DISCLAIMER: I don't own Star Wars, Knights of the Old Republic, or any related concepts or characters! I did name the player character Rune, however.

I Like You

Revan grinned down at Carth, grinding her booted heel harder into his throat, choking him. She relished the look of horror on his face, the smell of charred flesh emanating from his blaster-burned hands. Using the Force to turn the blasters against him had been easier than she expected, and now he was defenseless. Maybe she had improved her Force mastery at this miserable Sith academy after all.

"So, you found me out, Carth," she said. She smirked at him, malicious glee dancing in her eyes.

If Revan were not holding onto his consciousness using her disturbingly natural skill with the Force, Carth would have been on his way into shock. As it was, he felt tears of horror running down his face. This woman, who he had finally begun to trust, had not only become the very thing he'd hated the most, but also coerced him into killing his own son. Or was that my own fault? I was the one who pulled the triggers. Carth pushed away the unwelcome idea with a shudder.

Revan had been watching him, grinning all the while, as he struggled for breath and sanity. Now she caught him by the throat and pulled him to his feet, pinning him between her body and the wall, her face close enough to his that he could feel her breath. His jugular pulsed against the warm palm of her hand. Gods, he would have loved feeling her pressed against him like this only a few hours ago. Now he was repulsed, too weak to fight her, and fishing half-heartedly for a response. "Go to hell," he croaked weakly. That doesn't even make sense. Concentrate! Think! You have to get out and warn the others…

She laughed at him, a sound with no hint of the genuine happiness he'd heard, or thought he'd heard, back on the Ebon Hawk just the other morning. She removed her hand from his throat, and Carth braced himself against the wall with his fingertips, gasping for breath. "Now Carth, you have a choice to make. You know that I'm more powerful than any of the 'Jedi' we have with us. I want to kill Malak even more than you do. You won't get in my way."

It was all too much; finding his son, losing him again, the betrayal of a woman he had thought he might love, the throbbing of his scorched hands… but there was this one thing more. He did want Malak dead. Maybe in the end Malak would take Revan down too. He had a suspicion that her last statement had a push of Force persuasion behind it, but he also realized that he didn't care. "I won't get in your way," he growled, his eyes staring at the stone floor. "But once Malak is dead, I'll do anything to make sure you're next."

"I look forward to watching you try," the woman he thought he knew whispered, and she kissed him roughly, digging her nails into his palms when he tried to push her away. Her lips muffled his cry of pain, and she seemed to like that.

"HK, I've got a task for you," Revan called as she finally stepped away from Carth. Carth looked down, away from her mesmerizing eyes, slowly and painfully absorbing the reality of his son's body sprawled on the floor.

"Ready, master!" HK-47 replied, tramping into the room from his guard position further down the hall.

"Carth seems to think that I've gone back to my old ways. I want you to watch him to make sure that he doesn't jeopardize our mission here," said Revan, straightening her black robes. "I want him alive, if possible, but if you have to… blast him."

"Exclamation: With pleasure, master!" HK said with obvious robotic glee. Carth gritted his teeth and the assassin droid leveled its blaster rifle at his chest. He was beginning to hate that droid.

Revan turned on her heal and walked into the dark hallway. "Go back to our room and take a medpac to those hands, Carth," she suggested over her shoulder. "I'm going to take their little test. I want you both ready to leave with me when I return." Much as it infuriated Carth, she was right when she implied he'd leave with her or not at all. He'd never make it out of the Sith academy alone if they already recognized him as Rune's… no, Revan's… slave. He'd never been successful at misleading Jedi about his intentions, and in a fight he would be laughably outmatched. Still, he stared at the body of his son and contemplated his options for escape, until HK-47 reminded Carth that he was still in danger of being "blasted" if he did not move.

He tensed to attack the droid, to wrest away the blaster rifle and doubtless doom himself in the process. He'd thought he had nothing left to lose after he carried out his revenge aboard the Leviathan, but this woman, this Sith, had somehow convinced him he had a purpose, a hope, a lover, and now he'd lost everything all over again. Everything ends sometime…

He turned away from his son and began to walk. Ever since Telos, his will to survive had sustained him when there was nothing else left. He would live, and he would make Revan pay for what she had done to him… and his only child.

Korriban held the last piece of the Star Map which Revan had been seeking. When she returned from her trial without the academy's dark master, she was stronger and more terrible than before. She slaughtered the students who resisted her or tried to flee, and quietly accepted the fealty of the few who kept their wits about them and offered her their service before her lightsaber met their necks. These she instructed to stay at the academy and prepare to join her in war when she returned.

Carth tried to get away from her the moment they exited the ancient academy grounds. He no longer needed her protection from the Sith students, and he'd thought to make a break for the ship to warn the others. Before he took two steps in his dash for the safety of the city, she had her lightsaber at his throat.

"Carth," she murmured in the same soothing voice she'd used to calm him so many times before, "I know you. I know what you're thinking. I know what you want. You can't run away from me." The hot hum from her weapon rattled his teeth… or was that fear? Chest heaving with the adrenaline energy he couldn't expend, he held his body still under the blade. Red light lit his face in the planet's gathering dusk. "I like you, Carth. I want to keep you around for a while longer. What I don't want is to be bothered by your responsibility for all life and honor while I'm trying to save the galaxy, so understand this: if you say anything that would make our traveling companions suspicious of me… anything at all… Mission will bear a punishment for your mistake."

The lightsaber snapped off audibly. Carth remained frozen to the spot as Revan pushed past him and continued down the road, a dark shadow on a darkening path. Mission… She was younger than Dustin by a few years. Once he'd gotten to know her, he'd gone to great lengths to protect her. He'd seen Rune… Revan… do the same, early on, until she'd begun to change. HK prodded him in the spine with the blaster rifle, and Carth forced his feet to move him forward. He was following a monster. He could only hope that he would find a way out for all of them, before she murdered another child. You pulled the triggers. Gods, no… focus. You have to be focused to see your next opportunity…He saw none before they reached the Ebon Hawk.

Revan had no trouble convincing the others that Carth and HK-47 were simply staying on the ship as a matter of course, while she tied up loose ends on other worlds. Mission, in particular, was delighted to be Rune's personal bodyguard for all of their off-ship excursions.

"Let him go. We have more important things to worry about," advised Bastila coldly. The group were standing on the beach of an unknown world, and had just realized that both Bastila and Revan were no longer the shining bastions of Jedi honor they once were. Carth was finally making his run from the woman he'd loved, vowing to save her, when he could.

Revan, however, was in no mood to be practical. She had plans for Carth that did not include leaving him running free on this nameless world. "Every person we meet must understand that we are Sith, and we must be obeyed. This won't take long," she told Bastila, breaking into a Force-propelled run.

Carth was fleeing without a destination in mind, and he knew that was a bad idea. He decided to head for the Elder compound to the south. If nothing else, he could be certain that there would be nothing alive there to attack him while he formulated a plan to get off this planet and…

WHAM. Carth felt himself launched through the air as Revan's powerful Force push hit him from behind. He skidded across the grass a short distance, and she was on him before he had a chance to fight.

She planted a knee between his shoulder blades to keep him in place. "Carth, I'm disappointed. I thought you wanted to kill me once I finish with Malak." She stood, pulling him to his feet by the back of the armor he wore and turning him to face her.

"Trust me, I do," Carth growled at her. She smiled that awful smile that made Carth feel at once furious and ashamed. She obviously liked to hear him say that, and yet he had said it anyway… he was pleasing her. Carth felt sick.

Canderous jogged up the trail, his repeating blaster cannon at the ready. "Bring him back to the ship," Revan commanded, and shoved Carth at the Mandalorian on her way down the path. Canderous gestured for Carth to walk in front of him, and the two made their way back to the ship.

"How can you follow her?" Carth demanded as they returned to the beach. "I thought you felt different after the battle with Jagi."

"She is Revan," Canderous said simply, "The only sentient in the galaxy who could beat us. There is no greater honor than fighting at her side." Carth shook his head in disgust.

The ship was in sight. For a fleeting moment Carth considered making another run for the cliffs. If Canderous or that infernal assassin droid shot him dead, at least he would avoid spending another moment with these women who were once his friends. No, there will be another chance to escape soon enough, he decided. In the battle to come there was no way that Revan would be able to watch him all the time. He just had to hold onto hope and focus on the task at hand...

Unfortunately, he had not counted the role of HK-47 in that scenario. When Revan, Bastila, and Canderous left the Ebon Hawk for their last battle with Malak, he was left behind on the ship with the droid to guard him. Revan had disarmed Carth herself, and locked his blasters in the cargo hold.

He had sat on his bunk for hours, waiting. Bastila had told Admiral Dodonna that Carth was dead, and she'd believed it. No one knew he was on the ship. There was no hope of rescue, and HK made it clear that there was no hope of escape either. "Warning: The master seems to prefer that you live, meatbag, but she did not say that I am forbidden to stun you." Carth gave him no reason to do so. He knew that the droid wouldn't kill him, so the choice was to wait on his bunk, or wait stunned on the floor until she returned. He'd been stunned before. He knew his preference. At any moment, this Sithspit space station could explode, and that would be the end. Any moment…

But return Revan did, at a leisurely pace, with Bastila at her side. Carth's heart sank. The two women looked… triumphant. Malak must be dead, and with him the Jedi who had landed on the Starforge, and the remnants of the Republic fleet. All was lost.