Chapter Text
SITH WARSHIP INIQUITOUS
The Star Destroyer Iniquitous, its hull plating gleaming silver as it reflected sunlight from the system's primary star, speared through the blackness of space, orbiting high above a planet.
Admiral Saul Karath, Supreme Commander of the Sith Fleet, glanced up from his station and took in the view before him; the dark green world of Vurdon Ka spun slowly beneath the Iniquitous, the wisps of white cloud that formed the planet’s dense, moist atmosphere seeming to gracefully dance in the admiral’s vision. A mauve-tinted nebula floated behind Vurdon Ka, acting almost as a backdrop to the planet.
Karath knew that the planet was practically a paradise. The native species, the Vuvrians, had evolved with almost no natural predators, and so they were known as a peaceful people famed for their exceptional piloting and problem-solving abilities.
But... then again... thought Karath, those heads look bloody ugly.
The Vuvrians were not blessed with the most handsome of looks; with twelve eyes, distributed almost randomly around their entire head, a Vuvrian had omnidirectional sight, which also made their alien faces even more alien to the casual observer.
Lord Revan had arrived at Vurdon Ka to secure the Vuvrians’ partnership in his Sith Empire. Whether that was to be achieved diplomatically — or at the end of a lightsabre blade — was entirely up to them. Their planetary leader, Governor Mylthea, had been awoken in the early hours to find Lord Revan’s shuttle practically right on her front doorstep; seeing the Sith Lord flanked by his best troops was, Karath imagined, probably quite provoking.
Revan had been planetside for almost four hours now. His apprentice, Lord Malak, had attempted to contact Revan several times, but to no avail; he had even gone out of his way to disturb Karath a handful of times to get the admiral to contact Revan, and even he had only been able to receive a terse message from the group captain stating that they would be in touch once an agreement had been reached.
Karath turned to the officer working at his right, a dark-skinned human woman. “Lieutenant, is there any update from the surface?” he asked for what felt like the thousandth time.
She shook her head. “Not yet, sir.” A trilling began to sound at her station. “Admiral, sir. There’s a communiqué coming in, your eyes only.”
Karath nodded. “I’ll take it in my office, Lieutenant.”
Admiral Karath’s personal office was just off the main bridge, only a short distance down the corridor that connected it to the main turbolift network. As he entered, the room brightened as the motion sensors detected his presence, and he paced toward his computer screen. Tapping a few buttons, Karath brought up the communiqué that the lieutenant had forwarded to his office.
Immediately, Karath’s screen was filled with the startling visage of Darth Malak. “Lord Malak,” he said by way of greeting.
“Admiral Karath,” Malak replied. His voice was distorted by the tinny vocoder in his metal jaw and throat prosthetic, the remnant of an old duelling wound. “There’s a situation developing that requires your personal attention.”
“A situation, Lord Malak?” he asked carefully.
Malak’s yellow eyes seemed to bore straight through the admiral’s head. “Where do your loyalties lie, Admiral?”
“My... my loyalties, my lord?” Karath felt his jaw tensing slightly.
“If there were to be a... rearranging of the command structure,” Malak said, “would you remain loyal to the Dark Lord of the Sith?” He paused. “Whoever that may be,” he added, almost as an afterthought.
Karath suddenly found himself in a dangerous position. If Malak was going to try to challenge Revan’s rule and take the mantle of Dark Lord for himself, Karath would naturally have to make a choice between the two Sith. Should he remain loyal to Darth Revan, or would his life last longer if he pledged his allegiance to Darth Malak? Either way, his life was forfeit if he now made the wrong move.
He also knew that the majority of the fleet would follow Karath himself, whichever choice he made; the commanders, generals, and admirals would fall in line, though a handful would require... subtle persuasion. Both Sith Lords had their own followers within the command structure, and that itself would cause hiccups along the way.
However, Karath also knew that Malak had his own spies aboard the Iniquitous. They were there primarily to keep tabs on Revan’s forces — Revan had also placed spies on Malak’s flagship, the Leviathan — and Karath was sure that if he were to say that he remained loyal to Revan, Malak would ensure his spies rapidly brought Karath’s life to a rather unnatural conclusion.
It was that image that settled the argument in the admiral’s mind.
“Lord Malak, you shall have my support.”
Malak nodded slowly. “Very good, Admiral. When the time comes, my people shall contact with you. Until then, I trust this conversation will remain between us.”
“Yes, Lord Malak,” said Karath, but Malak’s face had already disappeared from the screen.
Before the admiral could even begin to think of what life would be like serving under Darth Malak’s rule, the comm chirped to life. “Admiral Karath, Lord Revan’s shuttle has signalled that they are returning to the Iniquitous.”
“Thank you, Lieutenant. I’ll meet them in the main hangar bay.”
********************
“Addendum: the massacre you unleashed was, without a doubt, the bloodiest massacre I have had the utmost honour of participating in.”
Revan’s personal droid, a rust-red HK unit that he’d built himself shortly after the Battle of Malachor, had been pontificating on the recent ‘talks’ with the Vuvrian leadership; Revan had been hoping to bring the Vuvrians into his empire through relatively peaceful means, but he’d always suspected that Governor Mylthea would more than likely turn against the Sith Lord.
Which was why Revan had filled his shuttle with two full squads of his best troops.
Following Revan’s arrival, the governor had proceeded with the charade of hosting a lavish meal set on his personal veranda, even though the Sith Lord had arrived in the early hours of the morning. Revan grew weary of the song and dance within an hour, and he had signalled HK-47 to begin firing on the manse.
Which was when Governor Mylthea signalled her own troops to attack.
As it turned out, the governor had been keeping her own army in the manse’s basement level. Clearly, she had been prepared for Revan to initiate aggressive negotiations.
Mylthea’s forces had put up a brave stand against Revan, but she hadn’t foreseen HK-47 detonating bombs he had set up within the basement level after her forces had left it. Revan then left the droid to blast his way through the detritus of the collapsed manse, putting an end to Governor Mylthea’s scheming one soldier at a time.
The governor herself had attempted to flee through a passage dug into the rock below; it hadn’t taken long for Revan to catch up with her — and bring her around to his point of view.
Now, Mylthea was being led off Revan’s shuttle, wrists bound, flanked by four troopers. Her nightgown was ripped in places, and she had a nasty bruise on the left of her face.
Revan looked around as he exited the shuttle. The mask Revan wore, a prize taken from the Mandalorian leader during the climactic Battle of Malachor at the end of the Mandalorian Wars, reflected the lights from around the hangar, and the Sith Lord’s eyes could not be seen beneath the black slits of the mask’s visor. Admiral Karath stood at attention, awaiting their return, as did a legion of Sith troopers. “With me, Admiral,” the Dark Lord said, and the admiral followed along as they made their way to the detention cells on deck 30.
They crowded into the spacious turbolift, and the doors closed behind them. “The planet is now under our control,” said Revan. “The Vuvrians will take orders from Governor Mylthea’s replacement, who will take orders from me.” He looked over at Mylthea, who shrank away slightly. “I don’t foresee any setbacks.”
“Very good, Lord Revan,” Karath replied. “What is to be done with Mylthea?”
Revan remained silent for a long moment, hoping to increase the former governor’s dread. “She is to be interrogated.” The lift stopped, and the doors opened. “Then she is to be terminated.”
As Revan ordered the troopers to continue escorting her to her cell, Mylthea gave the Dark Lord a look halfway between anger, denial, and terror. The doors closed again. “Bridge,” said Revan aloud, and the lift went on its way as ordered.
********************
REPUBLIC CRUISER INDOMITABLE
Admiral Forn Dodonna, supreme commander of the Republic Navy, stood on the bridge of the Republic cruiser Indomitable, watching the blue of hyperspace blast past the ship. They were due to rendezvous with a squadron of Jedi fighters in the Outer Rim system of Belsavis, and the admiral was waiting for the Council to contact her with the added details of the upcoming mission.
A half-hour later, the officer at the nav station, Lieutenant Gallea, announced that the Indomitable was to arrive at Belsavis in one minute. Forn knew she didn’t need to issue orders; she had a fine crew, and they worked together seamlessly.
The ship reverted to relativistic space, the sublight engines humming into life and reverberating through the deck plating beneath Forn’s feet. Outside the ports, the off-white orb of Belsavis, the seventh planet in the star system, expanded into view. As they came closer to the planet, Forn began to notice the patches of verdant green dotted around the globe; they were, she knew, the last remnants of Belsavis’ pre-glacial jungles, and the inhabitants had adapted to living in these jungles.
“Sensors, confirm that the Jedi ships are here,” Forn ordered.
“Confirmed, sir,” answered a young lieutenant. “Twenty-five Aurek-class fighters, as well as the Light of Alderaan, one of the old Praetorian-class ships.” Following the Great Sith War thirty years previously, the modern Hammerhead-class had superseded the Praetorian, and so the Jedi had acquired the surviving ships for their own use around the galaxy.
“Advise the fighters that we can only carry an additional ten Aureks, should the pilots wish to stretch their legs. Hail the Alderaan,” she said, and the shadowy blue holographic image of Zhar Lestin, a Lethan Twi’lek and Jedi Master, appeared before her a moment later.
“Master Zhar, I wasn’t aware of your presence on this mission.”
“The Council feels this mission required one of us here to oversee events,” Zhar replied. “I simply volunteered my services.”
“I suppose you want to come aboard my ship?”
“That would be most hospitable of you, Admiral.”
“Well. Just be sure to not make a repeat of what happened the last time you were on the Indomitable,” said Forn, a grin creeping onto her face.
********************
Zhar popped the canopy and exited his fighter. It wasn’t often he was called upon to lead a military mission — owing to the fact that Zhar was more cerebral than high-octane — but this particular mission was... a special case. Zhar had been the only choice to lead the mission. If Kreia had been on Dantooine... if Kreia had heard about this attack, she would have been the first to denounce us, he thought to himself wistfully. Kreia would have had a personal stake in the mission, having been Darth Revan’s first master when he was still a Jedi. She would have hindered us, but to what extent? Zhar wondered.
Beside him, Zhar could see a handful of the other Jedi handpicked for this mission. Bastila Shan, a human woman in her early twenties, stood at the head of the group. Though she had only recently passed her Trials and become a Jedi Knight, Bastila was uniquely strong in the Force. Besides, her natural affinity for battle meditation made her presence on this mission a necessity. There had been very few Jedi who possessed the ability; even the ancient Masters of the Order had only the barest grasp of the technique. It was something that came around once in a generation, Zhar knew, and the Force had willed Bastila to be the next vessel.
Seeing him looking at her, Bastila walked over to Zhar, her navy-green flight suit sitting loosely upon her body. She offered him a smile.
“It seems we made it in time, Master.”
“I never doubted it,” he replied. Turning to his left, Zhar noticed a young Nikto officer making his way toward the group of Jedi. His red and black uniform softly reflected the light from the overheads in the hangar bay.
“Master Jedi,” he said, his voice gravelly. “Admiral Dodonna has asked me to escort you up to the bridge.” Smiling inwardly, Zhar nodded his assent to the officer, and he and Bastila followed him across the hangar bay.
********************
“Master Zhar, welcome aboard the Indomitable.”
The Twi’lek Jedi came toward Forn convivially, a broad smile upon his green visage. “Thank you, Admiral.” He clasped her hands fondly, and she returned the gesture. “It’s been too long since last we met.”
“Yes, that business on Geonosis left an indelible mark on my life. And my service record.”
“Yet you still made the admiralty within a decade.”
Forn turned toward the ports at the front of the bridge. “We’re just about to send the signal to Coruscant that we’re in position. Will you be leading the fighter squadron on this mission?”
Zhar shook his head, his lekku softly brushing against the back of his robes. “No, Admiral. Bastila here will be leading our Jedi squadrons.” The young woman behind him looked at him for a fraction of a moment, almost quizzically — as if Zhar had only now informed her of this decision. “Shall we get the attack underway?”
Forn nodded. Turning to her comms officer, Forn said, “Lieutenant, is the fleet reporting ready for departure?”
Lieutenant Tique, a female Duros from Chandrila, listened to her earpiece for a moment before responding. “All ships report ready, Admiral.”
“Very well, Lieutenant, open a channel to the fleet.” Forn strode to the centre of her bridge. “All ships, this is Admiral Dodonna. Set course for Vurdon Ka, and stand ready for immediate attack. Under no circumstances can this ambush be allowed to fail. Revan cannot be allowed to escape.”
The helm officer, a pilot Lieutenant Hobii, nodded at Forn; the hyperdrive was primed for the jump to hyperspace.
“All ships — jump on my command.”
With any luck, this would be the final battle in a war that had dragged on for far too long.
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SITH WARSHIP INIQUITOUS
The droid hammered its metal fist into Mylthea’s abdomen for what felt like the thousandth time and felt yet another bone crack inside her damaged body. Both of her arms were broken. Several of her toes had been detached, as had her left leg, all of which lay on the floor neatly lined in a row before her. Some kind of rod had been inserted into the open wound at her hip, and when activated via a console, it would heat or cool at a command. Three of her eyes had been removed. One was left dangling by the nerve. And yet, through all this, the droid still would not just... shut up. Throughout the ‘interrogation,’ the blasted thing had proceeded to give its personal opinion regarding organic life forms such as herself. He calls us ‘meatbags,’ she thought ironically. Searing heat overwhelmed her senses as the droid activated the rod inside her hip joint, and just before Mylthea thought she’d pass out from the pain, it disappeared and was replaced by a deep cold touch that was just as painful. Icy tendrils, like tiny daggers, clawed their way up her abdomen.
The metal door slid open suddenly as Mylthea heard heavy footsteps enter the torture chamber. “Aitch-Kay Forty-Seven, Lord Revan has a new mission for you.” Mylthea recognized the voice almost at once — the human admiral, Karath.
“Irritation: Admiral, I must say your timing is as illogical as always; my work here is not yet completed to the standards required by my programming.”
“The prisoner is to be terminated shortly, droid. Your mission here is ended; your priority is now to follow Lord Revan’s new orders.” Mylthea heard definite frustration in the admiral’s words.
The silence as HK-47 considered his response was palpable. It was almost as if the droid was imagining going against the admiral’s — and Darth Revan’s — orders, his programming be damned. Mylthea was turned away from the door; for all she knew, the droid was already raising his hand to crush Karath’s throat.
“Weary answer: Very well, Admiral Karath.”
“Very good, droid. Follow me, and I’ll brief you on the way to your ship.”
The sound of their steps died when the doors closed once again, leaving Governor Mylthea to her thoughts and to her pain.
********************
HK-47’s personal fighter, the Fiend, glided out of the Iniquitous’ hangar bay. His new mission was a target deep in Mandalorian territory. A female meatbag named Enfys Jakobi was making a name for herself as the leader of a local band of Mandalorians, using guerrilla tactics to strike at Sith bases throughout the Mandalorian sector. Clearly, this was not a state of affairs that Lord Revan could allow, and HK-47 was tasked with assassinating Jakobi before she could continue to build her forces and become a rallying figure within Mandalorian society. With any luck (not that he believed in such a thing, of course), HK-47 would return to his master following yet another successful mission, at which point he would indulge himself in a full soak in an oil bath.
HK-47 entered the hyperspace coordinates, and the Fiend accelerated into super-luminal flight.
********************
It is done, my Lord.
Karath reflected on the last words he had spoken to Lord Malak following the assassin droid’s departure. The Sith Lord had decided that HK-47’s presence was too dangerous for his plan to oust Revan as Dark Lord, and Karath had agreed with that assessment. The droid had racked up quite the tally for killing Jedi since Revan’s fleet had emerged from the Unknown Regions. If HK-47 was capable of killing a Jedi, he was also capable of killing a Sith Lord. Both Malak and Karath knew that if he were to have remained aboard the Iniquitous, the droid would have been a major problem, and they only had the one single chance to kill Darth Revan. And so HK-47 needed to be out of range. Now, Karath had only to ensure Revan was alone with Malak for the deed to be complete.
I’m sure as hell not going to get trapped alone in a room with Lord Revan, he thought to himself. Not that I’m anywhere near that foolish.
The intercom built into the wall in his quarters trilled, and the admiral moved to activate it with a press of a button. “Karath here.”
“Bridge, sir. We’re detecting a large Republic fleet emerging from behind the second moon.”
“On my way. Raise shields, ready weapons, and deploy fighter screens. Karath out.”
Exceptional timing, Karath thought ironically, his eyes rolling as he rushed out of his quarters toward the bridge.
********************
REPUBLIC CRUISER INDOMITABLE
The bridge crew worked feverishly as Forn watched them performing their tasks. The fleet had returned to sublight speed within the Vurdon Ka system. Using intelligence gathered by spies positioned in the Sith fleet, Forn knew the real-time positions of all of Revan’s ships orbiting Vurdon Ka. Hence why she had ordered her fleet to hide itself behind one of the planets’ moons.
Master Zhar stood to her left, his purple eyes focused on the view outside the bridge ports. Revan’s fleet was just now coming into view behind Vurdon Ka’s second moon. Forn counted at least eleven of the large Interdictor-class cruisers, four massive Centurion-class battlecruisers, three old and battered Derriphan-class battleships, as well as tiny pinpoints of light that represented the engines of hundreds of Sith fighters.
“This is going to be a tough nut to crack.”
Lieutenant Tique’s red eyes turned toward her. “Admiral, the enemy is turning to flee, their hyperdrives are powering up.”
Forn raised an eyebrow. “Oh, no you don’t, Lord Revan. Give it just a few moments, Lieutenant.” She turned to Zhar. “Any minute now.”
Just then, four Republic cruisers appeared in front of the fleeing Sith fleet. These ships had been retrofitted with the only interdiction systems that Forn could scrounge up from the Muscave Fleet Museum for this mission.
“Republic Interdictors have activated their gravity well projectors, Admiral, and have begun to unload fighters. The Sith fleet is trapped,” stated Tique.
“So far, so good,” said Forn. She turned to the Jedi Master next to her.
“Zhar, you may give the order.”
He nodded and activated the comm unit on his wrist. “All fighters, you are go for launch.”
“Acknowledged. Fighter squadrons launching now.”
Forn stood and strode to Tique. “Give me fleetwide.”
“Yes, sir.” She pressed a couple of buttons, and the intercom trilled.
“All ships, release fighters, and raise shields. We’re in for a rough couple of hours, I’m afraid. But we have a job to do get done, so let’s get it done. Dodonna out.”
********************
REPUBLIC CRUISER EXCALIBUR
Captain Hiyax Meru stood at the forward port on the Excalibur’s bridge, watching his fighters heading out to engage their Sith counterparts. I could very well have served with some of those Sith, he thought to himself. Even some friends.
But those friends had almost killed him back when they’d attacked his homeworld of Telos. Now, Telos was a barren wasteland. No animals, no plants. No life whatsoever. Just dead wasteland.
And to make it even worse, his own wife had turned traitor and joined the Sith ranks before the conflagration. She held just as much culpability for Telos’ bombardment as Malak or Saul Karath. Oh, she had attempted to lure him over, to convince him it was the right decision to make, that Revan’s empire would be better than the Galactic Republic. It was when she’d used their dead son’s memory, claiming that he would’ve done the same, that Meru had lashed out — hit his own wife — and left their home. An hour later he had left the planet. And he had never looked back.
He assumed, as he always did in combat, that his wife was on one of the enemy ships right now, working at one of the bridge stations. Maybe even commanding one of them. Which gave him all the more incentive to want to wipe the scourge of the Sith from the galaxy.
The Excalibur herself had been part of the mothball fleet in orbit of Muscave in the Coruscant system. The ships were there primarily for posterity but, like now, they were capable of being brought back into active service at a moment’s notice.
A stray turbolaser blast struck the ship’s shields close to the bridge tower, lightly rolling the Excalibur as if she were an ancient ship on the ocean. A few icons on the bridge stations around Meru blinked off and back on again in response.
“Comms,” said Meru. “Contact the Windward and the Mobius, tell them to begin strafing the Sith lines. Then let Captain Stryke on the Corvin follow us into the fray. The enemy isn’t getting out of this if we have anything to say about it.”
The comms officer, a human male from Coruscant, had been newly-assigned to the Excalibur direct from the academy. This was his first naval engagement. “Yes, Captain.”
Green turbolaser fire began to hit the Excalibur’s shields with more intensity as the gleaming silver ship joined her sister ships in attacking the enemy directly.
It wasn’t until about thirty seconds later that the Sith fighter squadrons started hitting them. Hard. Meru was dismayed to see sparks beginning to fly from some of the work stations at the rear of the bridge.
“What’s our shield status?” he asked.
“Fore shields at seventy-two percent and falling, Captain,” replied Commander Pash Dotellai, a native of Dantooine and Meru’s first officer. “Port shields at eighty-five percent, and starboard shields holding at ninety.”
Meru nodded. This information wasn’t surprising to him, nor was it particularly encouraging. If the shields fell, he wouldn’t be around long enough to complain about it. “Continue firing on that warship ahead of us. We’re going through their lines whether they like it or not.”
A squadron of Republic fighters raced past the Excalibur’s viewports, almost a blur to Meru’s eyes. Flashes of green and red marked the spray of weapons fire, and explosions marked the end of pilots’ lives in the cold vacuum of open space.
The bridge rocked as the Excalibur’s shields took a beating from the Sith warship it was fast approaching, the silver hull plating reflecting the light from the system’s primary. Hot golden sparks flew from a console to Meru’s right, the acrid smell of burned circuits assaulting his nostrils.
Another hit, stronger this time. Followed by another, and another. Sirens began to blare around him. “Captain! The Sith are focusing their fire on us; shields are failing!”
The enemy loomed large before Excalibur now. “Where’s the Corvin?” Meru asked.
“A hundred meters to starboard, sir. Her shields are failing, too.”
Meru nodded to himself. With the Corvin with them, they might just pull this off, with or without shields to protect them from certain death.
“Comms, tell Stryke to keep heading for the enemy ship ahead. Remind him of what happened at Randon.” The ship rocked again.
The comms officer gave him a somewhat confused affirmative. He listened in his earpiece, then said, “The captain asks ‘are you up or down?’”
“We’ll go up, ensign.”
“Yes, sir.” He relayed the message to the Corvin.
“Lieutenant, how good was your rating at the academy?”
The helm officer, Lieutenant Veronyka Opala, turned to face Meru.
“Top of my class, Captain.”
“Oh, good,” said Meru. “I was worried this might never work.” As an afterthought, he asked, “Did you ever hear about Randon, Lieutenant?”
Opala replied, “Sir. I know that this move worked against the Mandalorians.”
Another explosion tore through the Excalibur, sending yet more sparks flying.
“Yes, Lieutenant, it did. Barely.”
The lieutenant’s eyes went wide for half a moment before she returned her gaze to her console.
“Just be ready to kick into full gear on my mark, Opala,” said Meru. “Keep a channel open to the Corvin, Ensign.”
He began to make out individual viewports on the Sith ship now. Red turbolaser fire battered his ship, as well as the Corvin off their starboard bow. Jedi and Sith fighters continued to swarm around them, their dogfights raging through the bridge viewports.
“On my mark, people,” said Meru.
The Sith warship was so close now, Meru imagined he could almost see the faces of the bastards who populated it.
“Mark!”
Responding to his order, Opala sent the Excalibur flying above the enemy ship, while Captain Stryke’s own helmsman sent the Corvin diving below.
“Target their bridge and fire at will, Commander!” Meru ordered his second-in-command.
Dotellai hastened to acknowledge the order by activating the point-defence laser cannons on the Excalibur’s port hull. Though not powerful enough to punch through a ship’s shields alone, they were more than capable of damaging an enemy ship when within the shield perimeter.
Like they were right now.
The Excalibur’s lasers strafed the shining hull of the warship, causing explosions to violently erupt from the enemy craft. Then, faster than Meru could blink, Opala brought the Excalibur swinging around, allowing Dotellai to open fire with the ship’s forward cannons.
Meru never saw the damage inflicted as the Excalibur continued its 360-degree turn, but sensors told him all he needed to know; the enemy bridge had been obliterated and the warship had lost full attitude control, leaving her adrift in space. If her engineers didn’t work quickly, she would soon be drawn into Vurdon Ka’s gravity well.
“Very well done, everybody,” Meru said. “Opala, get us back on course and take us down into the atmosphere. Dotellai, ensure our troops are ready for a ground assault.”
*********************
Bastila sat cross-legged on the floor of the vacant science lab, her eyes closed and her concentration unwavering. She was deep in the Force, using its ebbs and flows in an attempt to influence the morale — and martial might — of troops, officers, and pilots from both Republic and Sith sides of this battle.
Through the Force, Bastila was able to use this gift, called battle meditation. It was an ancient technique requiring the user to delve deeply into the Force to rally allied forces — whilst disheartening enemy forces. The ability itself had been used by hundreds of Jedi and Sith during the many conflicts the pair had shared in the last millennia or so. By far the most powerful Jedi accomplished in battle meditation was Master Arca Jeth, who had fought in the Great Hyperspace Wars almost thirty years previously.
Six minutes into the battle, Bastila had influenced a great deal of the warzone; Jedi and Republic forces proceeded to take greater confidence in their battle manoeuvres, and the Sith forces began to fall apart in their inability to defend against the onslaught. All of this, Bastila could feel through the Force.
She could also feel two very strong presences in the Force, both strong enough to ignore her influence. Bastila knew that they could only be Revan and Malak.
She pulled herself back into the physical universe and opened her eyes. Sweat had begun to gather on her forehead, and the palms of her hands were just as slick.
Her wrist comm signalled, and Bastila answered to Zhar’s holographic image.
“Bastila, the Sith forces have become uncoordinated,” the Jedi Master reported. “It is time.”
She nodded. “Yes, Master,” she replied. “I’ll make my way to my fighter now.”
Zhar looked at her. “May the Force be with you, young one.” His grave face winked out of existence.
Bastila stood, smoothed her tan robes, and headed for the hangar bay.
********************
Eighteen Jedi fighters eventually followed Bastila into the Iniquitous’ main hangar bay. Republic fighters continued to draw fire away from the Jedi, though a few of Bastila’s wing-mates were cut to pieces in the crossfire. The remaining Jedi increased their speed, slamming through the Iniquitous’ force field and skidding to a halt on the hangar deck. The hangar was deserted of Sith troopers — all the interceptors had been launched, and there was a very low chance of anyone even daring to attempt boarding a Star Destroyer. Bastila popped open her cockpit canopy and leapt out.
Outside the hangar was a very different story altogether. Along every corridor, up every turbolift shaft, around every corner, Sith trooper after Sith trooper kept coming and coming, giving no quarter. After several minutes, the Jedi were slowly being pushed back the way they’d come.
That was when the young apprentice to Bastila’s immediate right had the uncanny idea to use the Force to bring the heavily damaged ceiling down upon an advancing group of Sith troops. Unfortunately, this same apprentice lacked the insight to beat a hasty retreat — as Bastila did — and ended up crushing himself in the process. The Force will guide him to where he needs to be, thought Bastila sombrely.
Deactivating her lightsabre, the Jedi directly behind Bastila — a Cathar named Anyara — said, “Great, now we’re trapped.”
“Not quite,” Bastila cut in. “Where there’s a will, there’s a way.” As my father used to say. With that, Bastila thrust her golden-hued lightsabre into the right-hand wall, and after a few seconds, had cut a Jedi-sized hole in the centre. “This corridor should lead directly to the bridge. Let’s move!”
Several hundred meters of running didn’t tire a Jedi. What did, however, was the constant threat of attack by Sith troopers interspersed at several intervals down the corridor. At the end of the passageway, a small contingent of enemy troopers were guarding the doorway to the Iniquitous’ bridge.
Bastila started forward, letting the Force propel her toward the troopers. Three of the other Jedi followed suit, while those remaining dealt with the troopers who were attempting to pin them down by showering grenades down upon them. The resulting explosion sent Bastila, the other Jedi, and the Sith troopers flying in all directions; Bastila and the Jedi flew through the bridge blast doors. With a flourish, Bastila landed on her feet and looked ahead of her.
She was immediately assaulted by a Dark Jedi, his red blade swinging for her throat. Arching backward to avoid the attack, Bastila then kicked the man square in the jaw as she flipped over. She sprang forward, not allowing the hooded man to return to the offensive and forcing him to remain on the defensive.
Behind her, her remaining companions were dealing with their own assailants.
Bastila’s golden blade clashed with her enemy’s; it was entirely plausible that they had previously known each other, from before Revan turned him to the Dark Side of the Force, but Bastila couldn’t afford to take that into account.
Their blades held together, testing their physical strength, until Bastila sensed a weakness in her opponent, turned on the spot and slashed at his abdomen. He fell to the deck, the life force draining quickly from him.
She looked to the fore of the bridge as her companions rallied around her.
The sight before them was staggering. Darth Revan, Dark Lord of the Sith, was Force-choking his second-in-command, a male human admiral. A mere moment later, he used the Force to throw the admiral across the bridge, intending to strike Bastila; the Jedi ducked and rolled forward, and through the Force jumped up into the air, somersaulting head over heels until she placed her lightsaber into a classic spearing manoeuvre. Revan easily dodged this, activating his own lightsabre in a blinding flash of crimson.
Bastila rolled as she landed, parrying an attack from Revan. She kicked out with her left leg, and connected with the Mandalorian mask that Revan had worn ever since his victory at Malachor V. The Sith Lord recoiled, somersaulting backward toward the front of the bridge, and Bastila imagined that she could see a sneer of contempt beneath his mask.
Revan propelled himself at her, his blade held low and feinted a slash at her legs. Bastila was ready, her yellow blade clashing with the crimson of Revan’s weapon.
Suddenly, Revan hurled Bastila backward with the Force, slamming her onto the deck with a bone-jarring thud. The three other Jedi helped Bastila to her feet as Revan used the Force to choke another of his subordinates. Walking forward, her lightsabre raised defensively, Bastila warned, “You cannot win, Revan.”
Any further confrontation was nullified as all were abruptly knocked to the deck as disrupter fire flew at the Iniquitous from a nearby warship — one of Revan’s own, no less. The resulting explosion ripped through the Iniquitous’ shields and hull plating, smacking the group to the deck yet again, before a rush of escaping air blew past them and attempted to pull them into the empty vacuum of interstellar space.
The explosion faded as the air blew into space. Bastila, as well as the others on the bridge, used the Force to pull themselves toward the deck, and then, continuing with the Force, held themselves there. Darkness began to creep into the edges of Bastila’s vision as her body succumbed to the first pangs of unconsciousness. Just as she was reaching the limits of her endurance, Bastila felt rather than saw a force shield being raised to cover the exposed hull plating.
Pitch-black smoke began to slowly clog the environmental systems, even as those systems were struggling to pump fresh oxygen-rich air into the bridge area. Golden sparks sprayed intermittently from bridge stations.
Silence punctuated the returning atmosphere as Bastila looked around for Revan, ready for another assault. But it was an assault that never materialized; crumpled on the deck below a computer console on the port side of the bridge, was the unconscious form of Darth Revan, fallen Jedi and Dark Lord of the Sith. His face burnt, bloodied, and bruised from the explosions. The mask that he’d taken great pains to wear in public had been knocked off and lay next to the Sith Lord. His black robes were shredded, and pockmarked with burns. There was no sign of his lightsabre.
Bastila reached out with the Force. A moment went by, a moment that was interspersed with continuing fire from other Star Destroyers, as she felt for Revan’s presence in the Force.
What she felt made her gasp.
Revan was dying.