Clash of Darkness.
Disclaimer: If I owned Star Wars, Mace woulda killed Palpatine, and then bent Anakin over, yanked down his robes, and then proceed to whip the darkside right out of his stubborn ass! So, OBVIOUSLY I do not own Star Wars; that privilege belongs to George Lucas, however, the plot, the original characters, and the dual saberstaff wielding technique known as the Whirlus form belongs to ME! I would also like to give special thanks to Wookipedia for providing me with the research information that I needed to make this story possible.
Cast of Characters.
Leia Organa Solo: Jedi Knight/ Jedi Master, Human female.
Han Solo: Captain Millennium Falcon, Human male, Corellian.
Oortal Keldaani: Captain Alderaan, Human male, Commenoran.
Dol Gahn: Healer/medical technician, Ithorian female.
Saba Sebatyne: Jedi Master, Barabel female.
Kyle Katarn: Jedi Master, Human male.
Darth Magus: Sith Lord, Kel Dor male.
Selar: Jedi student, Human male.
Kenth Hamner: Jedi Grand Master, Human male.
Cilghal: Jedi Master/Healer, Mon Cal female.
Mirta Gev: Bounty Hunter/ Mandalorian, Human female.
Boba Fett: Bounty Hunter/Mandalorian Leader, Human male.
She moved across the cold stone floor of the ancient training room with all the speed she could still muster from her agonized muscles. Her sweat slicked body straining to meet the demands that she placed on it, as she struggled to block all of the incoming strikes to her naked form. Block, parry, dodge, deflect, slash; it was a constant need that flashed through her mind as she struggled desperately to do what none of the others, her Masters included, had managed. She fought to live.
She tried not to think about the fates of the others. She didn't want to join them in the grisly death that awaited her should she falter in the slightest. She knew without needing to be told that she was the last one still alive. As much as she didn't want to think about what had happened, and what was still happening, she could not shut out the scenes that surrounded her. The sight of dozens of twisted, mangled, and half eaten bodies, and the creatures that were still feeding on them. She knew that one small misstep, the slightest mistake or hesitation and she would join the rest of the nearly four thousand Sith who were being surreptitiously trained here in the deepest bowels of Korriban.
She had just finished the first half of her second four hour saber training session with Darth Magus, when the creatures had burst up into the lower crypts. Both the Sith Lords and the students had quickly been overwhelmed by the creatures that were ravenous for flesh.
Almost a third of a planet away from the Valley of the Dark Lords, this base had once been a training ground for tens of thousands of Sith troops, but that had been countless thousands of years ago, back when Korriban had sustained millions of Sith. The ancient academy and base had been rediscovered shortly before the beginning of the Clone Wars and had been immediately put to use.
Darth Magus, the Sith Lord who'd been trained by Darth Tyranus himself while still young had been one of the last to fall. He'd been killed when he cast aside the specially designed training weapons in favor of his lightsabers which had little effect on the impossibly tough hide of the creatures. She knew that only these two training weapons were keeping her alive.
Composed of highly compressed beskar, each of the two training staffs weighed a full metric ton apiece, and required use of the Force to merely lift those weapons. Equipped with a small motion powered, but high speed gyroscope inside each end, they perfectly mimicked the handling characteristics of an actual double bladed lightsaber, also called a saberstaff. Instead of an energy plasma blade that would eventually burn through the hide of the creatures, she was wielding weapons that smashed and crushed them into oblivion. The training session had been grueling as always, Darth Magus was a relentless task Master, and he demanded that she always train with these weapons that he'd had built specifically for training.
"You will use them until you don't even realize that you are using them!" The aged Sith had snarled at her on countless occasions.
Now for once, she was truly glad that these weapons were as heavy as they were. Limbs broke, skulls crushed, and bodies shattered under the force of her blows. Her breath was coming in ragged gasps, her muscles screamed in the agony of exhaustion, but she refused to let up. To let up was to die, she'd already seen that, and there was no way she was going to become a meal for some nightmarish beast.
Finally, a break. There was a slight opening in between two of the creatures, and she took full advantage of it. Slipping between them, she started for the ramp that would lead up to the lower levels, from there, if she was lucky and the Force was with her, maybe she could make it to the upper levels, from there to the surface, and then to the ancient spaceport to escape.
The only problem was, she'd never been to the surface. Every single one of her thirteen years, had been spent deep in the bowels of the Sith home world. She'd spent just enough time in the simulators that she could fly a ship if she had to, but she'd never be hired as a pilot.
Now that she was on the ramp leading upwards to the lower levels, she was fighting a running battle in an area that favored her, rather than the creatures she was forced to fight. The close quarters forced them into limited numbers that she could deal with. She considered trying to take some of them out and lessen the number of opponents that she faced, but for every one of the creatures that fell back due to injury, it seemed as if ten more were just begging to take its place. Knowing that she couldn't begin to afford a war of attrition against them, she continued to make her way to higher ground.
She kept her weapons in constant motion. Slamming and smashing aside the limbs and claws that reached for her. For once her small stature was a true advantage. With the full sized staves that she was using, each one meant to be used with two hands, she had greater coverage from the weapons. Alternating her attack patterns, she sometimes had her staffs rotating counter to each other, and at other times rotating in sequence to deliver follow up attacks against her opponents.
During one of her counter rotation attacks, two of the creatures rushed her simultaneously. She dropped into a crouch, and raised her low staff, so that both weapons were now just above her head and smashed both of them in the legs. With the wet sickening crunch of shattered bones the creatures went down. Following up with a twist of each wrist aided by the Force, she brought her weapons around for a second attack to the heads of the two beasts. Even as they fell, she noted with revulsion that their brains had hit the freezing stone floor first.
Three and a half hours after that first horrific rush of death from below, she caught a break. She struck the creature that was chasing her and barely noticed its fall from a crushed skull, when she realized that she was alone in the corridor. Seeing a student barracks that had been abandoned for countless thousands of years, made her hope that maybe, just maybe, by some miracle of the Force, she could find a place to rest and possibly find some clothing to warm up for a while.
A quick glance inside showed her that although the creatures had been there, they weren't there now. That was all she needed to know as she went inside and sealed the two meter thick door to keep the creatures out. Turning around from the door she took stock of what was in the room that she might use. She ignored the grisly remains of several students in favor of the two creatures that lay unmoving in the room. Two swift blows ensured that if they hadn't been dead, they certainly were now.
She leaned her weapons against a wall, while she searched the large communal dormitory. When it was all said and done, what she had was one cloak that while blood stained wasn't damaged, two single hilt lightsabers and two double bladed lightsabers. It was these last two items that made her sigh with relief. The broken remains of the other lightsabers and the far too little remains of their mangled owners, she ignored.
She worked quickly as she gathered up the remains of the shredded clothing. She couldn't tell whether what she was now using as a belt to carry her newfound lightsabers had been a shirt, pants, or even some type of undergarment because of the bloodstains on it, but it served her purpose. A few more strips of shredded cloth served to cover her feet and tie the cloak around her to provide some warmth from the near freezing cold of the surrounding stone. She then used the cleanest strip of cloth she could find to bind her hair up and out of the way, so that she would neither be blinded nor hindered by it.
Testing one of the plastiformed bunks with her hand, she watched as it collapsed from sheer age. Going over to the ancient terminal which by some miracle of the Force, still functioned, she pulled up a student map. She choked back a sob of pure terror at what she discovered.
"Those who falter or fail are weak! Only those who are strong are fit to survive to become Sith!" Darth Magus' voice railed at her from deep within her memories.
Hoping that she was wrong, and that she'd somehow misread the map she looked again. No, she wasn't wrong; she had nearly fifteen kilometers of passages, walkways, corridors, ramps, and rooms to pass before she could even think of trying to cross the surface of Korriban! The motion sensors showed more than seven hundred of the creatures roaming throughout every level of the academy! It would take an entire army of fully trained and highly skilled Force users to cut through them all. What chance did she have when she wasn't even considered worthy enough to be issued her first lightsaber?
She knew that she couldn't stay in this room forever, not only did she need both food and water, but she would also need clothing to keep out the ever pervasive cold. For now, the near freezing air help to refresh her exhausted body, but she knew that later, it would begin to sap her strength, strength that she would need if she was going to survive.
She slumped down against the wall and closed her eyes. To the untrained eye, she might have appeared to be sleeping; this assumption would have been far from the truth. She entered a meditative trance and began pulling the Force to her as she concentrated on trying to strengthen and re-energize her weary body.
"Dress yourself in rage, clothe yourself in the Force, and you will be unstoppable!" Darth Magus had bellowed at her the one time she had dared ask about clothing because she was cold. That had been many years ago, and this was the first time since that lesson that she'd ever wished for clothing during a training session. Although upon really thinking about it, her complete lack of clothing hadn't given the creatures anything to grab onto.
With that realization her eyes flew open wide. With a deep breath she stood and stripped off the bloodstained cloak. Folding it into a tight ball, she then tied it lightly to her makeshift belt. If one of those beasts managed to grab it, she would still not be hindered in her escape.
Turning to face the sealed door, she tried to quell the fear and terror that threatened to rip the very breath from her lungs, to call up anger, rage, and hatred in the place of those fears. She tried in vain.
A quick glance at the student terminal showed that none of the creatures were outside the door. Grabbing her staffs, she instinctively used the Force to pick them up, it had become second nature to her, an instinctive action, for Darth Magus had punished her mercilessly each and every time he'd caught her without them.
Darth Magus had used her training as an excuse to pioneer new training techniques in both the Force and in combat. Some of her first memories were of trying to learn how to simultaneously use two weapons that were even longer than she was tall. Failure had always resulted in punishment, and that punishment was always the same; hours upon hours of excruciating shocks from Force lightning.
Brief use of the Force released the seal on the door and the proximity sensor immediately opened it. Seeing that the corridor was clear for the moment she set out at a brisk pace. She knew that she needed to move quickly, but there was no way that she intended to run blindly into one of those things. As formidable as they had been, even her Masters had proven to be no match for the beasts.
She had no idea what they truly were. All she knew about them was that they were mostly immune to any effects of the Force. Darth Magus had often referred to them as the Guardians. He'd told her and the other students that they guarded the legacy, heritage, and strength of the Sith; ensuring that only those who were truly strong and worthy would survive to become Sith Lords. That alone had told her just how dangerous they were, even before they had shown up, and now, she knew she had to face them; alone.
She'd gone less than fifty meters when the first one came upon her. With a bellow of infinite rage, the creature charged straight at her. Instantly both of her staffs went into motion. Whirling them around her in a counter clockwise pattern, she began spinning in that direction herself to add extra power to her strikes.
With one staff at waist level, and the other above her head, both of her weapons were moving with blinding speed. As soon as the creature entered her striking range, she hit the beast with everything she had.
Her high staff slammed into the creature's shoulder, crushing its way inward almost to the center of its chest. The second staff hit the foul beast in the arm, forcibly amputating it by the simple fact that the staff continued inward until it was slicing into the abdominal section of the beast by sheer power.
At 1,000 kilograms each, the two weapons together weighed in at two metric tons. Driven by the unstoppable power of the Force, which in turn was fueled by her fear, desperation, and fierce will to live, the weapons knocked the creature to the side to slam against the unyielding stone with a sickening wet crunch of shattering bones, and pulping organs.
In the near silence that followed the creature's instant death, she could hear the heavy tread of several more approaching. A strong steady gait that belied the terror gripping her soul propelled her forward to meet them. She could have sworn that her heart had frozen in mid beat when she saw eight of the creatures rushing towards her. In pure desperation she reached out for the only real weapon that she had left. Calling the Force to her with a strength born of fear, she gave herself up entirely to the Force.
She blinked in puzzlement as she looked around her in a near daze. Somehow she was in the private chambers of Darth Magus. She quickly looked around to see if any of the creatures were nearby, and nearly collapsed in relief when she saw that the massive stone door was closed and sealed.
She looked around and spotted a data terminal. Setting her weapons aside she went over to it and seeing that it was in standby mode, entered her student codes. While her codes wouldn't give her any access to anything she wasn't authorized for, it still activated the terminal. Calling up the map of the academy, she realized in shock that more than ten hours had passed since she'd last used the terminal in the lower levels. Calling up the motion sensors gave her another shock, one that rocked her to her core. Her legs collapsed out from under her as she stared at the terminal in disbelief. Barely more than four hundred of the creatures remained. Had she done that? No! Surely not. There was no way that she, a mere student, not even qualified to attempt to build a lightsaber, had taken out nearly three hundred of the most dangerous creatures ever to walk the harsh world of Korriban!
Maybe they just left; maybe they're leaving, now that everyone's dead. She thought.
With that seeming miracle giving her a temporary measure of strength, she stood and began cycling through the security cameras that were everywhere within the academy. A shaking hand rose to trembling lips as she saw the countless smashed, battered, crushed, and shattered bodies of the creatures that littered the passages to the lower levels.
Sinking back to the cold stone floor, she began trembling in shock. She had easily recognized the devastation caused by her own weapons. That and the fact that the carnage formed a continuous path back to the first barracks that she'd taken refuge in, were a dead giveaway.
Looking down at herself she took stock of her appearance. She still had her belt. The cloak and lightsabers were still there, and the coverings were still on her feet. Nothing else looked familiar.
As she looked down at her body, it was like looking at the body of a total stranger from their own eyes. Her skin, normally an alabaster white from never having seen a sun of any kind, was now colored a greenish blue and black. She was so drenched and covered in the splattered blood and gore of the creatures she'd killed to get here, that she was no longer recognizable as herself.
Too exhausted to get up without help, she once more called upon the strength of the Force to revitalize herself. The fact that she had to do so, proved her failings. Darth Magus had repeatedly told her and punished her for such acts, because a true Sith would be constantly using the Force to fuel their strength.
As soon as she felt that she was able, she climbed wearily to her feet, and began to thoroughly search the room. She knew that she wouldn't find any clothing that would come close to fitting her better than what she already had, and any that she did try to use would only serve to hinder her at this point. Instead, she extended her search to other items of use or value in her situation.
Using one of the lightsabers on the locks of the chest and closet. She found several packets of her deceased Master's emergency rations, which she devoured hungrily. She found a large satchel which was packed with several flight uniforms. These she tossed carelessly aside, the Kel Dor had been far too large for anything of his to fit her.
Inside the chest, she found several data pads, including one data pad that was crudely attached to some type of large crystal. Activating the data pad that was attached to the crystal, she found that it accessed information that was stored in the memory crystal it was connected to. She stared at the data pad in a mixture of shock and relief. It contained the complete teachings of the Force, with maps and references to other more valuable learning aids! She quickly shut down the data pad and stuffed both it and the crystal it was attached to in the satchel. After she had carefully packed those in the satchel she resumed her search of the chest and spotted a very strange looking medical kit.
Opening it to examine the contents, she was surprised to find it filled with nothing but Mandalorian battle stimulants. She nearly tossed it to the side when she realized her mistake. Those stimulants reproduced the same effects of her own body's adrenalin, but amplified by a factor of ten. The strange cocktail mixture also produced an intense rage, which might, just might help her get out of here alive.
Finding nothing else in the chest except a small pouch of strange looking metal disks, she decided that she needed to get some sleep.
When she woke up for the third time, it was with a feeling of desperation. She knew that she was safe as long as she stayed behind the sealed door, but again, she eaten all the supplies she'd found, and something was nagging at her to get moving. She grabbed the satchel and both of her staves and got ready to leave when she looked back at the small pouch still lying where she'd dropped it. Something was telling her to take it with her. She shook her head irritatedly. It was useless weight that might slow her down or otherwise get in the way. But still, that something insisted that she take it with her.
With a resigned shrug of her shoulders, she walked over and picked it up. She tucked it into her makeshift belt, so that she could easily discard it if she had to.
Checking the data terminal revealed less than a kilometer to go before reaching the main doors of the academy, it also showed her that most of the remaining creatures were closing in on her position!
Was this why she hadn't been able to sleep for a mere thirty minutes? Was the Force somehow warning her that they were coming for her? She had no answers to these questions, and no one to ask, so she put them out of her thoughts and prepared to leave the room.
After injecting one of the Mandalorian battle stimulants, she felt it begin to take effect almost immediately. A snarl of chemical fueled pure animalistic fury escaped her lips as she opened the door, and started heading for the surface.
As the first of the creatures rushed at her, a strange haze filled her mind. She couldn't think, she couldn't act, reaching for the Force; she released a scream of primal rage that made the creature pause for a split second. Then she was in motion, the Force fueling and guiding her actions. Like a marionette in the hands of a master puppeteer, she had absolutely no control over what she did next. In stunned disbelief, she watched as one of her weapons went flying from her hand in a whirling blur to kill the first beast before it ever got close to her. Even as her first weapon was returning to her hand, her second was arcing out to strike at others that were fast approaching.
With both of her weapons careening wildly around her she moved towards her goal and destination. Her steps were steady, solid, and determined. Although she didn't know it, her every move was now being determined by the living will of the Force. No longer was she trying to bend the Force to her will; she was far too weary for that. No, her exhausted state, along with the mental stress, desperation, and the stimulants she was under, combined to forge her into a living extension of the Force. With no control whatsoever, she merely watched helplessly as her body moved on its own accord, towards a goal that she knew she could never reach.
The next thing she knew, she was blinking her eyes in pain. She heard the deep rumble of the academy doors closing behind her, but she couldn't see anything. After having spent her entire life in the dimly lit underground depths of the hidden Sith Academy, she was not prepared for the sheer brilliance of even the relatively dim natural sunlight of Korriban.
With her weapons still hovering protectively around her she stumbled her way along the worn but obvious trail that led to the spaceport. She had no idea how far it might be, but she knew that she had to get there.
So blinded was she by the sun, that she never saw the first five ships that were sitting on various landing pads as she passed them. This was fortunate since they possessed no hyperdrive and were unable to traverse the vast interstellar distances that she would need to travel in order to fully escape the creatures.
As she climbed into the ship, she shielded her eyes to try to find a spot to store her weapons. She managed to get them wedged along the seat at an angle so that they extended towards the control pedals. Still shielding her eyes she tried to read the instrument panels. She finally located the main power switch and then sealed the cockpit. She was still trying to see well enough to initiate the main startup sequence, when she heard the enraged snarls of the creatures that were the cause of her predicament.
Within minutes the creatures were slashing at the hull of the ship trying to get to her. She could hear a strange rattle coming from inside the ship with her and quickly realized that it was being caused by her weapons. Frowning in concentration she realized that she had never released her grip on them with the Force. It took an act of concentrated will on her part to accomplish that task, but once she did, she found her ability to focus increased by a fair bit.
Quickly starting the main engines she ran through the most basic checklist which was all she'd been taught and lifted off. She had no clue where she might go, or where she'd end up, but at least she wouldn't get eaten by those things!
As the small craft cleared the atmosphere of Korriban, the blinding light began to dim as her course put the bulk of the planet between her and the sun. The dim glow of the instrument panel was more on a level that she was accustomed to, so she was now able to see the panel clearly for the first time.
The ship was old. She had no doubt about that, she just hoped that it would still work well enough to get her someplace safe. Knowing absolutely nothing about hyperspatial navigation would normally have hindered any attempt she made to fly the craft to a safe haven. Instead, her ignorance only served to assist her as she felt the Force guide her in setting the autopilot to reverse the previous course that it had flown an unknown number of years before.
As the ship entered hyperspace the girl slumped down into the pilot seat in exhaustion. At this point in time, it didn't matter how fearful she was that those creatures might still come after her, she simply could not keep her eyes open any longer.