Malachor V, Some Time After Last

[suitably_heroic]

"...ttn..."

The letters danced through the dark space in his head, but they didn't connect.

"...ttn..."

And now they just hurt.

Mira	"...tton." "Atton." "Atton." "Wake up, you--"
Atton	Unhhh. "'m not... a nerfherder." Space. What was that? And why couldn't it see he was busy dying down here? Leave him alone.
Mira	"Of all the times you choose not to bounce back at the last second," Mira said. She didn't wait for him to say anything else - she just grabbed him by the arm and dragged him to his feet. "We need you. Now."
Atton	"'m busy," Atton protested. "Ow. Ow. Mira." Need him? What did anybody need him for anyway?
Mira	"One, you are the only pilot we've got who actually knows how to fly the Ebon Hawk," Mira said. She slapped a couple of kolto patches over the worst of the jagged wounds on his chest. This wasn't the time to let him know just how bad he looked - he might lose consciousness again. "Though space knows why we let you get away with that, I don't think we've ever gone anywhere without crashing into the planet--" She yanked him towards the door. "Which leads me to two, you're the only one who knows the Hawk's initialization protocols, so even if one of us did want to fly, we'd probably lose ten minutes figuring it out, and then we'd all be dead."
Atton	"I can walk," Atton protested. "Ow. That's my bad arm-- I can walk."
Mira	Mira immediately let go of his arm.
Atton	And Atton responded by very manfully... dropping to the floor on his knees and hacking up a mouthful of blood. Fantastic. "Got it-- I can--" Cough. "--walk, just a minute--"
Mira	Mira rolled her eyes and yanked him back up off the floor. "And that's why nobody listens to you," she said.
Meetra	Worry still gnawed on Meetra's heart. She wasn't certain if leaving Atton the way she had had been the best choice-- but she couldn't linger on that now. The Jedi Order had always preached against attachments, and this was why. If she focused overmuch on him-- on any of her people-- she would not be able to do what had to be done. She stepped into the central chamber. There, then, was Kreia. Her black robes suited her poorly; irrationally, Meetra found herself missing the deep browns in which the old woman had once dressed herself. "Kreia."
Kreia	"At last you have arrived. Is Malachor as you remember?" Kreia said. Her voice was soft, but it carried. "You no doubt have many questions. I would be a poor teacher if I did not give you the answers you seek here, now."
Meetra	Meetra sighed. "Why have you done this?" she asked. She could only hope Kreia truly had chosen to be upfront-- this once.
Kreia	"It is said that the Force has a will, it has a destiny for us all," Kreia said. She turned until she faced the Exile openly. It was time for her to understand... as much as she needed to understand. "I wield it, but it uses us all, and that is abhorrent to me." Her voice grew stronger now. "Because I hate the Force," she said. "I hate that it seems to have a will, that it would control us all to achieve some measure of balance, when countless lives are lost. But in you... I see the potential to watch the Force die, to turn away from its will, and that is what pleases me." Her mouth curved. "You are beautiful to me, Exile. A dead spot in the Force, an emptiness in which its will may be denied."
Meetra	"If you hate the Force," Meetra said as she walked towards Kreia, "Why do you use it?"
Kreia	"I use it as I would use a poison, and in the hopes of understanding it, I will learn the way to kill it." Kreia did not move as the Exile approached. She saw no reason to. "But perhaps these are the excuses of an old woman who has grown to rely on a thing she despises."
Meetra	Meetra crossed her arms. She glanced away. "You were manipulating me all along," she said softly. Using her for what she was.
Kreia	"Yes, always," Kreia said. She would hardly lie to Meetra about this now. "From the moment you awoke, I have used you. I have used you so that you may become strong, stronger than I."
Meetra	"So you used me to get revenge on Sion and the others." How Sithly of her.
Kreia	Kreia could hear the Jedi behind those words. No matter. "I used you to keep the Lords of the Sith from condemning the galaxy to death with their power unchecked," she said. Her apprentices had been another excess of the Force-- another source of pain for the galaxy. "I used you to lure them to Telos, where they could be, at last, fought and killed." She lifted her head. "I used you to reveal Atris' corruption, so that her teachings could be ended before they began. I used you to gather the Jedi so that they could be destroyed. And I used you to make those who wounded me reveal themselves, so they could be killed by the Republic."
Meetra	"Why did you destroy Atris?" Meetra asked.
Kreia	"I never destroyed Atris. She had destroyed herself," Kreia said, raising her voice. "I merely stripped away the illusion and brought her truth. Her teachings could not be allowed to continue. And like Malachor, she was a part of your past, unresolved. She needed to be something you could confront - and defeat, one last time. It was part of your training. Part of what was needed to make you complete." It was her fondest wish, that Meetra would understand this. Understand her motives. Understand into what she had been made. "And there must always be a Darth Traya. The galaxy needs its betrayers, especially in the times to come." She softened. "She loved you, you know, as one loves a champion. You were all that she could not be."
Meetra	Meetra blinked. She thought back to her friendship with Atris... and what Kreia said, she could not parse. She had only gotten cold hatred from the Jedi Master. "She never mentioned such feelings."
Kreia	"Yes..." Kreia said. Of course Atris had not. She could not. "It is all that is left unsaid upon which tragedies are built. More echoes, traveling through the Force."
Meetra	"Your Academy here won't last, Kreia," Meetra said. "I can activate the Mass Shadow Generator again." They had stopped the other two Sith Lords, yes. But her old Master... she couldn't let Kreia destroy what she had come here to destroy.
Kreia	"More talk of machines and threats," Kreia said. She might not have been capable of rolling her eyes, but the notion was clear. "If you would end Malachor, then do it. But it will not be a victory for you. And of course you must be willing to die - to kill us all. Including your friends." She tilted her head. "You may hold the fate of Malachor in your grasp, but I hold the answers to your past and future in mine. Would you destroy us all before learning them? If so, then do it - for you have already failed me."
Meetra	Was this the point of it all, then? This... exchange? Strange... but then again, so was Kreia. "Why me?" she asked quietly.
Kreia	That wiped the disappointment from Kreia's face - and brought almost a smile. "Perhaps you were expecting some surprise, for me to reveal a secret that had eluded you," she said. "Something that would alter your perspective of events, shatter you to the core." She shook her head. "There is no great revelation, no great secret. There is only you."
Meetra	More riddles. "But there were other Jedi you could have chosen," Meetra pressed.
Kreia	"No, there were not." Kreia was resolute. She had looked. She had not found any. "In times past and in times future, there are Jedi who will stop listening to the Force, those that will try to forget it, but maintain unconscious ties. And those, as in the past just as I, who have had the force stripped from them." She gestured towards Meetra with her one intact hand. "No Jedi ever made the choice you did. To sever ties so completely, so utterly, that it leaves a wound in the Force." She sighed. "It was a mistake to try to make you feel it again, I see that now," she said. "There is no truth in the Force." No smile came to her face now, just a strong gladness, something old and yet surprised. "But there is truth in you, Exile. And that is why I chose you."
Meetra	Meetra bit down on her lower lip. This was nothing like any situation she had faced before... but that, too, was no doubt part of Kreia's plan. "What happens now?" she asked.
Kreia	Kreia drew her lightsaber. Snap-hiss. "The apprentice must kill the master," she said simply, and then the time to speak... ended.
Mical	"Atton," Mical said, "Are you certain you can fly?"
Atton	"Oh, now someone wants to know!" Atton snarled. Sure, he'd just dropped into the pilot's seat like a sack of ferrocrete, but still-- seriously. "Do me a favor, all right? If my arm falls off, just jam it back in there!" His fingers ran quickly over the controls.
Visas	"I sense that Kreia and the Exile are now in conflict," Visas said quietly. She gripped the back of the pilot's chair. "I believe... she is winning."
Brianna	"I have faith in the Exile," Brianna said. She picked up a medkit. "I have less faith in our pilot."
Atton	"This planet is falling apart," Atton snapped. "You think you can do a better jo--" Okay. No focusing on anything other than flying right now. Okay.
Meetra	"Yield, Kreia," Meetra panted. She had worked up a sweat, but there were only a few bruises to account for this fight. Her opponent was in a much worse shape. "You need not die."
Kreia	Kreia held on to her now-useless arm. "If you do not kill me, I shall end you," she snapped. "Strike me down, end this."
Meetra	"No," Meetra said. "This is already over." She lowered her lightsaber. "Your life is yours, Kreia... and you cannot teach me anymore."
Kreia	"You will not show me mercy," Kreia ground out. "I will see you break before you do!" Snap-hiss. Snap-hiss. Snap-hiss. Three lightsabers rose up into the air, fully lit, twisting around her like a storm.
Meetra	Well, damn. Meetra's lightsaber came back on, just in time-- she beat back one, then the other, then the third. Lightsaber parts went spilling across the floor, but one attacked again. Another strike. That one broke, too. "Kreia," she snapped, driving the lightsaber forward... ... and striking flesh, this time.
Kreia	Kreia sagged over, her cowl drooping over her face. "...You," she managed, curling her arm along the wound in her chest. It was only the Force now that let her hold on... just for another moment. "You are greater than any I have ever trained. By killing me here... you have rewarded me more than you could possibly know."
Meetra	Meetra let out a trembling breath. She deactivated her lightsaber again, stepped in closer. "Kreia," she said, her voice shaking, "There's still time to save you--"
Kreia	"Save me?" Kreia echoed. She was smiling. "You already have - it is enough what you have done, from now into the future."
Meetra	"The future?" Meetra repeated, her confusion clear.
Kreia	"Many things do I see as I gaze here from the heart of Malachor. This place... channels such energies." Kreia looked straight up, up, up into the dead skies of this dead planet. "It is my last gift to you... from one exile to another."
Meetra	... Ah. Now, now she was beginning to understand. A vision. Meetra bit back whatever platitudes she had left for her old mentor, and did as she wished, just one more time: she asked. "I would like to see this future," she said.
Kreia	"The Republic will fall," Kreia said, "as it always has, a fall that will take millenia. Under the care of Ithor, the surface of Telos will bloom again, and its golden fields will harbor scientists and thinkers. Complacent and peaceful, it will forget the time that Saul Karath orbited it and brought fire to its skies. But it shall be a homeworld again to others, who will stretch out across the galaxy and bring life." And so she spoke, of planet after planet, sketching out their paths into the future. Dantooine would rise, and Nar Shaddaa would persist but grant more chances, grow more of a heart, and Onderon would blossom, but lose itself. "Korriban, like Malachor, brushes the edges of the empire that waits in the dark. And like Malachor, the Sith have forgotten it. For a time. They will remember. Revan knew this."
Meetra	"And what about my friends?" Meetra found herself asking. She was already beginning to understand what she had to do when they left here... and it would not include any of them.
Kreia	"You travel with them for so long, yet you do not know them still," Kreia admonished her, but only gently. "Feel them through the Force, feel what they feel, hear their thoughts and know them, as I fought to know you." She took a deep breath and turned her attention away from the heavens. "They are the Lost Jedi, you know. The true Jedi, upon which the future will be built. They simply needed a leader, and a teacher." Did you see now, Meetra? How Kreia's legacy would spiral on into the future ahead? She could not have asked for a greater gift... a greater accomplishment.
Atton	"We're here, we're here," Atton said. "Stop ragging on me, will you?!" He didn't know how he managed to park the Ebon Hawk right off this cliff. No, really, he didn't know.
Mical	But Mical did not stop to listen to Atton complain. He had already rushed out of the cockpit, hot on the heels of the other, speeding out the back across the ramp-- to find the Exile.
Atton	"You are such an asshole!" Atton yelled after him, and nearly fell out of his chair on the way off.
Meetra	"What of the Mandalorians?" Meetra asked.
Kreia	"They will die a death that will last millenia," Kreia said. "Until all that remains is their code, their history, and in the end, the shell of their armor upon the shell of a man, too-easily slain by Jedi."
Meetra	Meetra nodded. She took another deep breath. She could see Kreia worsening with every second. "And Atton--?"
Kreia	Was that a face Kreia pulled? Perhaps. "Atton is, as always, the fool," she said. "And the Force watches out for ones such as him, I feel. As it watches out for the old such as I." His future was hard to see. She supposed that fit the man he was.
Meetra	"Does he love me?" Meetra asked, her voice softer now.
Kreia	"He is a fool, and that should answer all your questions," Kreia said - even more irritably. "He has nothing to offer to one such as you - and even one such as Atton is not so ignorant of that fact."
Meetra	Meetra hesitated for a moment; in that moment the last of the color faded from Kreia's face. "And you?" she said at last.
Kreia	"I would have killed the galaxy to preserve you," Kreia said. Even her voice was beginning to shrivel up. "I would have let the galaxy die. You are more precious than you know; what you have taught yourself cannot be allowed to die. You are not a Jedi, not truly, and that is why I love you." She looked towards the entrance, and found the Lost Jedi hobbling towards them. Soon. "Revan came because Malachor, like Korriban, lies on the fringes of the ancient Sith Empire, where the true Sith wait for us, in the dark," she said. She was rushing her words now - there were things Meetra needed to know before Kreia expired. "These corrupted remnants of the Republic, the machines spawned by technology that Revan led into battle were not Sith. Revan knew the true war is not against the Republic. It waits for us, beyond the Outer Rim. And he has gone to fight it, in his way. He left the Ebon Hawk and its machines behind, for he knew he would not need them." She turned back towards the Exile. "And, like you, he knew that he must leave all he loves behind, no matter how deeply one cares for them. Because such attachments would only bring doom to them both in the dark places where he now walks."
Atton	Atton wasn't sure how he'd managed the whole trip out of the Hawk and a hundred feet down the ramp and into Kreia's Academy again. He felt like he was going to pass out at any moment, and it wasn't like anybody was there to help him do it. By the time he got there, all he could see was Meetra, the others, and just past them, the crumpled body of Kreia, life long gone. He leaned against the side wall and flashed Meetra a weak smile. "Need any company?" he said. "I mean, I'm not doing anything."
Meetra	Thank the Force. He was alive. Meetra finished her conversation with Visas with a quick word and brushed past her to join Atton. She slid an arm around his shoulders, propping him up a little better. "You didn't need to walk this far." Space, he needed a kolto bath. She wasn't even sure he'd make it back to the ship.
Atton	Atton held on tighter than he was willing to admit. "If I'm not around to bail you out of trouble, who knows what could happen?" he said. He limped along as she walked, using her for balance. "All right, then," he said. One step before the other... "Where are we going again? I mean, because last time, we were heading toward this mining colony on the edge of space, and there was this Sith Lord, and..."

[[ ... and that is the end of canon. oh god. nfb, nfi, ooc-okay, taken (and adapted for readability/time/coherence/character focus) from 'knights of the old republic 2'. we'll do a little epilogue thing tomorrow and make a little reading list... ]]