[@Piercing Light]


			[img]https://i.pinimg.com/originals/6f/fd/93/6ffd9362f61144fd9122b9e54809d1f4.jpg[/img]

				[i][b]	Yavin IV[/b][/i]

"Well, she isn't the only one" Luke said with a rueful laugh as Kale thanked him for an apology he hadn't sough. Luke nodded his head in ascent. He might not have come here for one, but he was owed one nonetheless. Around the pair, the braziers burned revealing a race of crimson skinned primitives gazing up at starships. While other images of those same primitives united under the iron grip of a grim, gaunt looking human. At the mention of Arin the room seemed to grow almost cold as the depictions seemed to almost dance. The comm device seemed to tug at him and at the images which danced in the light, why this strange sensation filled his senses he couldn't say but the force itself seemed to be at a crossroads, a Nexus which centered around one lost boy. 

"Do you have any idea why he did it?" Luke asked his eyes a mix of speculation, doubt and an all too disturbing certainty. "I've been studying these rooms Kale, the ziggurats outside in the gardens and the other temples. I never had the education Leia Organa did, or really even Mara's or yours. But even on Tatooine we knew of the Sith, we were always told they were a crazy cult of heretics to some religion called "Jedi" who were warrior monks in the days of the Republic. They fought and lost a war with the Jedi long ago and their sect went extinct. Kind of comforting to know I keep having microseizures because of a figment of my imagination" Luke smiled lightly and then his eyes shifted to the door as Mara Jade came in. "But Mara told me the Sith were something else once, long before The Emperor and..my father.."

"They were a race of force sensitive conquerors, who took Dark Jedi exiled from Coruscant six thousand years ago as living gods." Mara spoke, repeating a story she'd heard from the Emperor. "Lonely exiles who met with savages and together bred a new race" She offered Kale a shrug as if so say she had no idea if this was the genuine article or merely a lie told be a dark and powerful space wizard who was slowly losing his mind and delighted in lying to his followers on his better days. "This place, it holds the force in it, light and dark. You've felt it haven't you Kale? Like footprints in the sand? Or thunder just beyond your visual range? It's like, two groups of giants fought here and one lost everything and the other burned like a sun. I think Yavin was a Sith stronghold once, I think the Jedi overcame them, maybe the last of them or one of their successors like Palpatine...I don't know but it's long ago and that powers almost like an echo, its almost powerless. Aren, has something that's concentrated darkside"

"It's more than that" Mara warned "The Emperor once warned us about Holocrons, they don't always just contain the techniques and skills of dead Sith and Jedi, sometime they even fragments of their souls or are a doorway to afterlife of the force". Luke blinked at that last part "You..sure?"

Mara nodded fiercely "Oh yeeaaahh...trust me" she spoke, jittery almost as if she was recalling a personal experience that horrified her but excited a darker part of her. "I was sent after an Inquisitor once who opened a Holocron and the fragment of some Sith lord was inside. It destroyed him, all that was left was this, animal with more power than sense...Darth Sidious forbade me from discussing it, but I get the impression the old ones were stronger. Like, the followers of Bane..uhh The Emperor's type of Sith, sacrificed grandiose power for more subtle, dangerous and manipulative skills. Maybe because the old ways were too destructive or something"

Luke nodded allowing Kale to process where they were going. "Aren, needs our help Kale but that isn't the only mission I have for you." Here, Mara stepped forward her eyes flashed with eagerness but also caution. As though she was urging Luke to trust her with this mission, rather than Kale. 

Luke catching her eye laughed "Mara wants out of the temple and into space, I can't say I blame you though" he gave her a knowing smirk. "Two months ago the force started to shift around the territory held by Grand Moff Kaine, there's a power growing there, it's dark and its terrible. Aren may be heading there, or he may be running off on his own. I want you to track him down and bring him back to us, if you believe he has been, possessed by this Holocron, don't engage, call me and I'll come to you. We'll bring him back together"

Mara raised an eyebrow "So you're sending me after this relic hunter you think is out there? The non threat?"

Luke laughed "I'm afraid so"

Mara shook her head ruefully "See that Master Kale? He can't kill me in a fight so he's trying to murder me with boredom" Though she protested, it didn't sound like she was going to refuse. Tracking down Jedi had, sadly been one of her specialities. "Y'know, Aren might have gone to Coruscant"

"Why?" Luke asked with confusion "Aren't all the inquisitors dead? I'm not sure if Sate Pestage would" oh right, Luke paused "Or...Hissa i should say, doesn't he run the remnant now?"

"Right, but I mean the con artist"

Oh, Luke thought, right. Some imposter set up shop claiming to be a Jedi, but Republic intelligence assumed she was just an Inquisitor running some hair brained scheme to discredit the new Jedi order. Mara dismissed it as nonsense and agreed with their spies, but Luke wasn't sure, he'd felt echoes around two presences that were invisible to him. One, seemed kind and simply curious, the other? Death occurred around it. "You agree with our operatives?"

Mara shrugged "Only way to explain why someone the history books made out to be one of the greatest Jedi of her time, big hoohah Sith killer and all wasn't shot to pieces the moment she showed up on the nearest corner babbling about being back from the dead or whatever"

"Unless, she killed all the other force users, or redeemed them"

"You can't redeem inquisitors Luke and most herniated Storm Troopers could kill inquisitors, they were kind of the Joke of the Dark acolytes I'll have you know"

Luke cleared his throat, suppressing laughter. "Regardless...Master Kale, we need to retrieve Aren and..Well I was going to say destroy the Holocron but I don't know what that'll do"

"I don't even know if they can be destroyed, toss it out an airlock or bring it back to study so we can figure out how to destroy it?" She offered.

"Or bury it in a vault and forget about it" Luke added, he was perfectly okay with indulging his curiosity about Jedi and Sith history, their knowledge, their power. Same for any of his Jedi when it was just scribblings on a wall, but something potentially alive? 


"Find him, I've got a bad feeling about this, like we're surrounded by Experts when we're still trying to figure out how to walk" Luke gave a weary sigh and then paused "And...Make sure Aren knows, we aren't going to kill him, or throw him out of the order. We just want to know what happened"

"may the force be with you" Mara added with a smirk, finishing the master's "session" with the customary blessing.

She was so going to have fun making the farm boy pay for this later.