel as if his control over his own mind was slipping away. He had defended Dantooine, Corellia and Centerpoint and he had fought at Pho Ph’eah, but even as he waited for Laili to hopefully return for further training he was unable to see that she very well could be the girl of his dreams.

Regardless, he knew he had acted inappropriately, though he agreed with much of what he thought he had said. Much of that short session was a blur to him, and he did not know why he had become so cold and rude. Clearly it stemmed from his inability to trust anyone after the betrayal of Kit and Dexon, but he was uncertain of that fact. He didn’t know if it was because he couldn’t trust anyone or if it was because he couldn’t trust her. That question was one that caused him more conflict than any other.

He had spent the day reflecting on what had happened, regretting what he said and the decisions he had made. He had shut Laili out and made her suffer because of his own pride and arrogance. He had always worked hard and channeled him ambitions to pursue his dreams and turn them into reality, but for once he turned his dream into a nightmare. Usually when he had a nightmare, he forgot about it soon after, but the effects of this particular nightmare would undoubtedly last for some time.

However, his mistakes from the morning did teach him a valuable lesson. The world around him was so fast-paced that sometimes he never looked and paid attention to what was happening around him. For so long, he had always been focused on himself and what he was doing. He never took the time to really pay attention and to truly appreciate anyone else other than his closest friends. It was one of his greatest weaknesses and he did not know how to change it.

As he sensed her approach, Ussej turned to see Laili slowly and unsurely entering the chambers. It was clear to him that she was approaching slowly, obviously due to a combination of hesitance and fear. It was also quickly evident that she had not used the time he had given her to rest, as her eyes seemed to ache with tiredness. When she did not immediately say anything to him, he realized that she did not have to. Her silence spoke volumes about what he had done.

Moments that seemed like lifetimes slowly went by and Laili had still said nothing. She would not even look him in the eye, keeping her own eyes facing the ground as she tried to figure out something to say to break the silence that was becoming awkward even for her. She could only hope that he was planning a session that only had to do with Jedi training. If that was the case, she would do whatever he asked her to do in training without pushing him, because she knew that his so called “Jedi way” would come back to haunt her once again if she did.

Ussej watched as she continued to say nothing, the grief of the morning and the anxiety of the present swelling throughout his very soul. Watching her as she sat down upon the ground, he could not help but wonder if they would be able to mend their tattered relationship. As he sat down with her, she finally looked at him as he looked into her deep blue eyes. Even as he wanted to speak, all he could think of was how much of a feel he had been and how he had hurt her. He wanted to blurt out the truth about his feelings for her to hear and for everyone else to hear. All he could do was hope for the best and at that moment he knew that it was time to express how he truly felt.

“I don’t know what happened to me this morning,” Ussej said, taking her hand into his. “All I know is that I truly care about you and that I would do anything for you to forgive me.”

It was hard for Laili to believe after what he had said that morning. All throughout the day, she replayed the events on Coruscant, Nar Shaddaa, Corellia and Onderon over and over again in her mind but she could not figure out what had made Ussej change so quickly. Her heart had been split in two and there was nothing but pain inside of her. Unable to sleep, eat or do anything else, she had locked herself in her chambers. Only her desire to hear what Ussej had to say brought her out.

“Ussej,” she said softly as she pulled her hand away, “no one has ever said anything so cruel to me. Why did you?”

“I was trying to protect you,” Ussej said, his eyes appearing tormented.

“Protect me from what,” she asked. “I can handle a lot.”

“The truth about Pho Ph’eah,” Ussej said as he stood up and turned away from her.

“What do you mean,” she asked, also standing up as she had suddenly become intrigued by Ussej’s claim. “Is it something that my brother did?”

Ussej smiled at her question, knowing that it would have come either then or some time down the road. He knew that Laili would not find out about all the people he had helped to kill during that battle, though he of course knew that she was well aware that he had been involved. The HoloNet had informed everyone of who was involved and what had happened, and the hearings on the matter were public knowledge.

Despite the public hearings, the official records made it out to look like the Jedi had very little involvement. After the incident, the Jedi Order’s public approval ratings plummeted. They hated becoming political, but they knew that they had to make the order look good in the eyes of the Republic or Ravinos would have won. Despite that effort, approval ratings remained low. Viea and Ravinos got exactly what they had wanted.

“I helped kill so many people,” he said, looking up through the small window as dozens of citizens made their way past it. “I knew somewhat was wrong when Kit told me that we were going to take out the government, but he was my friend so I trusted him. I led the squadron that helped destroy the capital city and when the planet’s leader told me there were no Sith I cut him off and watched as Ravinos destroyed the complex.”

Ussej subtly moved a finger to his eye to wipe away the tear that was threatening to spill out. While it felt somewhat liberating to get that off of his chest, he still feared what her reaction would be. He did not know how anyone would be able to forgive someone for not only an atrocity like Pho Ph’eah but for covering it up. It was for that reason that he assumed he would never see Laili again.

“If I had just listened to my instincts,” Ussej continued, “I could have stopped Ravinos and saved so many people.”

“Why didn’t you tell me this,” Laili asked as she forgivingly stepped towards him, almost as if his own plight had made her forget about what had happened only a few hours earlier.

“I could have saved him,” Ussej said, “and I didn’t want my guilt to hurt you too.”

Her eyes gazed deep into his own and she was able to see his nervousness and the truth behind his words. Her heart was aflutter with the pain of the truth, but it quickly became overshadowed by something else. It was almost as if she felt joy stemming from his ability to apologize and open up to her. She could not help but smile as a tear began to fall softly from her eyes and her heart beat wildly in her chest.

Unable to think of anything comforting she could say, she stepped up behind him and placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. He turned as he felt her touched and she stepped in and wrapped her arms around him. Leaning into him, she gave him a comforting hug and she was unable to feel his anxiety and his racing heart slow down. It made her feel important and useful knowing she was a comfort to a respected Jedi Knight, which made her believe that she would be able to give Ussej that obvious help that he needed.

“There’s nothing you could have done,” she said as she stepped out of their embrace to look into his eyes. “All you can do now is forgive yourself.”

Her embrace had felt warm and soft, and he himself felt whole for the first time in many years when he realized she was trying to comfort him and help him. When she backed away, it seemed as if part of him backed away with her. He hated that feeling of emptiness and realized that he had finally found the moment where he could properly express his strong feelings for her. It was at that moment that he finally decided to act on his heart rather than on his loyalty to the Jedi Code.

Leaning in, Ussej gently kissed Laili’s tender lips. He placed his hand on her soft face with his cold and frightened fingertips and felt even more whole than he had when she was only in his embrace. After a short moment, Ussej pulled away and stepped back to look into her eyes, hoping to see that she felt the same as he did about the moment short moment of absolute compassion that they had shared.

Laili faced him without having a single word to utter as a response. Quite literally, she had no idea what to say or, for that matter, what to do. They had gone through so much to simply dismiss it or say “thank you” and continue with their training as if nothing had happened. She always knew that there would come points in her life where she knew she would have to face her destiny, the same destiny that all Humans faced, and that was one of them. She took his hand, still staring into his own ocean blue eyes.

Looking upon him, she could not help but feel absolute joy when she saw that beautiful yet awkward smile that warmed her heart every time she saw it shine through. She didn’t know if she could say that she loved him, as they didn’t know one another all that well, but she knew that she had cared a great deal for him ever since they met again on Coruscant. However, she also knew what he had said about the Jedi Order’s policy towards love. That conflict was powerful, and it was almost too much to bear.

“You know the Jedi won’t approve of this,” she said, realizing as she said it that the disappointed look on Ussej’s face meant that she had metaphorically “killed the mood”. “I just don’t want what happened to Kit and Aletra to happen to us too”

“It’s better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all,” Ussej told her. “Isn’t that what they always say?”

He knew that the statement held some truths and some falsehoods, but he felt as if the former outweighed the latter. Not only that, but he knew that Damien Nightblade, his closest friend, was madly in love with the Queen of Onderon and had been for some time. Nothing had happened to them. Ussej could not accept that he would have to bury his feelings every time he came into contact with another Jedi when the Grandmaster of the Jedi did not.

He sighed, turning around again as he placed his hands on his waist. He watched through the small window as the citizens of Iziz walked through the streets in their daily routines, taking everything they had for granted. There were young couples everywhere that were madly in love with one another. Ussej could only ask himself why he and Laili were unable to be like anyone else.

Laili moved next to him and gently placed her hand onto his back as she too watched the citizens above. She saw the husbands, wives and lovers walking hand in hand through the streets and desperately wanted to be like them, though she knew that they did not have to face the dangers that she and Ussej would always have to face. The citizens of Onderon only had the specter of Viea to worry about, while Ussej and Laili quite literally had to worry about Viea herself.

Moving her gaze from the streets, she placed her hand onto his cheek and turned his face towards her. As she looked into his eyes once again, she knew that the path they were prepared to take would be a harsh road, one rarely traveled by two members of the Jedi Order. Regardless, she knew that the risk would be worth it. Everything would pay off when the war was over.

“Alright,” she said. “Come what may. We’ll face it together.”

“Laili,” Ussej said as he turned around to face her fully, “I want you to know I’d do anything to protect you. I’d even turn to the Dark Side for you.”

The latter part of his promise stung, but for the moment she ignored it. She closed her eyes and wrapped her arms around him, nestling her head against him. She let the subtle tears of joy fall as her heart beat wildly in her chest. She had longed to be held in his arms for so long and everything finally felt right as her worries and troubles became so distant.

Her eyes opened once more as she rose up towards him on her toes so she was able to lean in and gently kiss his lips. It didn’t matter to her if anyone who walked by was able to see them. All she could think about was the future of their relationship and the life that they could possibly build with one another. It was all that seemed important and, for a moment, she was almost able to forget all about her brother.

“Don’t make me spend another night alone,” she told him.

“Laili,” he said with a smile, “you’ll never be alone.”

A cold chill moved across her body as the hairs on the back of her neck stood up. Words that could have been calming and even soothing instead filled the back of her mind with fear. Rather than being terror, however, it was the fear of the unknown, though she was prepared to face it. She looked into his eyes and realized he also felt such a fear, yet along with that fear was a deep compassion that she knew, in time, she would be able to fall in love with.

Having him so close made her breathing speed up as her heart fluttered in her chest and her cheeks turned a rosy-pink. Lowering her eyes from his own, she never wanted to leave his arms. Her want for him was stronger than ever before and she found it hard to concentrate even on the moment with him so close. Simply nodding her head, her eyes rose to meet his again.

Not needing to say anything, Ussej led Laili out of the training room. The distance between them grew in an effort to keep themselves hidden from the other Jedi while maintain the guise of a strict teacher-student relationship. Though their compassion for each other was strong, neither one of them wanted to blatantly show their feelings for one another to other people so soon.

Laili knew full well that Ussej had some form of love for the Jedi Order, even if it was only for what it could have been. It was a love that she could never compete against, nor did she ever want to try to compete against it. In Ussej’s mind, though, the choice was as easy as it was to breathe. He had almost lost her that morning and knowing that was enough for him to hold onto her forever, no matter what the cost.

As they stepped into Laili’s personal quarters, she stood near the bed but she did not face him at first. It wasn’t until he approached her from behind and placed his hands on her shoulders that she turned around to face him. His blue eyes reflected the compassion he held for her, leaving no doubt in her mind’s eye that he would come to love her. The pain that he had caused her earlier seemed to erase itself from her mind.

With such gentleness, she felt his fingers raise her chin as he lowered his head and kissed her. Her eyes closed as she felt the shiver of desire rush down her spine and throughout her body. His kiss slowly deepened, drawing her further away from their surroundings and thrusting her head first into the waves of their passion. She responded to the kiss with her own desire and moved closer to him, pressing her body against his own. The distance between the two of them had been too great for far too long, so it seemed only right.

Ussej broke the kiss and looked onto her flushed face with so much compassion and desire. He had to force himself from taking her right there on the floor. In her eyes, he could see the confusion at him stopping as she tried to meet his lips again. There was a hunger in her eyes that pushed him deeper into his own desires. Waiting until her lips were just inches from his own, he tilted his head and kissed her softly on her neck.

There, her scent was stronger, intoxicating him further. Feeling and hearing the moan rising in her throat, his hands moved to the base of her back and began to stroke it gently. His lips moved further down her neckline as she titled her head back and he ignored the slight pain of her nails digging into his back. His breath came ruggedly as he brought his lips back up to her own and pressed himself against her, pulling her closer to him.

Laili’s knees grew weaker as he kissed her deeper than he had ever done so before. When he broke the kiss the second time, she tried to catch her breath as he moved them towards the bed. Ussej swept her off her feet and carried her to it as his lips met hers again. She felt her heart bursting with joy and love. She could not imagine anyone else that could touch her as deeply as she had.

With a gentleness unbefitting a man as powerful as he, Ussej laid her upon the bed and gazed down at her beauty as he drank deeply of it. Her hands moved up to stroke his chest and slipped down to unhook his utility belt, his own hands moving in to help her. The belt slid off of the bed as his hands moved towards her own belt.

She raised her arms to make it easier for him to slide the belt from underneath her. Her hands slipped under his robes and stroked his broad, muscular chest. Sliding the robes off of his shoulders, she exposed his flesh and brought her lips to his Adam’s apple. Breathing deeply of his musky scent, she closed her eyes and helped him as he pulled her own robes off her shoulders, though she wasted no time in quickly her hands back to his body.

As she teased him with her lips, his hands moved across her soft flesh, caressing every inch of her sweetness. He moved his hands slowly up her torso towards her soft breasts. She was not playing fair, though, as she drove him even further beyond sanity with her kisses and caresses. Feeling a moan rising from deep within his chest, he interrupted her teasing with her lips and met them with a deep hunger. Leaning into her and forcing her to lay back, his hands explored further down her torso. Her supple form responded to his touch as her hips rose allowing him to remove her lower garments and caress the flesh that had been hidden underneath.

Laili felt another moan rise from her throat, though she did not try to hold it back as she had done before. Her desire for him grew with each passing moment and the longer he held back pleasing her, the more it drove her beyond sanity. She moved her own hands down his torso, caressing his stomach as his hands moved to aid her and direct her. Her breath began to catch as she could feel his body already responding to her touch.

When neither could hold back any longer, the two succumbed completely to their desires as their passion drove them to heights they had not experienced before. After strength had failed both of them and their hungers were sated, the heavy breathing began to slow as their hearts beat wildly still in their chests. Laili laid her head upon Ussej’s chest, letting the beating of his heart, which she knew only to be for her, lull her to sleep. His hands gently stroked her hair as sleep overcame him as well. All was as it should have been between the two of them. They were together and he would be damned if anything or anyone would tear them apart.

Only mere minutes passed by until he heard the beeping of his communicator on his utility belt. Though it had immediately woken him up, it was clear that Laili was not even slightly disturbed by it. At first, Ussej ignored its sound and for a moment it seemed as if whoever was calling him had given up trying to reach it. However, after a few minutes of peace and quiet, the beeping began once again.

After slowly and softly moving Laili’s arms off of his chest, he stepped out of bed and threw his brown cloak over his exposed body. Picking up the beeping communicator, he stepped over to the far side of the room to answer so he would not disturb Laili. Though he despised the fact that whoever was calling chose that very moment to call him, he knew that he would never get any peace and quiet unless he answered them.

“Bac here,” Ussej said softly.

“Ussej,” the voice on the other end said, “it’s Damien. Do you read me?”

“Go ahead,” Ussej said.

“I need you to do something for me,” Damien said. “There’s a lake eleven kilometers north of the city. I want you meet me there in a half hour.”

“Can’t this wait,” Ussej asked, holding back his sigh of frustration.

“No,” Damien said. “I expect you to be there.”

Before Ussej had a chance to respond, the audio transmission ended. Damien had clearly cut the link, which meant that what the reason he wanted Ussej at the lake was important enough to not allow any sort of negotiation about it. Because of it, Ussej wanted to yell and scream, as he was furious that he had to leave Laili, though he did not want the sounds of his frustration to wake her.

Moving to the side of the bed, he slipped his robe off and got dressed in the clothes he had been wearing only shortly before. When he was fully dressed, he stepped into Laili’s refresher and fixed his hair in the mirror. He did not want to give any indication that he had just had a sexual relationship with Laili, especially to Damien. Though the Grandmaster himself was in a relationship, Ussej did not want to risk hypocrisy on his friends’ part.

When Ussej was ready to leave, the door slid open. He checked his surroundings to ensure that no one would see him leaving Laili’s chambers and when he felt that the coast was clear he stepped out into the hallway. Before leaving, he took one last look into the room and smiled as he saw Laili sleeping soundly. If all went well, he would be back before she even woke up.

As the door slid shut, its hiss caused Laili to stir and, moments later, wake up. As she awoke, she could not have been happier. She had expressed a great deal of love to a man she cared greatly for, and she knew that he had expressed it back as passionately as he could. However, when she stretched out her arm and felt nothing beside her the happiness dwindled.

Turning over, she realized that Ussej was gone. She stepped out of bed and threw on her clothes as quickly as she could. When she turned on the lights, she searched frantically for some sort of note that Ussej might have left explaining why he left her alone even after vowing that she would never be alone. When she found none, the anger began to swell up within her. The anger, however, was not as much directed at Ussej as it was directed at herself. She had given in to her desires and was burned for it.

Stepping into the refresher, she let the water in the sink fall into the pipes as she stared at herself in the mirror. She could not figure out if it was Ussej’s own issues that made him leave or if it was something about her. Regardless, the water she began splashing across her face helped somewhat, but only to calm her down. That calm was violated by the sound of her communicator beeping, and she had no idea who would be trying to reach her unless it was Ussej calling to apologize.

“Rendar here,” she said.

“Miss Rendar,” the voice on the other end said, “this is Queen Arael Maans. I must speak with you immediately. We have a mission for you, one of great importance. How soon can you be ready to leave?”

“Immediately,” she said, not even waiting a half a second to respond.

“Very good,” the queen said. “I will see you soon.”

When the transmission ended, Laili breathed a sigh of relief. She wanted nothing more than to leave the enclave, as it had brought her nothing but pain. After the mission was over, she would finally be able to resume her search for her brother without the distraction of Ussej. In the end, she wanted nothing more to do with the man who claimed to be a noble Jedi Knight if he was to continue acting like a child.

 

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