The greatest structure still standing on the volcanic moon of Oricon, the ruined fortress that once served as the headquarters of the Dread Masters, remains as a beacon of darkness. Impenetrable at its heart, the fortress is surrounded by a lava moat with a single bridge for access with walls two stories high and crafted of the hardest permacrete. Its walkways and open courtyards are decorated with eternally-burning braziers, hanging and broken chains, and even plaques and murals depicting acts of tyranny and strength. Statues, obelisks and pillars show signs of aging, crumbling, cracked and ruined, though their fearsome, ancient Sith visages still stand as a testament to the Dark Side and the imposing power that the masters of the fortress willed upon their visitors.

Down into the central palace and through one of the two sets of staircases lays the ruins of the atrium. It has long been looted for all of its artifacts and knowledge, left bare by the raiding and marauding of treasure hunters and researchers. Four side-chambers lead down, two to the left and right, deeper - these rooms, all abandoned, hold obelisks fused into the very stonework of the floor. Ancient Sith wisdom is etched into each one - messages of fear, of control, of domination and madness alike.

At the very rear of the palace is a large, tall stairway, leading up into what can only be considered the throne room of the wicked Council. A seven-sided platform sits atop a bottomless pit, with the walkway from the doorway taking up one side flanked by six green crystals. The remaining six edges are dedicated to walkways ending in a dais, resting upon which are the tall thrones topped with crystal where the ancient Masters of Dread once sat. Here, you can feel the twisted knots in the flow of the Force, plucked and pulled at with a more powerful grasp than you could ever hope to possess. As you approach the center of the massive platform, you hear footfalls behind you. The deathly silence is finally broken.

A glint of metal, half buried under crumbled permacrete, caught the Kiffar’s eye. He knelt in front of the pitted wall, holstering the blaster in his left hand and gently brushing away the detritus. Maybe I’ll find something valuable on this cesspool of a planet to make the trip worth my while. A quick glance towards the six-legged bantha grazing in the nearby courtyard caused Terran’s mouth to turn down in a sneer. Not that mutated beasts and rivers of frakkin’ lava aren’t lovely. Shaking his head, the Arconan made sure the blaster in his right hand had the safety disengaged and turned back to the pile of debris in front of him.

As his fingers brushed the smooth, silver metal, he caught brief flashes of violence and half-suppressed fear. Could be some sort of relic that they were fighting over, he mused, continuing to clear away small bits of rubble, or maybe an ancient weapon I could interest a collector in… The thought trailed off as he finally uncovered the worn-down glyphs etched into the metallic surface. They were nearly illegible after so many years. The Arconan gripped the object lightly and carefully lifted it into the light, struggling to make out what remained of the Aurabesh characters.

“Sh… Shack…” Terran struggled to read the words, the object so worn down that half the letters were indistinguishable from the surface in which they were set. Then he saw the rest of the object he had pulled from the rubble. “Shackle Solutions,” he deadpanned. “Terrific. These’ll be worth millions.”

Sighing in resignation, the former-Jensaarai began to toss the stuncuffs over his shoulder in disgust. An insistent tingling from the Force stayed his hand. He held the ancient restraints, newly-burnished from his efforts, at eye level and pondered why in the galaxy he would want to keep them. After a few seconds, his impatience got the better of him. Then the blurry, reflected colors painted across stuncuffs’ surface shifted and he heard the unmistakable whisk of a blaster being unholstered.

“Hold it!”

The woman’s voice, somehow sounding both startled and cocksure, wasn’t particularly intimidating. The threat of a blaster bolt to the back of his head, on the other hand, did a fair job of reigning in the Kiffar’s urge to react. That would be Brimstone’s pet. Cursing his own inattention to his surroundings, Terran knelt unmoving.

“Toss whatever that is to me.”

With his effort to stay still, Terran grew acutely aware of the dozens of pieces of sharpened gravel and solid refuse that dug into his knees. Concentrating on the mask that he habitually used to conceal his presence in the Force, he reached out with his emotions and took in his surroundings. He could just barely detect a presence behind him, like a faint shadow on a cloudy day. The energy pack in the blaster, on the other hand, stood out like a beacon. Okay, how the hell do I get out of this? Maybe if I—

“Now, or I burn a hole in your head.” Her voice, clearly growing agitated, derailed his train of thought, replacing it with a surge of irritation.

“Which one?”

“Can the chatter. Do it now.”

“Sure, sure,” Terran murmured, trying to portray a calmness he didn’t feel. As he spoke, he focused on a section of the wall just in front of his right shoulder, suffusing it with the Force. “Whatever you say. But which one?”

“Which what?” she growled.

“Well…” the Kiffar replied, struggling to keep the smirk from his voice. “You said to hold onto it. You also said to toss it to you. I’m just not sure what you want.”

“Stop stalling. Toss. Me. The. Artifact.”

“Gladly.” The Arconan readied his WESTAR-35, still concealed across his lap, and tossed the restraints over his left shoulder in the woman’s general direction. He felt the faintest echo of surprise from her when he complied, followed by a second sense of startlement when the object sailed sedately towards her, without any telekinetic trickery. Third time pays for all. He felt her reach out to grab the cuffs, then her irritation flared as she realized he had held a useless, long-dead restraint system rather than a valuable relic. Terran could hear her scoff and the jangle of the stuncuffs as she dropped them to the ground and began to relax. Now!

He spun his blaster, aiming for the section of wall on which he had been concentrating, and fired a salvo of shots. The bolts of blue plasma hit the surface and ricocheted off, cascading over his shoulder and towards the woman standing behind him. As the fourth and final shot burned past to the right of his neck, he rolled in their wake. The debris-cluttered floor dug into his shoulders and upper back, then he was up on his feet. He turned towards the source of the deadly voice, his left hand instinctively drawing his still-holstered blaster.

Red hair, pale skin, green eyes - it was Taranae. He discharged another burst of blaster fire. A burn across her left cheek marked the graze from his first salvo, but she dove clear of the second, rolling smoothly to her feet and unholstering a second DL-44. “You’re good.” she asked, an eager smile spreading across her features as she circled around towards his right. “Who are you?”

“You know, I’ve been asking myself that the last few months. So far, this is the only answer I’ve found.”

Terran fired another burst of blue plasma in the Plagueian’s direction, causing the Sith to lunge to her left, and slammed his right-hand blaster back into its holster. A flick of his wrist launched his lightsaber from its sleeve-sheath, and he lit the amber blade as his booted feet ate the distance between them. A whisper from the Force sent him side-stepping to the left just before Taranae fired a salvo of shots from her DL-44’s. Five bolts scorched by to his right, and he batted away the sixth with his lightsaber, the crimson dart skittering from his blade and chewing into the wall on his right. A second pair of salvos, more widely spaced, stopped him a half dozen meters from the Human. He stepped to the right, avoiding a trio of bolts, and parried the remaining pair.

The blasts left their own charred dimples in the once-mighty fortress walls, but the distraction afforded the Sith time to sheath her blasters and draw her own lightsaber. It snap-hissed to life, bathing the pale woman in a sinister crimson glow, and her smile - all teeth - told him the chances of her answering his questions voluntarily were slim to none. The Human turned to the side, angling her body away from him and raising her lightsaber so it ran parallel to the ground. With her free hand, she gestured invitingly - or mockingly - to Terran.

”It’ll be easy,” they said. “Just wait for her to reach the Fortress and take her by surprise,” they said. “She’ll never see you coming.” This is the last karking time I volunteer for “some quick intelligence-gathering”.

She watched his movements carefully. She knew not who he was or why he was here, but as long as he remained, he would be an obstacle to her mission. Not long before their chance meeting, Taranae had also been doing the same thing as man stood in front of her with his amber blade in hand, facing her with a calculating look on his face. So far the fortress had held its secrets from her, and as she wandered through the numerous areas that made up this grand structure, she kicked up dust and skittered small rocks across the floor with her feet. She knew she had been making too much noise, but as the dust settled when she entered this particular room and she saw her adversary pick up something from the rubble, a spark of hope had ignited deep in her chest. The spark had died the instant she realised the object was just an old pair of stuncuffs.

She knew then that a confrontation was unavoidable and that she would have to do something to get this man out of the fortress. After the attack with her blasters failed, she sighed as she drew her lightsaber as the man stopped in his tracks and she beckoned him mockingly, her lightsaber already held for what she knew was about to become an attack. Thoughts flowed through her mind as it quickly got the rest of her body up to speed on all the available options available to her to end this fight quickly.

She flicked her red hair from her eyes with a motion of her head, ever keeping her eyes on the Kiffar standing in front of her. Time seemingly froze as each combatant stood staring, neither willing to make the first move. Motes of dust swirled around the room like flies, trying to escape the small shafts of light in some areas of the fortress. Suddenly, the Kiffar glanced past Taranae’s right shoulder and she took her chance. She leapt at the man, a flourish of her lightsaber marking an arc through the gloom as it swung towards his neck.

Terran had barely glanced at the bantha behind the Sith as he sensed her muscles bunch. Knowing she was about to attack, he raised his lightsaber at the last moment, blocking her swing. He smiled as he realised he had surprised her with his speed and she clumsily staggered to one side, gaining her composure again quickly and turning to face him. Her scowl told him that she had maybe underestimated him and he knew he was in for a rough ride now that her assessment seemed to have marked him as a bigger threat. He saw her gesture, a slight movement of her hand giving away her intention and he dove to one side. Sure enough, one of the huge green crystals that could be seen from this room hurtled towards his position and it crashed into the wall close by, exploding into fragments and showering them both with debris. As Terran rolled to come up again, he saw that Taranae had not fared so well and her attack had caused more trouble for her than it did for him. She shielded her eyes from the blast, avoiding shards of crystal from embedding themselves in her face and eyes and Terran knew that here was a chance. Concentrating, he used the Force to make himself invisible and made sure he hid his Force signature. He glanced towards the bantha, which had suddenly taken a keen interest in the nearest exit and was hurriedly making its way across the rubble-strewn room. At a slight nod, the bantha stopped and stared directly at the Kiffar. Terran flicked his eyes towards Taranae, who had now removed her arms from her face and was scanning the area with a look of sheer malevolence on her face that made him grimace. He could sense that she was now much angrier than before and would probably stop at nothing to see his dead body laid on the floor of this room. He nodded again and the bantha lowered its head, grunting as its mood became darker. Suddenly it charged directly at the Sith who looked up in surprise at the charging behemoth with a look of bewilderment.

Taranae frowned as the creature barrelled towards her. (i)So this Jedi knows how to control the beasts does he(i)? She thought. Well two can play at that game. She concentrated with her hand stretched out towards the charging beast and it slowed gradually, eventually stopping with its nose brushing against her outstretched palm. It snuffled gently as it breathed in her scent, a cloud of mist billowing from its nose as it breathed out. Taranae gestured and it shuffled backwards, heading away towards the exit.

“An impressive display,” she said to the room in general, “But if you thought your little show of control would save you, you’re wrong.” She had already guessed the approximate location of her hidden foe. She knew he would not be able to move without revealing himself to her, so she would use this to her advantage. She concentrated and the smaller pieces of debris in the room lifted from the floor as she gestured. Moving her hand in a swirling motion, she watched as the rubble spread and whirled around the room like a mini maelstrom, the centre of it being the location in which she thought the Jedi lay hidden. The storm of debris picked up speed and the objects in it became lethal weapons, swirling in all directions and becoming bullets of death for anyone caught in their path. A sudden movement caught Taranae’s eye, and just as suspected, her foe leapt sideways as a piece of column struck the area he had concealed himself in. Taranae smiled in satisfaction.

“Nothing is impossible to see,” she shouted to him, “It just needs a little push to become obvious.”

She gestured again as the debris dropped to the floor around her and a blast knocked Terran off his feet. He was thrown into the wall behind him and the breath was knocked from his body. He slid down the wall and landed on his backside before falling forward onto his knees, gasping for breath.

Taranae stalked towards him, no sense of haste in her movements. She gently swung her lightsaber by her side in a circle threateningly as she closed the distance. Terran was now trying to rise sluggishly but she knew he was winded and would need time to recover. She meant to savour this moment, to watch her foe suffer before finally snuffing out his life for good. She pointed her fingers at him and tendrils of energy shot forth from them, grounding themselves in Terran’s body. Forced to his knees again, he writhed in pain as the Sith advanced. He had to do something quickly, or his life would end here and now on the rubble-strewn floor of the fortress.

Fire screamed up his nerves, boiling blood and shearing sanity until his soul became pain itself. He was the fire. He had always been the fire. He—

No!

He had been something else, just a moment before. And he could almost reach it.

The inferno rose again, crashing through him, dragging him under. It set every nerve alight, gnashing his bones and scorching his thoughts. Then it receded, a blazing ebb and flow, and he reached once more for his Self.

Terran...Terran Koul.

With a gasp, he knew himself. He saw himself. He saw the play of lightning over the nerves in his body, and he willed those nerves to silence. He could see his skin begin to darken in places, as amethyst tendrils burrowed their way into him. He ignored it, silenced it, as he silenced the cry from his scream-ravaged throat. Then he raised his head, and met the Plagueian’s gaze.

Taranae’s eyes widened perceptibly, surprise at his control causing her attack to falter. Then her lips turned downward and she raised her hands to renew her assault. The Arconan knew he had only seconds before the pain returned, and he reached out instinctively, flooding the space directly in front of him with all the power he could muster. Then she struck, a torrent of energy crashing towards him.

The wave of lightning spiderwebbed towards Terran, then struck the area of Force-charged air directly in front of him and cascaded back towards Taranae. The redhead saw it but failed to react in time, and the discharge sent shocks of dark current coursing through her system. She gasped and stumbled back a pace, into the maelstrom of debris she had let fall so haphazardly. Terran seized the opportunity.

He reached out with his emotions, beckoning the world around him to come to his aid, and felt the Living Force rush into him, suffusing him with energy. The Kiffar shunted waves of power through his nerves, calming his raw synapses and blanketing their electric protests. Winded but resolved, he sought out a dozen small pieces of metallic detritus from the haphazard circle, gripping them in his mental grasp and hurling them towards the Human at dire speeds. Terran’s aim held true, a dozen tiny projectiles slicing through her skin in a dozen different places, ripping a yelp of panic and pain from Taranae. Her knees bent, then buckled as the Arconan sent a single, fist-sized chunk of rubble hurtling into the back of her right leg. She fell. He rose.

Struggling to his feet, Terran resheathed his lightsaber and grabbed his fallen blaster from the ground. As he walked slowly to the Plagueian, wary of any sudden movements despite her state, he rubbed the back of his head with his free hand as if searching for any obvious signs of trauma. Cloaking in the middle of a fight? Trying to force a placid bantha to charge a lightsaber-wielding maniac? I must have a karkin’ concussion. His fingers felt nothing, and they came away blood-free. So much for that idea. I’ll have to worry over losing my marbles later. Shaking his head at his own foolishness, he eyed the fallen Human. Taranae was on her knees, bent forward and supporting herself on a single hand. The other was fumbling with her holstered blaster.

“That’s not going to happen, Sith.” Terran’s words came out with a slight slur, his mouth chalky.

Taranae’s hand continued to fumble with her blaster, the Force-fueled lightning having melted the cheap synthetic holster’s material to the DL-44’s metal casing. With a sigh, Terran drew back his booted foot and crashed the reinforced toe into the Human’s button nose. The cartilage shattered with a wet, sickening crunch and Taranae sprawled backwards from the force of the blow. The Kiffar stood over her for a moment, surveying her condition, then knelt down, planting a knee on her sternum and shoving the barrel of his WESTAR-35 under her chin.

“You know, this could have been easy. I came here with two simple instructions. Neither of them needed all this ruckus. Frakking Sith, always having to cause a fuss.”

The Arconan turned his head to the side and spat, splattering the ground with saliva and blood. He spied the area where their bantha interloper had been grazing just minutes before and suppressed a smile. Turning back to Taranae, he dug the blaster into her chin harder out of spite. With his free hand carefully out of view, he made a beckoning motion towards the impromptu bantha pasture as he continued speaking.

“The first, from my Proconsul, was to see if I could gather any intelligence from you. Clearly you have none to divulge - which is a shame, for you, as we would have paid handsomely.”

The Plagueian sneered up at him and her words overflowed with vitriol. “My loyalty is not for sale, Arconan. Tell me the second instruction, so you can kill me and get this over with.”

“I’m not going to kill you. I need you to deliver a message to Brimstone. It’s from our Consul.”

“Fine,” she grunted, forcing the response through clenched teeth as if the word itself pained her. “What’s the message?”

Finally letting his grin show, Terran stood and maneuvered the floating pile of bantha poodoo into view. Then he dropped it on her.

Sauntering towards the courtyard’s exit, he called back over his shoulder, “Tell your Master that Atyiru Araave sends her regards.”

He was so busy chortling over his own wit that he barely heard the Plagueian growl and draw her second blaster.

Taranae's nose wrinkled at the smell. The pungent odour of the mess that now covered her body ate into her senses and she almost retched.

Typical, she thought, again I thought I had the upper hand, but this time I really do end up in deep bantha poodoo.

Terran walked away towards the exit from the chamber, a cloud of dust kicking up from his footfalls and chortling at the sith’s misfortune. Her brows knitted in anger; she was not finished with the kiffar yet and she unfastened the strap on her second blaster carefully, making sure she was as silent as possible. As she withdrew it from its holster, she noticed her foe freeze in mid-step and she knew he had heard her movement despite her movements being as quiet as she could manage. She aimed a snap shot at the back of his head but he whirled with astounding speed and deflected the bolt at the last moment. He dove for cover as a hail of blaster fire followed the first round, disappearing behind a stone pillar close to the only exit from the building.

The Plagueian took her chance and rose slowly, wincing at the pain and the smell. She raised a hand to her face as she felt wetness trickling down her cheek. Wiping it gently, she gazed at her hand as it came away covered in blood. The Assault from the numerous projectiles had taken its toll on her and had damaged her more than she had thought. She stumbled to the side of the room and half-sat behind a pile of rubble, concentrating as hard as she could. She felt the pain from her lesions begin to fade and a pain she hadn't sensed before now in her right knee faded to nothing. Revitalised, she began to formulate a plan to escape this mess. She wanted the Arconan dead, but she had been given her best chance while he had his back turned. That had ended in failure so she had to think of something else. Believing that escape was now her best option she stood, peering around the side of the rubble as she tried to spot her enemy in the debris.

Terran saw Taranae's head appear from behind a small heap and armed a thermal detonator. Stepping out for a split second, he threw the detonator in a high arc that would eventually force it to land just behind her. He ducked back into hiding and began to count down.

As Taranae heard the clunk of a small metal object behind her, her mind swam. She knew the sound presaged an explosion as this was a grenade of some kind. Looking around desperately, she spotted a crack in the nearby wall and decided to use it to her advantage. She slowly raised her hand in the air to form a fist as it began to draw power from her surroundings. She fed on the dark energies of the fortress and willed them to her aid. Bringing her fist down sharply, she punched the ground at her feet.

The resulting shockwave accomplished three things; the grenade flew away from her position, fuelled by the wave of power that blasted outwards from Taranae at its centre. The explosion against the far wall rocked the entire room and debris and dust cascaded down around both she and the Arconan. Terran was knocked from his feet as both the blasts from the grenade and the impact reached him. As he landed on his back winded, one glance was all he needed to inform him that hanging around right now was not a good idea. He shakily pushed himself up, casting nervous glances around the room. His eyes eventually settled on the sith as she met his gaze, and she grinned at him as the room collapsed between them. He ran as fast as he could towards the exit as he dodged falling pillars, rock and other miscellaneous debris as it fell around him. Gaps opened in the floor as the heavy stone impacted it and crashed straight through to the chambers below, and more than once, Terran had to leap for his life as gaps as large as small ships opened up in front and behind him. Gasping heavily for breath, he dove through the door and into the outside air as a cloud of dust and debris followed him out as if it were a beast, attempting one last time to snare a meal as he stumbled away from it.

He collapsed gasping on the ground, rolling over onto his back and gazing at the ruined entrance. There was no way in his opinion that Brimstone's pet could have survived a total collapse, but he knew of the resilience of the sith. He had a feeling that this would not be their only meeting. He gathered his blaster that had dropped from his hand as he fell and slid it back into the holster. He shook his head as he walked away. He only wanted to deliver a message and this is what had become of the situation.

Taranae coughed harshly as she crawled through the narrow hole that the explosion and her power had opened in the wall. The weakness she had perceived had indeed worked to her advantage. The cloud of dust billowed from her small exit as she stood and dusted herself off. With any luck, the Arconan would think her buried in the rubble. Holstering her DL-44 again, she set off, grinning to herself. She had plans for this Kiffar. Next time he wouldn't be so lucky.