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You encounter him on Kashyyyk.
He--or whoever the hell was piloting that ship of his--had nearly killed you during your grueling, unimaginable climb, but truthfully, so had the flora, the fauna, and the borderline suicidal exertion of it all. Spry, you are, and lucky, definitely, but a seasoned mountaineer you are not. It's been starting to feel like this archaic tree is meant to be your grave.
At the top, triumphant, is where he finds you.
He's familiar, oddly, despite the utter concealment of himself beneath that impenetrable uniform. Small gestures and shifts that conjure something nondescript and long-forgotten, like a language not spoken but once surrounded by. Your sweating face becomes taught and rigid, straining to lend a closer ear to his movements and posture.
“We don’t have to be enemies,” is what he says as he drops from the open ramp of his ship, boots squelching against the sodden earth across this makeshift arena from you.
Modulated, robotic, and unenlightening.
“Really?” comes your haggard and skeptical response.
Your hand ventures automatically to your saber, slipping it from your belt and igniting it between you despite your cynical expectations. Doom weighs over you. If something so passive as the planet’s terrain could come so close to taking your life, what real hope did you have of defending yourself against one who actually desired it for himself?
Well, it's hope wrought from artifice, but it hasn’t abandoned you entirely. The kind of hope that empowers the Force--the kind that might just deliver you towards one last miraculous survival, the same as it had from the last Inquisitor you faced. Hopefully.
He either laughs or exhales. The saber at his belt remains ignored.
“Really,” he confirms. “Come with me, and it’ll be easier than you think.”
“With you?” you sneer back. Your weight shifts back and forth to secure your footing. “I don’t know if my sprinting across the entire galaxy to escape you freaks was any indication, but that isn’t exactly an option.”
The Inquisitor nods. “Sure it is. Actually, it’s your only option.”
Rather than respond, you brace yourself, raising your saber in preparation to defend and doing your best to tune out the erratic pounding of your heart. The Inquisitor hesitates, maybe deliberating, his arms crossing over his chest.
“...I don’t really wanna fight you,” he deigns to reveal eventually, a tilt to his head.
Your scoff nearly stumbles on into nervous laughter. “Well, that’s a new one. And why not?”
He shrugs. “You’ll die.”
Good to know someone has faith in you. “Isn’t that the point?”
“Yeah… For some of us, it is.”
His gloved hands reach upwards without urgency to rest against his helmet, sliding his fingers to the back and unlocking its mechanism with a quiet hiss. It rises, falls, and lands wetly in the mud.
...Ah.
Something hot, acidic, devastating swallows you from the inside, rendering you paralyzed as your absent recognitions click together. Kestis. You place him immediately. Cal Kestis of your youngling clan on Coruscant, an unremarkable boy who grew for years at your side. Last you recall of him was at the Gathering, his crystal carefully, vigilantly in his grasp, as though he didn’t trust himself to keep it intact; just a little too tense to construct his saber smoothly on the first (or second) attempt. He had always been like that, too nervous for his own good, and painfully scared--not for his life, but for his worth. Once or twice, you had selfishly taken the time to think back on that eager and pitiful boy, to hope that, wherever he was, his master had found a way to encourage those useless habits out of him.
Perhaps your hopes had gone unanswered; and perhaps that is why Cal had not survived.
Revolting, grieving, ruined yellow eyes stare affably back at your sickened expression. He’s grown so much, but his hair is just as vibrant as you remember. A freckled face now strewn with scars to match.
“...I was wondering why someone new had started following me,” you say, with all the effort and strain of pulling out your own teeth. You think you would’ve preferred to die in your ascent than to see that this has become of him. “Didn’t think your ‘sister’ would let anyone else have the pleasure. She’s kind of obsessed with me.”
Oh, stars, what happened, Cal? What happened to you?
“So am I,” he jokes, but how he could overcome the guilt of betrayal to do such a thing, you cannot comprehend. “When I realized it was you she’s been hunting, I knew I had to get to you first.”
“So you can do the honors yourself?”
Where did you hide? When were you found? How long has this been your existence?
“So I can make sure she doesn’t,” he corrects.
He says your name--the final piece slipping into place, shattering your last feeble hopes of misunderstanding--and steps mindfully forward, one hand outstretched and the other still stubbornly neglecting his weapon. Even at his distance, the sight provokes a small flinch. Your hands are starting to ache from how tightly they cling to your saber.
How badly did they hurt you, Cal? What did they take from you? How could this have happened?
“I want you to come with me,” he repeats pointedly. “Running only works for so long, and you know I’m the only one who’ll go easy on you.”
“I don’t know anything. How the hell can you expect me to trust you?” you spit back at him--and as you do so, your saber strays dangerously close to slipping between your fingers and joining your heart among the dirt.
You were kind. I know you were.
“I know you, and you know me,” he says simply, gesturing between you respectively. “This doesn’t happen often. There are so few of us left.”
“Yeah, and it looks like we’ll be down one more in a few minutes.” You tilt your saber towards him, a defensive position shifting into one of provocation. His eyes flicker blankly from your face down to the weapon’s point.
Maybe… maybe I was mistaken. Maybe this would've happened regardless.
With a sigh, he reluctantly takes the sheath from his belt and twirls it in his hand. “If you really want to fight, then we’ll fight. But you’re not going to win, and I’m not going to kill you.”
I didn’t know you, after all. Not really.
It can't end here. How could it? There’s too much work to be done, it’s too important a task, and Cere’s counting on you--she may never find anyone else to count on. The galaxy is as well, and that's why the rushing of your blood deafens your ears and makes your head feel light and weak. Even still, there’s a part of you that agrees with him. The shaky, fluttering breaths you force yourself to take do little to calm you down, and the world around you seems desperate to start spinning.
The only choice is to try. For Cere, for Cordova and BD-1 at your shoulder, for the Jedi that came before you and those who persist in hiding, those who have yet to exist and those who have yet to be made, and, alright, even for Greez. He'll miss you more than he'd ever admit.
And, maybe selfishly, you know it must be done for Cal--the one in your memories, the one who was a boy before he was a weapon. You may be the last sentient left alive to remember him.
...But, stars, I wish I had.
As his lightsaber ignites into a cruel and screaming red, he smiles.
“Y’know, I always liked you,” he muses, evidently liberated from the notion of mercy. He flourishes his blade playfully, showing off, like it’s all a game to him. “You made everything look so easy. I thought about you all the time.”
This isn’t really Cal--not one worth wasting any hope on, at least, so no words he could say should merit a response. Blinking erratically, you wonder if you have any chance at all while this incessant water floods your vision. Will you ever see Cere again? Should you silence the faithful droid at your back before it's knowledge can succumb to his grasp? Is there any chance at all of speaking once more to the boy from your childhood?
No matter how this corruption intends to toy with you, there's only one real option. Only one outcome you can ensure.
When you die at his feet, untainted by his hands or his doctrine, would the soul of him be grateful?
“I’m glad you survived," he tells you, roving towards you with boyish confidence. The grin against his cheeks pulls ever wider, sinister in its sincerity.
"You’ll make a great Inquisitor.”