A/N: Thanks to god for all and DreadWolf98 for your support. Beyond the rebuild of Chapter 3 that'll be posted within 36 hours of this chapter, this is the end of the line for this AU. I may come back to it at some point in the future, but I have too many projects going on right now to seriously pursue it at present.


Part IV

Revanchist Reborn


"You have come as I expected. The Dark Side is strong with you, my old master. But here on the Star Forge, I am invincible."

Revan snorted. "We both knew this could only end one way, Squint. It was always going to end with one of us dead on the other's lightsaber when we decided to become Sith Lords. Though I still cannot imagine why you thought it could ever be me, dead on yours. Then again, you were arrogant even as a Jedi. Or perhaps you became an idiot upon being fully consumed by the Dark Side."

Darth Malak turned to face Darth Revan as she slowly approached. The Observation Platform of the Star Forge was one of the largest chambers inside the great and ancient facility. Several booths were set around the area, holding Jedi from the Dantooine Enclave within their dark grasp. Revan could feel them in the Force, hanging just on the edge between life and death. Behind Malak was a massive, curving window that revealed the raging battle between the Sith Armada and whatever Republic forces Admiral Dodonna had gathered. The two Dark Lords knew their fight would lead to the same outcome—the beginning of the end for the Republic and the moment the Sith Empire came into its full supremacy. Their fight was but that to determine who was the true Dark Lord of the Sith to rule over the galaxy upon that final victory.

"You are the arrogant one if you think you can defeat me," Malak snarled. "It shall finally bring about your destruction. I had thought to turn the full might of the Star Forge against you, but I do not need that to destroy you in your weakened state, Revan. Only its dark influence is enough for me to overcome you."

She snorted, the sound crackling through the mask's vocalizer. "The Star Forge will always answer to me before you, Malak. I do wonder, though. Do you tell yourself that I am arrogant so you can live with and even ignore your failures? Your first attempt at an apprentice was a failure and died with little effort. Bastila as a Jedi defeated him and rather handily too. Then you turned to her, and if we are speaking of arrogance, then yours was on full display with that decision.

"She was already mine when she fell into your hands. I'm surprised I'm saying this, but thank you for guiding her to the Dark Side. I have replaced you with her—something I had long considered before you fired upon the Revanchist—and I know for certain I will not need to be as mindful of her as I was of you. Darth Helene is loyal in ways you could never be."

"It is the way of the Sith to destroy ones' master, Revan." Malak seemed to smile, even with the metal construct that had replaced his lower jaw. She had erred then, letting him live. "One day she will turn on you and either she shall become the Dark Lord of the Sith or you will destroy her as you have destroyed everything else precious to you."

"Perhaps," Revan admitted. "But that will only come to pass after I have dealt with you, my failed pupil."

She then ignited her lightsabers, humming red and violet. They were the same lightsabers she had carried when they returned from the Unknown Regions, when they found the Star Forge, when they attacked the Republic at Foerost and began the Jedi Civil War. Bastila had held onto them, along with her helmet. For safekeeping, she said while enroute from Rakata Prime. The Mandalorian helmet she had found on Cathar had returned to its rightful place upon her head, the final declaration of whom Revan was for all to see. She was the Lord of Vengeance. The return of all three to her marked, in many ways, the conclusion to the great venture to destroy Malak and, unknown to the Jedi, her grand rebirth.

The Force must have known even then how closely we were bound, and perhaps even our destiny. I can feel my apprentice's gift fueling me just as the Dark Side does. I hope Malak has made peace with the fact the last thing he shall see is this mask.

"Then let us end this," Malak declared, igniting his own crimson lightsaber.

The moments leading to the first clash of blades was slow and methodical, a time to plan and plot how their fight would play out. Revan drew upon the Dark Side, the strength Bastila funneled into her through both their bond and her battle meditation, and delved into the inherent strength of the Star Forge.

The Force fights for us, Master, Helene reminded. Let me handle the Republic while you deal with your former apprentice.

Revan grinned and brought her weapons down upon Malak. She slashed in crosses, first aiming to cut him from shoulder to hip, then from neck to groin, and finally sideways across his torso. He defended himself against them, but stepped back with each attack. She continued to press her attack, battering at his lumbering defense and slipping around every counter attack. Her violet blade slipped behind his guard and seared his left shoulder, burning flesh and rending his red jumpsuit. He grunted and used the Force to push her away.

Malak hobbled over to one of the strange holding booths with a Jedi from Dantooine. "Do you recognize them?"

"Weaklings from the conclave you attacked," Revan said with a shrug. "A shame I won't have the chance to turn them, but you have been ruining my plans too long. It matters not why they are here. I will kill you, even if I must carve through them."

"Oh, they are not here for you to fight," Malak declared. And then he turned to the booth. She felt him reach out with the Force, drawing upon the dark signature of the Star Forge, and tear away the Jedi's life force and draw it into himself. Revan gasped, momentarily startled by the lengths Malak was going to gain the upper hand.

I should not be surprised, she reminded herself. I am Sith, just as he. We do whatever we must for power. No matter how destructive and immoral it may be.

"As long as I possess the Star Forge, I am invincible, Revan. There is no hope for you. I am the true Dark Lord of the Sith."

"Then I will break your power and destroy you, piece by piece." Revan moved not to confront Malak, but for the booth nearest to her. She drove her crimson blade through the Jedi, shattering the booth and letting them pass into the Force.

Malak bellowed. "How dare you! You will not defeat me, my old master! No matter what tricks you try, I have surpassed you."

A shame I am wearing this helmet. Otherwise, he would see my smirk and grow even more furious. I guess he was named the Lord of Malice for a reason.

In the end, she only said, "Then stop me, Squint."

Revan cackled and flipped, absorbing Force lightning and returning with Force drain whenever her lightsabers weren't enough to deflect the blasts of power. It took longer than she wished, but her violet blade slashed through the final Jedi bound to strengthen Malak. Her former apprentice roared, his fury boiling over, and charged like a Bull rancor gone mad. She stood her ground, spinning her blades into a mixed-form stance. With each step, he drew closer. As she could read the fury in his bloody yellow eyes, she smirked.

It was over in a flash of red and violet and red. Malak fell onto his knees with a mechanical gasp, his lightsaber turning off and falling away, rolling until it came to a stop at her feet. His arms were drawn in to feel and hide the deep slashes across his chest.

"It is over," Revan declared, deactivating her weapons. "Do you have any parting words, my failed apprentice?"

"This…this should not…have happened," Malak said, struggling to hold onto life. "I…I am the…Dark Lord…of…the Sith. Not…you."

"No longer. You were a fool to challenge me, both in the Sernpidal System and here aboard the Star Forge. Your reliance upon its power was your undoing. My hatred of what you have done to my plans and me was fuel enough to destroy you a thousand times. But then, you were always weaker than me even as Jedi."

"You are…right," Malak admitted and she saw his eyes flicker from yellow to hazel. "As always…you…were right…Revan. You are conquer…and savior…hero and villain…and I? I am…nothing. And I…fade…into dark…ness."

Malak collapsed and Revan knew it then and there. He was dead and she was once more the Dark Lord of the Sith. Her dark form remained standing over the corpse for a long moment and then departed the Observation Platform.

It was a long, quiet stroll back to where she left Darth Helene and HK-47. When she entered the chamber with its great holographic map of the Star Forge and the battle beyond, she removed her helmet and grinned.

"Finish them, Lady Helene. I have a Republic to destroy and an Empire to rule. I do not wish to leave my loyal troops waiting. Prove that yourself to be the Lord of Victory as I am the Lord of Revenge."

"As you command, master," Darth Helene said, grinning. Revan closed her eyes, feeling the flow of the Force and of the battle. With the slow certainty of poison creeping through veins, the Republic Fleet sent to destroy the Star Forge was routed. She felt the spark of Master Vandar extinguished. Soon, eleven other Masters would suffer his fate and the Council would be no more. Soon, her Sith Empire would stretch from its ancestral world of Korriban to the capital world of the Republic. The Jedi would join her or be sent to Tython, the ancestral world she knew the location of. She had been honest to Jolee on the matter of letting those Jedi who wouldn't join her would live. I never did say whether the Jedi would have the choice of where to go, did I. Nor did I tell him how they would be confined to that world with no means of departing for whatever purpose they wished. They would no longer be a threat, bundled in on a single world with no capacity to train new Jedi.

In time, their ancient religion would be forgotten. Those sensitive to the workings of the Force would only be Sith.

And she, Revan, their Dark Lord, would rule the galaxy with apprentice and lover by her side.