TheElvenJedi

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

- All sounds good on the first two points to me! Pretty sure there was some sort of terminal thing there too XD though heavens knows how/why the Rakata built it up there...

- Love the idea of the door being locked to everyone except those who have/had a Force bond too. Seems like something they would engineer for sure XD

- an interlude sounds VERY appropriate, as you say they never really got a chance for one between last act and this one, and they've got a LOT to process and deal with. Poor Bol especially seems like he needs one D: (Awww Ethan, Buddy, she's waaaaayy too old for you XD I'm not sure on Ari there, I think she'd be too worried about Yerbol to leave him on his own for very long in all honesty XD she can tell something is off and the fact that he doesn't know/can't even tell her what it is either is understandably very concerning for her haha XD)

- Well, we completely turned all the Lore on its head for Act I, so I'm super looking forward to seeing where we go from here with this act. Does almost feel like a separate "Chapter" (or series, even, if we're thinking in terms of TV shows and so forth lol) to the other three acts *excited flailing*

Ooohh Kira! Nah, why not, I say let's have her tag along, poor girl Dx might give her the closure she needs too? (plus, and I do stand corrected but I'm sure she hasn't?) no one has seen her since she ran off after Voldon died, so it would be SO Kira, as you say, to pop up out of the blue again with some kind of crazy scheme.

Sounds like a good outline so far! What do you think? :')

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

Ayeeeeee, those are some good ideas there my friend o.o yes to both of those first points, Odessen would be perfect for them to set up a 'secret' base and all the yes to being captured by Val later on the way to Zakuul.

As for Revan and Meetra, eeek. So many good options there, PERHAPS (since it would be a shame to not include them both somehow?) Revan is alive and present on Odessen, but Meetra has been captured and tortured by Val, and Revan has been trying to free her... But since they're both old by now it's more difficult for him to match up to Val and Arcan so he has to enlist the Qyaari's help?

And perhaps said attempted rescue mission could result in their capture? And they have to escape down onto Zakuul to find Val and Meetra in the room with the Eternal throne?

And then... I envision a big confrontation of some sort (a la KOTFE minus the getting frozen in carbonite part? XD) where either Revan or Meetra (OR as you say, perhaps both? They're old and tired as hell by now I imagine and I know my Revan would rather go be with Bastila in the end XD) attempt to face Val and fall, but the Qyaari escape back to Revan's Academy on Odessen to reconvene with what's left of the True Sith they had trained? (:
With possibility to have one or two (one each, twins perhaps?) actual Sith Purebloods to be among them, descendents of Renso's sisters perhaps, who have been hiding out with Revan due to knowing of Val's influence over the Empire and blah blah?

.... Okay, brainfart over for now I think lol hopefully at least some of that made sense XD

I KNOW ISN'T IT. I'M SO EXCITED. and I'm not ashamed to admit I legitimately cried when they showed the crystal caves because HOT DAMN THEY'RE SO BEAUTIFUL ;w; they're everything the crystal caves SHOULD have been o:

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

Okay, that's at least soothing XD I look forward to the big reveal in the meantime!

Indeed, haha! Sounds like a plan, it's getting late over here so I'm probably going to disappear for the night too so no worries :)

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

ALSO THE APEIRON DEVS RELEASED A PLANET TEASER/REVEAL AND HOLY CRAP IT LOOKS AMAZING LOOK

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

AAAAHHH, I was slightly concerned for him before but now I'm REALLY worried and so is poor Ari D: (but also excited to find out later dhfhg *flails*)

So, Aria proposed two options, I figure if they go with the first one it'd give them a little bit of time to try and process things before diving right into the complete unknown? Either way they'd have to take some time to decipher the coordinates and give our duo some time to talk before all the crap hits the fan? XD

We alsoooooo need to figure out some of the other places they're going to go to. I'm going to assume that eventually they'd end up on Ziost, and perhaps Zakuul? But between that, there'd be some other Rakata worlds they'd have to go to that we'd have to make up? XD

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

Despite Aria's earlier scolding when Kytra had brought it up, the Champion couldn't help but take in the gorgeous landscape with silent appreciation as they made their way up and over the rise. Even the Tuk'ata seemed to be enjoying themselves, trotting ahead of the group with their tails arched high over their backs as they nosed curiously through the detritus that was scattered all about the surface of the pathways. The grisly artefacts didn't bother Aria, of course, she had seen FAR worse in Korriban and in their adventures since then (a brief flash of the disembodied, castrated corpses Illesia had left for them in the sewers on Nar Shaddaa sprang into her mind’s eye).

Kytra, on the other hand, nearly fainted as Chwuq flounced back towards the Qyaari with a humanoid skull clasped in her teeth. Aria abruptly stepped between the hound and her apprentice, perching her hands on her hips as she stared at Chwuq and ordered firmly. “Drop it. NOW.” while Kytra turned her back and hid her face in her paws.

The Tuk'ata needed little encouragement, plopping the skull down at her master’s feet almost as soon as the words had been spoken, as if she were trying to prove a point.
“Others…Come. Here.” she rumbled, struggling to articulate the warning, though she pawed at the skull insistently. “Not safe. Go…home, now?”
That didn't inspire confidence. Even the dogs were nervous of their path. And yet…

“No, we can't go home.” Aria sighed, scratching behind Chwuq’s ears soothingly. “We're so close now, we HAVE to find them.”
Chwuq snorted in distaste, shaking her fur out though she made no further protest as Kytra managed to compose herself and turned back.
“I'm alright, sorry Master, I was just caught off guard, it won't happen again.”
Aria had to give her credit, even if she WAS still the most skittish of the four of them, she hadn't thrown up this time and that was a marked improvement.
Neither of the pair made a protest as Yerbol suggested they kept their guard up on their approach, each drawing a saber as they fell in with the two men. Chwuq and Taral assumed their positions at the front and rear of the group once more, and the Qyaari crept warily towards the temple.

Being met by solid copper doors which were shut fast was certainly very suspicious. However, that didn't draw their immediate attention as the pedestal that was standing in front of it opened up to reveal the contents within.
Aria felt a lump form in her throat as the holocron flickered to life, the tiny, bright points that marked out each planet appearing first, and one by one dotted lines formed to connect them to one another in a confusing jumble.
“What…Is that?” Kytra breathed, the map coordinates mirrored in her irises as she stared at it in awe.
Before Yerbol could finish his answer, however, the Champion’s legs buckled underneath him as, she assumed, another vision overlook him. Thankfully, this time Aria was close enough to catch him and gently lower him onto his knees before he hit his head on the foot of the pedestal. She gently supported her partner through the entirety of the ordeal, her heart clenching uncomfortably as she watched his eyes flickering back and forth at unnatural speed. Was this what she'd looked like when this happened to her? No wonder he'd looked so worried when she came back to.

Words could not describe her relief when Yerbol’s eyes opened once again. Aria had prepared to firmly push him back down and insist that he take a moment to recover, yet the Champion seemed far weaker this time, his body falling forward despite her best efforts to help him stay upright.
“Woah, easy, baby, easy…” Aria frowned worriedly, but stepped back to allow him to rise on his own as he waved them off.

Something was off, she could tell. But was now the time, or the place, to bring it up? Would there EVER be a time or a place? She pushed it aside for now. Figure out where we have to go, then while we're en route maybe you can get him to talk, she decided.

“Alright.” she spoke out loud as Taral whimpered anxiously and shoved his muzzle under Yerbol’s arm, settling into a semi-content purr as the Champion weakly patted his nose to reassure him. “So, we have a Star Map, that's a start.” when she was confident Yerbol wouldn't require her to catch him again, Aria rose to her feet and approached the map, her jaw slackening momentarily as she realised how densely packed the coordinates were. There were so many….
“How are we EVER going to narrow it down from…this?” Kytra gestured helplessly at the map, circling it restlessly as she frowned at it from each new angle, hoping it would somehow grant an epiphany of sorts.
Aria joined the Selonian, her finger pointing out each of the planets as she spoke their names. “Well, we can discard all of these planets on the fringes of the Outer Rim and Hutt Space: Ilum, Makeb, Oricon, Rishi, Yavin Four…they might have gone there once, but I doubt it was before they came to Lehon, which, from the coordinates Vano sent us, would be… Here.”
That only ruled out about seven points however, and still left them with HUNDREDS to sort through. Aria's jaw slackened as she processed this, shaking her head and moving past the pedestal to examine the door behind it.

She could make no more sense of the carvings upon it than her husband, of course, but that didn't mean that the door couldn't, in theory, be opened. After all, the young Champions had once moved an entire stone slab out of the opposite wall in order to form a bridge that they could cross, how was a door any different?
She exhaled softly, closed her eyes, and extended her hands at the same time as she did her senses, and attempted to heave the door open by force. Kytra quickly figured out her Master’s plan and joined her, as did the two Sith Hounds, although it seemed to make no difference.

Karking. Copper. THAT'S how this was different.

Five minutes later, Kytra was leaning heavily against the left hand panel and Aria was breathing heavily as she swiped the sweaty hair out of her eyes.
“Stuck!” both Tuk'ata chittered in unison, the Champion rolling her eyes as she drawled sarcastically.
“How VERY astute of you, I hadn't noticed.” an exasperated huff left her, turning back to Ethan and Yerbol. “Its solid copper, it’s not budging… But there could be clues in there that could help us triangulate some of these coordinates and narrow the list down.” she gestured back to the Star Map, “OOOOOOOR, we can take it back to the ship, see if we can get Vano back on the line and let the archive computers do it for us. But who knows if we can get a signal through to Zinuthra from here, the Elders got cut off right as we landed…”

Truthfully, she had no idea how to open this blasted door and Aria wasn't so sure she wanted to ask Yerbol to help them, he seemed unsettlingly weak all of a sudden and the last thing they needed was the other Champion collapsing on them.

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

Okay, I KNOW I said tomorrow, but I started writing and I couldn't stop hahaha XD

Since you mentioned mixing personal revelations in there, I threw in one of Aria's and also a possible reason behind said relatives/loved ones making an appearance. After all, Revan is a tactical genius and I think he would want to make sure anyone who DID follow them would be strong enough to face Val and the Dark Ones ;)
Context for Ari's vision: "You always have a choice" were the last words her mother said to Ari before she killed her so, yep that was below the belt a little Revan XD

Had fun with all the KOTOR references too *squees* ONWARD, to Lehon and more references still! XD

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

Aria swallowed the lump in her throat that formed as they approached the raised dais and the figures appeared to them. Having a hunch that the set of visions they received here would be the most brutal ones yet, the Champion made the wise decision to situate herself opposite Yerbol, with her back leaning against one of the spires for support as the apprentices arranged themselves on either side of their mentors and Yerbol began explaining the concept of shared meditation to them.
“It’s a very…personal exercise.” Aria supplemented as Yerbol prompted her into the conversation, “You have to have a lot of trust in the person you're meditating with… Or have nothing to hide.” with that encouragement to hand, Aria straightened her back and relaxed her shoulders, clasping her right hand over her heart and, when the other three looked at her in confusion, elaborated her reasoning behind the gesture: “If Revan and Meetra were both doing it, it must symbolise something. The Force might show us more if we mirror their postures exactly.”
The nodding seemed to ripple through her companions as they, too, shifted their positions and-

The visions flooded in almost instantly, one after the other, so clear and distinct that every detail, every word, came as if she had been standing right there when it had happened.
Revan turned to look at them, towards the end, speaking a single warning.
Do not follow, unless you would see yourself swallowed by a darkness even I cannot comprehend.

If you didn't want to be found, or followed, why leave a map? It seemed a fair observation to Aria, but it seemed to amuse him as he scoffed in retort.
Fools. The lot of you.

The next face she saw was entirely unexpected and hit her like a sucker punch to the gut. A face she thought she would never, ever see again.

She barely looked any different, each curl in her hair was immaculate as always, and meeting her dark gaze was like looking into a mirror. Only the grating timbre of her voice betrayed the mass hemorrhaging of her lungs which had taken her life.

Aria, you don't have to do this. Please. You can still turn back.

Mother? What… H-How are you…?

Chasing Revan drove your father mad. Don't let that be your fate.
I HAVE to. It’s what I do!

You have a choice, sweetheart. You ALWAYS have a choice.

No, I don't. I never had a choice. Not since I first set foot on Korriban, and not now either.
She knew that with the utmost certainty. And regardless, if Yerbol made his mind up to go, she wasn't going to let him go alone.

Aria's face was entirely drained of colour as she snapped back to wakefulness. The others looked no better, Yerbol was shaking and breathing heavily, Kytra's fur was prickling and Ethan looked decidedly unsteady where he sat, hands braced against the marble floor.

“Lehon.” Aria finished as Yerbol seemed to have trouble formulating the sentence. Even though they had all seen the visions, the map, it seemed more final to say it out loud.
“But how do we GET there?” Ethan prompted, ever focused on the task at hand. He shakily rose to his feet once more and moved around the dais, searching for something that might give them the location of this mysterious planet. Kytra took a moment longer to recenter herself, clearly she too had been affected by whatever she had seen in the last part of the vision - it appeared they had each seen something different, something designed, perhaps, by Revan and Meetra, to shake their spirits and quail their determination to follow. The Selonian paused as she dusted herself off and frowned at her mentor.
“Master Aria, are you…crying?”
“NO!” Aria protested vehemently, palming the tears away quickly and hoping that Yerbol wouldn't see right through the tough girl act.

We have to focus. She reminded him firmly through the Force bond. Whatever any of us saw then, we CAN'T let it stop us from going after them.
_____________________________

The Qyaari now stood in the CIC on the Commodore, with the coordinates for Lehon (which had been tricky to find out, but with some help from the Elders and the combined effort of their own wits and the Zinuthra's library archives) plugged into the navcomputer courtesy of Ethan, and the autopilot engaged to allow them all to gather around the holoprojections of the Council of Elders.
“Oh, you're all alive.” Cheriss sounded both surprised and immensely relieved, “Good, good. What did you find?”
The Champions and their apprentices then proceeded to recount their experiences on Malachor, concluding with their current destination.
“Lehon?” Ailel repeated, tenting her hands together as she mused aloud: “Now there's a name I'd only ever seen in holocrons and data archives.”
“What’s the significance of this planet, Master Ailel?” Kytra leaned forward curiously as the Elder explained.
“It was the place where the...Dark Ones, built the Star Forge. Revan went there once, it's where Bastila fell to the Dark Side, corrupted by the essence of the machine.”

So that was what the vision had shown them.

“They must have left something else there for you, another Star Map, perhaps?”
“Or clues to these Dark Ones.” Aria suggested, her mouth pressed into a thin line. “The name alone doesn't give us much to go on… Dark what, Dark Side, dark skinned? It could be anything.”
A bleep from the Commodore’s cockpit drew their attention briefly. Neta excused herself from the room to return to the yolk and bring the ship down through the stratosphere. Moments later, her voice announced over the comm line.
“Well, we'll soon find out! Hold onto your hats, kiddos, looks like it might get bumpy again!”
“Take care… Don't- Unnecessary risks-”
“Revan… Always- Unpredictable, even as… Jedi-”
Cheriss and Ailel’s last warnings were at first broken up, as if the line had suddenly become very strained, before it went completely dead.
“That's comforting.” Aria snorted sarcastically, stumbling forward into the display table as the ship rocked once, then levelled out.

The landing wasn't quite as tricky as Malachor, but it certainly couldn't have been called smooth. The Qyaari stood warily before the viewport windows, surveying the landscape before them.
“Doesn't look so dangerous.” Kytra mumbled, her whiskers twitching as her bright eyes watched the roiling waves breaking on creamy white sand beaches. “Looks like a vacation planet.”
“We're not here to take a holiday.” Aria reminded her apprentice firmly, raising a hand to point at the large dome that jutted into view over the furthest hillside. Three large spires jutted out from each side, giving it an appearance almost similar to the dais they had sat on only hours earlier. “That looks ominous. I'd bet next month’s pay that that's where we should head.”
“The Dark Ones… You don't think they could be the True Sith, Masters?” Kytra suggested, craning her head upwards towards the Champions. “The buildings, they look the same, the shape, the circles, the spires.”
“I don't know.” Aria admitted, glancing to her partner for his input. “Appearances can be deceiving, and if they'd built the Star Forge I'm almost SURE there would still be more True Sith around today. Technology like that would've made them unstoppable.”

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

Oh man, he is... I feel for the poor guy, he's already a bitter old man by now (he might not be crazy but I'll be damned if abandoning his family and never watching his son grow up didn't have some kind of effect on his psyche XD), he's going to be pretty upset I'm sure. Might even be kinder to have him die heroically and put him out of his misery LOL but we can explore that closer to the time for sure! ;)

Sounds like a plan, batman XD ooohh, actually you have a GOOD point there. Why didn't I think of that *facepalms* them holocalling the Elders while en route would be far more expedient indeed, let's go with that XD

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

Ohhhh maaaaaannnn I got CHILLS from those visions (and Lysa being there hurt my heart a little aaahh D:) Working on a post now so should have something up by tomorrow at the latest!

One thing I wanted to clear up though, in terms of getting them OFF Malachor, did we need to discuss how they were going to do that or are you alright if I just jump them back over to Neta's ship/arriving back on Zinuthra at the end of my post?