Writers notes: I usually don't make notes in my stories since that disturbs the reading, but I have to make an exception here to make it clear that most of the descriptions related to Auratera and the Jedi Temple there (Acablas) are not my makings, it's more or less picked directly from Wookieepeedia's sites about Auratera and Acablas. The cave is my own, though.

Chapter 8: Auratera

Auratera. Once an inhabited planet where numerous species once were living peacefully together on a planet which literally was soaked in the Force. Iktotchi, twi-leks and ithorians were living in harmony with humans. The peaceful life lasted for centuries until one day a Jedi Knight found the vergence in the Force. In due time the Acablas Temple was raised and the Jedi Order kept a constant presence on the planet. It might have gone well, but it didn't. The incredibly strong vergence attracted the Sith as well as Jedi and by the end of the New Sith Wars the Temple was still on the Jedi's hands, but their numbers (and the population's in general) had been strongly diminished.

As years passed the Temple was abandoned and the planet was erased from holomaps. Still, it emerged in the Jedi Order's history classes as an example of how dangerous the Force may be to untrained beings, -or darksiders.

….

"What a pity," was Tahl Uvain's first thought when she navigated her small starship towards the planet's surface.

This place seems so peaceful. It's almost like the Force itself is radiating from it. I can hardly believe that we chose to abandon it so many years ago. And still, I think I can feel the vergence. There is a…disturbance down there. It's incredibly strong, and despite the light I can feel darkness there as well. It's like it…seeks to balance the light from the planet's surface somehow.

As the small ship came closer to the surface she closed her eyes and let the Force guide her further down towards the surface. She literally could feel the Force dragging her towards one specific point.

Softly the ship's five hydraulic legs touched the ground and Tahl rose from the pilot's seat. She stretched her body and stifled a yawn. She had trusted the autopilot enough to get some sleep during the hyperspace legs of her journey, but there really wasn't much space for movement inside the small cabin. She rolled her shoulders to get some of the stiffness out of her muscles. Then she opened the hatch and went out.

Her final landing spot had been a mesa. The ground was plain and a perfect place for setting the ship onto. The vegetation was sparse, to say the least, but a mild breeze was whispering over the mesa and small dustballs whirled up into the air. The sky was clear and blue. Curious she went to the edge of the mesa and looked down. There really wasn't much to see as the valley below was covered by a thin layer of fog. She assumed it had to be the morning fog.

She tried to reach out with the Force to find which way would be the easiest to descent to what probably was the old temple somewhere down there, but to her surprise the Force felt blurred despite it's strength. It was more or less like disturbances in an else clear holo image. Patiently she sat down on a chunk of rock near the edge of the mesa. As soon as the fog disappeared she would be able to see what was beneath and hopefully find a convenient path down the side of the mesa.

She didn't have to wait long.

One hour later the fog has cleared and she could see the vaste area around the plateau. The landscape was quite open and the vegetation seemed to be sparse. The remaining buildings from the Acablas Temple were actually located to the other side of the mountain. It was quite embarrassing that she had been so mistaken. On the other hand - it was a good thing that she hadn't begun to descend blindly. It took her a while to find the most convenient way to climb down but after some reconnaissance she found a part of the cliff wall where deep crevices could be used as hand- and foot holds. Slowly she began to climb down, carefully testing each and every rock and crevice before she let it hold her full body weight.

From a distance she could see the bright sandstone walls of what she assumed was the old temple glowing in the sun, and everything seemed exceptionally peaceful.

"Seemed" was the keyword. Opposite to the temple walls another construction could be seen. It was made from darker stone and seemed to be partly carved out from the cliff itself. The shape was roughly as a pyramid but there was no pointed top to be seen. Instead an irregularly shaped cliff was serving as the pyramid top. Something about the construction gave her an eerie feeling. It seemed…evil.

"The Sith Temple," she thought and made a slight deviation of her course - heading towards the Jedi side of the wide valley. At this time of day the Sith construction was bathed in sun while the Acablas Temple was resting in the shadows, and yet the Jedi Temple seemed warm and inviting while the Sith construction was emanating chill and darkness. As she came closer she could see the ground opening in front of her. A conical, slightly asymmetrical, wide shaft was leading down into the ground between the two buildings. It resembled an old amphitheater but it was wider and more open. Far down there she could see an opening as if the cone continued towards the planet's core.

"Aca's funnel," she thought, trying to pull out remaining knowledge from past history lectures from her brain. She knew that below the cone there would be a cenote and even further down a dome shaped construction made in ancient days, maybe before any of the temples on the planet's surface was built.

"I'm not going down there," she decided, "I will have to find the same way as Ker-Wan used but first I intend to take a look at the Jedi Temple."

The main entrance to the Temple was easy to see. It was located slightly away from the cenote and with a shiver she passed by the funnel and entered the temple. It was simply radiating with light. Huge stone blocks had fallen from the walls but the entrance seemed safe enough so she entered the ground level of the building. A huge hall was her first impression of the place. She could see corridors and doors leading away further into the construction. On either side of the hall huge staircases built of the same bright stone as the exterior lead up to the upper levels.

"They did not chose their building material very well," she sighed as she judged the worn steps of the left hand staircase. She decided to go for the right one. It seemed at least a bit more safe. The next level seemed to contain something that might have been the refectory. She could see a long counter crossing the inner part of the huge room. Wooden tables and chairs were still standing, surprisingly well preserved - most likely as a result of the dry climate in this region of the planet.

Other rooms might have been used as classrooms and she could still se ancient boards hanging on the walls and something that seemed like a predecessor for a holo recorder was still on a table in one of the rooms. She could almost hear the young and eager voices of the generations that had lived and trained in the temple.

One more level - there were the dojos, no doubt. She could see metal cylinders gleaming in a rack on the wall near the door. Curiously she took one of them. They looked very much like the training 'sabers back in the Temple on Coruscant. She couldn't resist pressing the ignition button. A low tuned humming could be heard and a pale green light shot out from the cylinder.

"Wow, it's still working," she whispered in awe. Suddenly the entire temple felt so vivid and alive and for a moment she was almost expecting to hear the sound of eager young voices entering the refectory below.

None came.

The upper levels were all dormitories and she could see some larger rooms which most likely had been the Master's bedrooms. Obviously the Padawans of this temple had stayed in the dormitories and the Masters have had their own private rooms. None of the rooms she found were big enough to be used as shared quarters for a Master-Padawan team.

With a low sigh she decided to leave the temple buildings. Ker-Wan's diary had clearly mentioned that the cave he had found was outside the temple walls, and she decided that instead of taking the direct approach and try to find a way down inside the Temple she would try to find Ker-Wan's cave.

According to the description it shouldn't be too far from the temple itself. After all he had been on his way back when he found it. She decided to follow the cliff walls on the "jedi side" of the valley. Somehow she felt that Ker-Wan would have been far more reluctant to enter a crevice in the cliff on the "Sith side", even though the Sith construction might not even have been built when he left the planet. Inclined to the light as all the Kh'enbis seemed to be, he would probably have avoided the more sinister dark side of the cliffs as long as he could.

It was early afternoon when she found it.

She had been examining loose rocks and virtually open crevices in the cliff meticulously the entire day but every time she'd found what she thought could be the entrance she had been disappointed. Either it was only a shadow or the crevice or cave stopped a few meters into the cliff. As the sun began to descend and the "jedi side" was covered in light she saw it. A small dark shadow, almost vertical in the cliff. Big enough for a slim person to squeeze him or herself through but still so narrow that most people wouldn't even think of trying.

Tahl Uvain was not "most people". She entered.

The crevice opened into a small cave as soon as she was through the opening and with a sigh of relief she realized that she could stand up. She had feared that she had to crawl most of the way to wherever she was heading but Ker-Wan's description had been right.

Even more so it seemed, as she slowly proceeded through the cavern. The Force really felt strong in here, yet it was like it was battling itself. She could feel the warmth of it and yet something that felt like cold tentacles trying to capture her. Still, she couldn't see anything more than the rough stone walls.

She continued to walk, some places she actually had to crawl, through the cave and as she gradually came closer to what she expected would be the so called dome under the cenote. The stone walls began to flicker, much in the same way as Ker-Wan had described. From being perfectly normal stone walls they sometimes seemed to brighten by an internal light, sometimes the light was disturbed by dark or even red shadows shimmering over the surface. If it hadn't been so disturbing it would have been a spectacular, and to some extent beautiful view. As it was, it gave her once again a feeling of something evil reaching out for her.

And finally the cavern opened up and she could see the bright light Ker-Wan had mentioned. But through the years something had changed, or else his description had been inaccurate. The soft white light was the same but the red and black flickering over the walls seemed to be more intense than described in the diary. The white and golden shadows were hardly to be seen in-between the waves of red and black rolling over the bright stone that formed the inner walls of the dome.

"I really don't like this," she muttered to herself, and instinctively she pulled closer to the water surrounding the 'island' in the middle of the pond.

"That is wise of you," a voice behind her said calmly, and she startled and turned around, 'saber hilt in her hand before she had even begun the movement.

An old man stood behind her and held up his hand in a disarming movement. Fine crinkles had formed around his blue-green eyes and even deeper crinkles spread out over a weathered face. Thin, wispy hair covered his skull and a neat white beard was covering the lower part of his face. In the moment he saw her face she could have placed a bet that for a moment a mixture of astonishment and fondness flew over his facial features, before they re-arranged back to a seemingly calm demeanor again. Somehow the man seemed to glow with a bluish light, not unlike a hologram, but he seemed solid enough.

"Now, I'd say this is a surprise," he greeted her to her astonishment.

"What? Do you know me? And who are you, anyway?"

"I am Ben," he answered quietly.