When the First Order beset on Takodana, Maz Kanata’s castle took the brunt of the assault. Located on the shore of a lake that was owned by the pirate Maz Kanata, it served as a haven for travelers, smugglers and other unsavory characters. Sensor grids and advanced communication gear secured the castle from unannounced attacks, giving its owner and visitors enough notice to flee the scene.

The area around it is rumored to have been the battleground for the Jedi and Sith, being of strategic value for those willing to seek control over Takodana, and is littered with ancient ruins that resemble the structure of the castle itself. Inside, the castle’s gray exterior vanishes into shades of brown, the color of sandstone. Tables and chairs fill the cluttered spaces where travelers could share tales or pursue their own controversial interests. Unfiltered smoke permeates the air, clogging the senses with a sweet odor. Various criminal groups have at some time or another sought shelter in the castle, their passage evidenced by the many-colored banners outside bearing their insignia.

Now, the castle remains uninhabited. Several of its towers have crumbled under the First Order’s assault. Stonework pillars have toppled over, scorched from turbolasers and blaster fire. Other segments lie in ruin, still too new for the forest to have reclaimed the land around the castle.

Dek stepped gently through the uneven sandstone hallways of the castle. The datapad shone brightly into his face as he reviewed the data, in Sullustan, he had on the planet and the former Grand Admiral of Clan Scholae Palatinae.

Subject Name: Baelor Pwyll

Status: Defection

Last Known Coordinates: Starwind. Takodana. Vjun. Thrawn.

Objective: Reconnaissance.

The Sullustan saw the door to a former canteen halfway open. Sliding the pad into his pocket, he knelt through the small open portion of the transparisteel metal opening and turned to see a young male with brunette hair and built physique. The Warden had a bow and arrow around his torso, a hatchet on the left side of his belt, and two lightsabers hooked on the right side. A BB droid squealed at the sight of the Sith, moving to place itself between Baelor and Dek.

“I could hear you coming from a parsec away,” the Warden chuckled.

Dek smirked, “I’m not surprised. I don’t sneak. I’m simply here to accomplish a goal of seeking out the places you’ve been.”

“Well, we both know what this means.” The Warden grinned and placed some objects wrapped in a cloth into a container held by Kelpie.

“Why did you leave, Baelor?” The Sullustan asked.

“It’s irrelevant. I don’t need to explain to you the brutality of Scholae tactics without protected freedoms of a centralized source of benevolent power.”

“You think the Empire as brutal…” Dek spoke, soon to be interrupted by Baelor.

“...Empire? Is that what you call a hobbling group of Palpatine sycophants?” Baelor exaggerated a sarcastic laugh, “Your Empire is nothing to write home about.”

Dek didn’t have any further need to this banter. He held out his hand and felt into the mind of the Jedi. “You will give me the information I want,” the Sullustan sneered.

Baelor started to reach for his saber, but felt a forced mental block pulling him away. The Jedi’s arm was in a tight struggle, but he was able to slowly shuffle his feet at an uneven pace towards Dek.

The Sith focused further, equally peering into the river of thoughts that was this Human’s mind, but also focusing on trying to control Baelor’s movements. Kelpie, sensing his owner was in trouble, rolled towards Dek and rammed him surprisingly in the shin. Dek felt what was about to happen, and pulled his saber to his hand while the Jedi instantly did the same for both of his. Dek lunged and crossed sabers with the Jedi, locking their blades, while Kelpie rolled away, safely distant from the lightsabers. Dek stepped back and parried a strike from one of the blades, while twisting to avoid another. The Sith made a slight poke in response to Baelor, which was swiped away quickly by Dek. Responding, the Sith made a sweeping lunge diagonally across Baelor, but the Jedi was able to block with both sabers. However, Baelor shut off one of his sabers and tried to ignite it into Dek’s slightly rotund belly. The Sith temporarily disengaged from the battle, rolling backwards. Dek looked into the doorway on the opposite side of the room. Out came being Dek was only just met a couple seconds prior.

Baelor had glanced just for a moment, but kept his gaze realizing who it may have been, “Belarius?!”

The Jedi’s call echoed through the chamber, yet for several moments no one else responded. It was like the wind had been knocked out of everyone as Baelor’s puzzled cry faded into the stone ruins surrounding them. Finally, the boisterous laugh of the older brother filled the room.

“Yes, brother, it is I.” Belarius continued to chuckle as he stalked into the room with arms held wide. “How have you been?”

“I was doing great until this dipshit interrupted my day-drinking.” Baelor was quick to point the tip of his blue blade at the panting Sullustan, though the Jedi quickly returned to his guard and began slowly pacing to the opposite side of the room as Belarius continued to walk in between the two combatants.

“Well, if only you hadn’t left Scholae - all this could have been avoided.”

“I was never even apart of Scholae!” Baelor spat, gritting his teeth and forcing himself to continue. “I only came to Ragnath to see you, Bel. To see if we could resolve our differences.”

“Ha! That’s laughable, Baelor.” The Sullustan interrupted the brothers and stepped forward raising his datapad in mockery. “I have the assignment orders right here, defector. How could you become Grand Admiral if you weren’t enlisted?”

It took a few moments of reflection for Baelor to clearly hear what Dek said. Finally, an uncomfortable, uncharacteristic fury lit itself in Baelor; and the man strained against leaping across the floor and clawing out his brother’s throat. Again, through gritted teeth, the man forced out as calm a response as he could.

“Dek, you were on leave at the time - so I don’t expect you to know the truth. But listen to me when I say my brother is using you against me.”

“Lies from a traitor…” Belarius was quick to cut in before the Sullustan could answer and immediately ignited his own crimson blade. Baelor’s eyes had quickly darted between the two Sith and it didn’t take a proton scientist to figure out that he was clearly outmatched. Yet, the man knew he could use the environment to his benefit. Having had enough time to study the place before his opponents had arrived, Baelor was ready to bring the ceiling of this place down - literally.

Arching his left arm back to provide stability, Baelor was quick to cast his dark chrome lightsaber into the air as if he were tossing a disk and he watched as it sailed through the air towards the intended target. The ignited blue blade twirled in the air as if it were dancing, until it made contact with the stone ceiling of the former cantina where it disappeared into the structure like a hot knife through butter. Yet, while the weapon had clearly cut through the support of the ceiling, the Jedi’s weapon clanged to the ground without nothing else following it.

Everyone’s eyes shifted nervously as they looked up at the ceiling to see what would happen next. For a brief moment, Belarius started to chuckle at the incompetence of his brother but was interrupted by a grown that sounded there the room as the ceiling shift. Yet, it was the disgruntled chipping of Baelor’s droid, Kelpie, that seemed to sting the most for Baelor as his face blushed in embarrassment.

“Well...that was anticlimactic.” Dek said under his breath as he continue to study the ceiling, though the Sullustan refused to move from his safety in the corner. Belarius on the other hand took the opportunity to further mock his brother and strided quickly across the room to the Jedi’s fallen saber, showing no fear for the gash in the ceiling above him. Instead, the man grabbed the Jedi’s weapon from the ground, turned, and tossed the weapon back to his younger brother stating that he would be needing it. Yet, as the weapon landed careful in the Jedi’s right hand; it was his left hand that thrusted forward - directing itself at the ceiling again.

This time, no saber was cast forward. This time, nothing soared through the area. Yet, it was this time that something shifted in the structure above, as if forced by the Jedi’s empty-handed thrust, and the groan of the structure grew once more before finally a hailstorm of stone, dust, and debris rain down from above upon the Jedi’s older brother. Yet, as the collapsing structure consumed the Sith a command was defiantly shouted at Dek from the other Sith.

“Kill him!” The words were clear, but Belarius had disappeared and long with him; his brother ran across the cantina towards his droid and with a single kick sent the mech flying through an open window before he too dove through and immediately the Sullustan found himself giving chase.

“If Baelor could fit through, so could I,” the Sith thought to himself.

Leaping through the door head first, Dek rolled out as he activated his lightsaber, and deflected two arrows quickly fired at him from the Jedi, who had taken a momentary defensive stance before slinging the bow over his shoulder once again. Baelor ran into the forest where small bushes turned into large trees, while Dek, who had taken a moment to deignite his saber, took his own battered blaster rifle from its position around the his torso and fired at Baelor’s feet, feeding the Jedi’s desire to run faster and tire himself out quicker.

Dek ran in the same distance, slowly keeping an eye out for clues from nature or from the Force. The rolling trail of the BB-8 unit was easily seen, but it soon stopped in a dusty area. Dek assumed Baelor picked up the droid, thinking it may reveal their position.

“He must have an escape plan,” Dek thought to himself, “Otherwise he would never have run from the castle.”

Dek moved from tree to tree, back turned to the rough bark, aiming around him while sensing out his opponent's latent energy. Dek looked on the ground to see deeper, inlaid steps going across a muddier pit area to behind a tree. But Dek knew better than that. He twirled around and fired wantonly into the trees. He felt the wisp of a lightsaber come at him from the sky, and instinctively fell to the ground, feeling the saber whip back up to its owner. Dek reached out with his hand to attempt to stall the Jedi with the Force, but was met with a blinding flash of light to his face.

The Sith fell back from a quick blow to his chest from Baelor’s outreached hand, still in the tree, forcing the Battlelord to drop his blaster. Dek instantly sent out his senses, trying to feel everything around him. He couldn’t feel the droid, but he felt the trees and the wind moving in slow images. The Sullustan could sense an entity falling towards him. Slowly seeing the light dissipate from his sight, he grabbed his lightsaber and placed into into a defensive position. Both lightsabers connected, and Baelor swept himself back, spinning for another strike. Dek clumsily blocked the attack, while trying to make a quick motion towards where he thought Baelor was. The Jedi swung from atop Dek’s head, but Dek was able to dodge the attack. The Battlelord stabbed, but Baelor twirled and swung around with an attack of his own.

Seeing increasingly clearer, the Sith improved his form, blocking multiple attacks, and responding with attempted strikes of his own. Dek swung below, then to the left arm, then diagonally across the Jedi, but was swiftly kicked in the groin by the Jedi. As Dek fell to the ground, he sent up the illusion that Baelor was on the edge of a hole, Baelor rebalanced for a second, while Dek shoddily kicked out his own leg, knocking Baelor to his knee.

“Fwec you!” Shouted the Jedi.

“No, fwec you!” Responded Dek.

“Great comeback! Did Princess Elincia teach you that?”

“Your mom taught me that last night.” Dek gritted through the pain.

“You forgot your jokes in the Old Republic, Sith.”

Dek reached out with his last strength, feeling for something to take from Baelor. And he got it! Dek was overjoyed at the thought of getting something valuable from Baelor! Secrets still on Vjun!

“I give up!” Dek half-heartedly grinned. “You got me.”

Baelor looked at the Sith, “Yeah, whatever, Dek…somehow this was all worth it to you.”

They both recovered smoothly and headed on their ways.

Later that night, Kelpie confronted Baelor on why Dek gave up. “I gave him something he wanted. Information. I thought if I let him have it, I could simply walk away from this and so would he. And he took the bait.”

“Beep-beep-woo-woo!”

“Heh, I gave him Vjun. I told him a castle of Darth Vader existed there and that’s where I went to hide, delving into secrets of the Force.”

“Dee-woooot…”

“Eh, I hung out for a few nights and found a really cool stick of which I grew fond of, but a castle of Darth Vader? Are you kidding me?! That’s got to be some bantha-poodoo, ancient legends kind of stuff!”

A whirl of protest sounded from Kelpie, though to be honest - Baelor had never learned the damn droid’s language and couldn’t deny it might have been a scream of excitement instead. Regardless, as the droid screeched through the air, he soared through the window and soon landed on the rocky, uneven terrain outside with several skips across the earth before coming to rest with a clang against a rocky outcrop.

In comparison, Baelor was much more graceful as he dove through the window and turned his fall into a flip. Landing on his feet again, Baelor launched himself forward into a roll that absorbed the dangerous height of the fall. Once Baelor had finally stood and regained his senses while ignoring the chatter from Kelpie, he nodded towards their parked X-wing in the distance and told the droid to beat it. When a tone much like a raspberry was given in response, Baelor was quick to point a single finger at the droid and wave it threateningly.

“Don’t make me hoof you again!” Baelor warned, taking a moment to look back towards their window of escape. It was peculiar to the Warden that the Sith underling hadn’t bothered to follow the Jedi through the window, yet for as annoying as the droid was - the next whirl of warning it made gave the Jedi enough time to grasp his lightsabers and activated them. The distinctive sounds of the weapons as they sprang to life had deafened the noise of blaster fire that rang from the far side of the castle wall. It appeared that as Jedi and droid took the straightest approach to exit the cantina, the Sith had bothered to double back to the entrance of the castle and now had a clear range of fire on the pair.

“Go! Now!” Baelor shouted over his shoulder. Again, not understanding the droid but taken its lightening tone, Baelor concluded that the droid conceded. It was about time too, through gritted teeth the man cursed at every bolt fired from the ranged Sith. It took every ounce of focus from the man to make sure he caught each bolt on one of his blades, deflecting them wildly around him. He spared only a moment to question why he hadn’t taken the time to learn a more defensive guard. In the open field that surrounded him, there was little for him to make use of to break up the badgering fire of the Sith and he was forced to slowly advance step by step between deflections - and at this rate, he’d be hours.

After several minutes, the work out the man was being put through was clearly evident on his brow. Sweat beaded across his face and soon drenched the Jedi collar. In that time, the Jedi had only moved a dozen meters or so. Every time he leaped forward to get out of the Sith’s fire, and hopefully gain some distance, the Jedi found the Sith had accurately predicted his charge and quickly pinned the Jedi down again. When he had tried to retreat, again the Sith had predicted his movements. Short of lying down and accepting his fate, Baelor found he had no choice but taking the assault square on. For the first time in a while, Baelor felt simply vulnerable and unable to alter his own course.

It was at that moment, when fully consumed by that awful emotion, that his fate changed. A triumphant tone whistled loudly from across the battlefield - grabbing everyone’s attention. As the Sith’s fire stopped, this black object wheeled across the field and continued to toot loudly. Dome pointed forward as if it prepared itself to ram anything in its path, Kelpie sped across the field and had given Baelor the break he desperately needed from the onslaught. While a lesser man would have taken the break to retreat or recover, Baelor’s focus now flipped towards concern for his friend.

Stumbling at first, the Jedi pushed forward and quickly closed the gap between himself and the Sith. Still protected by the stone archway leading up to the castle, Dek maintained his elevated position and had resumed fire towards the Jedi. At times reaching his blaster awkwardly over the barrier and firing blindly, Baelor still remained the primary target of the Sith until Kelpie had finally rejoined the Jedi at the base of the archway and had proceeded to charge forward against the protests of his human friend.

It was right as Baelor rounded the corner after his friend, that the man was met with the sight of the poor droid catching a blaster bolt square on its center of mass.

A fuzzy screech sounded from the droid as it sagged backward down the ramp of the archway. Missing the bottom of its round base, Kelpie ground to a halt at the feet of the Jedi - whom instantly discard his weapons to the ground beside him and collapsed to hug his dying friend. Likely projecting onto the droid, a labored tone beeped from Kelpie one last time before it’s dome top twisted towards the human’s chest. When the droid’s viewport was felt on the man’s chest, Baelor felt the weight of the loss in a cascade of emotion as memories of their adventures danced through his head only to end on how cold the droid metallic body now felt.

“I’m sorry, buddy.” Baelor choked out before straining to keep from sobbing. “I should have treated you better while I still had you.”

Forgetting the world after them, Baelor held the wreckage tight as he began to rock with it.

It was several minutes later before the Jedi’s focus was brought back to reality. A feeling of disgust had taken over the pain of loss as Jedi clued into the sicking laughter that rang down from the top of the archway ramp. Looking up to the source through tearful eyes, Baelor’s gaze fell upon Dek.

“How pathetic.” Dek began. At this point his blaster was held loosely by his hip but he quickly brought it up to the side of his face before continuing. “Allow me to put you out of your misery.”

“Wait!” Baelor protested, raising a single hand from the tight grasp on Kelpie. “This doesn’t have to end here.”

“Oh yeah?” Dek questioned with a laugh, “Why doesn’t it?”

“Look, while none of this had to happen; we could still go our separate ways.” When Dek failed to respond, Baelor continued. “You wanted to know what I was up to, right? Why don’t I allow you that, if you let me leave with him?”

The disgust was plain on Dek’s face, but he seemed interested. Again, when he failed to respond further, Baelor continued. Quickly, though it seemed to pain him to do so, the Jedi pulled a cloth wrapped object from the internal container of the droid. Presenting to above his head to ready the Sith to catch it, the Jedi then lightly tossed the object to the Sith’s outstretched arm. For a moment, the Sith fumbled to catch the object, but he quickly recovered and keep the object in his hand while tucking his blaster under his arm to examine it. Uncovering the cloth, Dek seemed confused when it produced nothing more than a green lightsaber crystal.

“What’s so special about this?” Dek quipped, staring deeply into the crystal while raising it to the light of the planet’s sun.

“That wasn’t part of the deal.” The words had a string of anger to them as Baelor thrust his empty arm forward. In sequence with the Jedi’s movement, one of the discarded lightsabers lifted from the ground and sprang forward, flipping end over end as it soared, towards the Sith. Either from the Jedi’s words or sensing something off, Dek turned his attention back to the Jedi just in time for Baelor to snap his fingers. Again, in sequence, the lightsaber activated itself and a bright blue light pierced through the Sith’s skull before it carried itself down to his groin from the rotating momentum of the hilt.

A painful groan came from the Sith, but it was soon overcome by the deep sobbing from the Jedi as he went back to hugging Kelpie’s broken body.