"When the last light warms the ashen surface of Tython, only then will they return. Back to where it all ended, so that it all can be reborn again."
Her dark eyes had read over the text a hundred times, but the hundred and first was different as she wandered through darkness and heat. Far behind and high above lay the remains of the modified shuttle she used to make it to the surface of Tython, swallowed by creatures spawned by the very darkness that acted as a guide as it sliced through the light of the Galaxy beyond. As she crawled from the specially designed reinforced cockpit bubble of the shuttle, the dark creatures stared with eyes alive with cold red light. If there was supposed to be fear, Selene hadn't felt it. Either from herself, or from the creatures.
The largest she knew by name: Terentatek. It stood sentinel over the crash site, the Force whispering truth her heart already knew, "They've been waiting for you." The very heartbeat in which she heard the whisper, she felt the ground shake and looked up to see the sky darken and swirl and crack with lightning. Bright, bright, blue lightning. The spawn simply watched as she slipped past them and headed down. It had to be down, simulations and projections were impossible given the nature of the planet Tython. There was no telling, Selene thought, if the Kwa had made it that way or if their Tho-Yors were the engines behind it all.
Or if Tython was truly an extension of the Force made into planetary form.
She heard howls high above her head the deeper down she went, and felt so easily what surged through the seemingly endless jagged rocky descent into Tython that was the Rift. The Light Side had arrived. Selene's eyes bounced between the gaps between rock outcrops, but down this far, there was no more sky to see...yet she could see. Through the eyes of Dark Side spawn Selene could see the hurricane above the Rift grow in magnitude and size, the entire sky of the planet would soon match the hazy green. The very balance of the planet has been thrown off.
Tython was having a fit, reconciling the sudden re-emergence of the Dark Side on the planet with the already established and entrenced Light Side that arrived with Revan's descendant, whatever the woman's name was. It was the first time in nearly a month Selene had smiled so broadly. She looked down upon her path, and continued on, leaving the Light Side for the Terentateks and much worse to deal with.
"Ramal?
The milkwhite spectre suddenly stood in Selene's path just ten feet ahead, staring with wide expanses of white instead of eyes. It wore robes, a battery pack on a belt pulled tight around their slender waist. It's voice was scared, shaking, even as it sounded like it belonged in that place between sleeping and awake to Selene. "No," was the only response Selene offered, her right hand nearing the lightsaber on her belt.
"Where is he? Where is my lover, our protector? He said he would come back for us when the ship was ready."
Selene narrowed her eyes at the pathetic spirit. The face of the spirit turned upward as a shriek exploded from the milkwhite image of what was once a woman, shaking the Rift on every level, unleashing a chain reaction of Dark Side spawn howls in response, fueling the hunger and rage of the beasts climbing quick to feed on the Light Siders. The sound had left her ears ringing, her eyes clinched tight, and her body rocked by the Force onto the ground. When eyes opened there was no spectral figure, only an open path down. Selene cleared her throat and pushed herself up to her feet, the carefully designed cockpit having shielded her body from broken bones but the crash landing still left her sore. Everywhere. Slowly she got back to her feet with a grunt, and started forward again.
"Too late for good-bye, Ramal?"
"Verressa was a very talented healer, but she was always naive."
The man's cold voice echoed through her own mind, the very reason she had come to Tython. Ramal Vi, the ancient Je'daii Ranger, and secret Dark Side user. The woman was doubtlessly part of his hidden cell of Dark Siders. She had read the journal countless times: the Je'daii had discovered one of their own, it was only a matter of time until their imprisoned fellow told the Je'daii what they were doing, what they had stolen, and where they were hiding. So Ramal had told the remaining members of his group to make for the Rift, hide there where the Dark Side would protect them long enough for him to come back for them and get them off the planet.
They believed him, or desperation had left them no choice but to believe him. It would buy him time to go on his next Ranger mission, the opportunity he needed to leave without a trace. Their sacrifice would allow him to survive and thrive off Tython. He just took what he needed and ran, leaving them to waste away in the poisoned emptiness of the Rift. That sounded like something Selene might have done, a thought that made her chuckle as she carefully descended narrow paths downward, the presence of something very powerful and very dark growing the further down she got.
"You're not far. Watch for the wyrms. Our blood should protect you."
Should, he told her through echoes, as if that was supposed to make her feel better. It wasn't the wyrms that were upon the forefront of her mind as she lowered herself from one rocky narrow platform down to the next with a drop of ten feet, then a drop of twenty feet. Shadows danced every time she landed, the very Dark Side reacting to her presence. She felt clear, and she had never felt so strong. Like the entire Dark Side of the Force had focused itself on her, the only Dark Side user on the planet of Tython.
After the twenty foot drop was a small platform, and then just heat. As she peeked over the edge she found lava flow steaming and hissing as it met water flow. Between the steam could be seen shifts of movement, something, or somethings were alive and stirring down there. Selene felt her lips start to smile again as she embraced the full flow of the Dark Side power she felt focus on her, and simply stepped off the edge of the small rocky outcropping and plunged down into the steam and heat and danger below.
This was not here.
Curious, Selene thought in response to the statement from Ramal's echo. Looking around after landing softly she found only newly formed lava rock barely cool enough to not melt her boots onto her feet. Moving quickly was essential to staying upright, but her academic mind still wondered: was this the result of Tython? Was this the Rift's response to the hidden lair? There wasn't time to fully consider all the options and weigh them accordingly. The entrance of the cave stood before her, whisperings just past her hearings coming from deep within, two pale spirits with faces hidden in bonewhite shadow under spectral hooded robes.
The moment she took a step forward, spectral blades came to life and the game was on. It was her left hand that acted in response, not the right hand near her lightsaber hilt. For this she needed Ramal's amulet, not her lightsaber. Both spirits knelt, hissing and howling and cursing Ramal Vi. They hate you. They know you left them. What are you sending me into?
Entering she began to sweat, the heat of the Rift cave so intense, her breathing became difficult and her vision blurred. But yet she still saw after near fifty steps into the cave, where it windened and opened up to reveal an ancient study and lab. The machinary looked pre-Republic, and she knew it was, based on the Kwa technology that had housed them and transported them to this planet.
The skeletons were everywhere. At least a dozen, though Selene didn't count them as she stepped over them she did look for what the story they told. They held each other as they starved to death, some skeletons tossed against a far cutout in the rock, like a pit for the dead. Cannabalism, murder, starvation. The Dark Side pulsated and whispered history into her ear like it never had before. It was distraction, she knew, because the echo of her ancestor told her.
And in the darkness, where there was no light, she found it's glow. Blood red, angry, crackling and floating with six skeletons sprawled out all around it...the crystal. The purpose for arrival. It happened as expected, no less. She felt her hands move, she felt her mind haze over. The fight for control had begun. Through gritted teeth and immense effort, Selene mocked him, "Did you think your own blood would be half as stupid and naive?"
"SERVE OR SHE WILL DIE."
That was his mistake. Ramal had never loved anything but himself, that had become preciously clear to Selene. Selene loved her sister. It was the only thing in the Galaxy outside of knowledge she truly loved. Threaten that? The rage was always her key, as revenge had been his. The rage of the living would trumpet the revenge of the dead. She was left with one option, as pure anger forged her right hand into an unstoppable force. Up came the lightsaber, then ignition, then it moved. The very instant it neared the crystal, everything seemed to explode in light, every sound of every scream, every ounce of pain and love, everything they were, everything they'd ever be...
BOOM.
Nothing but steam and lava would remain within minutes, yet the rumble of the explosion persisted, at least it might seem like that ot the Jedi above as the giant wyrm went screaming up the opening of the Rift, destroying the very path Selene had used to find her way down, as she found her way up on it's back. Near the top it stopped, roared a sound that sounded like no nature creature, a pure Force Scream. A sound that sounded like a fanfare of trumpets to Selene, announcing the arrival of the Dark Sider to the near surface of the planet. A quick hop and Selene's feet hit rock, abandoning the wyrm moments before it snapped forward and ripped into the rock of the Rift, twisting it's massive hundred foot in length body upward as it chewed and pushed through the rock, towards the surface.
The world was hazy green again, the sound of wind howling once more loud, now that Selene had gotten to near surface level. Not far above she could feel the presence of half a dozen Dark Side spawn Terentateks closing on the undeniable presence of the Light Side. Hopefully the Dark Side spawn would allow her an opening to slip past, because now all she needed was escape from a planet that she knew there was next to no escape from. But she had a plan, and the second phase of it was now kicked off as she began to climb up for the surface with whatever hand hold and rocky platform to jump up to she could find.
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