Chapter 21: A Sith Reborn
Ischuros struggled to stand. Mephisto hadn't yet trained the weapon onto Kalé, but already he could feel her hold on his mind ebb. Was she dying? Had he killed the one he'd sworn to protect?
"Stop!" He cried, hoping to gain time. Time to somehow undo the past 20 years. Time to change what was about to happen. All the while knowing he was powerless to change anything.
Mephisto turned and stared at him.
"Ah the pup is coming back to his senses. Did she die already? How disappointing." The voice taunting him did not belong to the Jedi master Mephisto. How could it when it was his own father's voice calling out to him. Or is it only the last voice he remembered coming out of his father's mouth? He couldn't remember so clearly.
He finally struggled to his feet and faced the man/thing which had taken possession of the Jedi Master. How quick it went, he'd only been in possession of the weapon for a mere instant. Had he already been tainted when he had returned to the village with it? He shook his head, now was not the time. He could only kill the man. There was no other way to stop the cursed spirit from killing more. Slowly he pulled his blaster and trained it onto the now advancing Jedi. Time froze as he waited for the moment to strike. Though the blade could pass through another saber unhindered, it could deflect bolts from a blaster. It was a rather ingenious construction. One which should be destroyed. So he waited as very slowly, the Jedi paced closer and closer. Until he was almost within striking distance. Then he stopped.
"You think you can defeat me with this pathetic weapon? So inelegant and crude?" Mephisto asked of Ischuros.
"It will wound your flesh as surely as your blade can kill me." He knew he would have but one shot. One short moment when the blade was cutting through him in which he could fire and kill the man. All his life he'd scoffed at how the women trusted in this mysterious Force. He could feel it, but not trust it. Now for the sake of one whom he had almost killed, he had to trust it. Trust it to know the moment in which to pull the trigger and end the plague.
"Foolish welp." Mephisto tensed his muscles to move again, but Ischuros held up his free hand, begging for a delay.
"Before you strike me down, answer me but one question: Who are you that you could so easily destroy not only my father and me, but my entire tribe?"
"I was once knows as Lord Drakus, until the cursed Jedi made me crash land onto your force forsaken world. I was a Sith, hence address me properly as should be." he snarled at the young man. Startled he watched as Ischuros knelt, laying the blaster by his side, hanging his head.
"At least I will know who to condemn before the Tribunal of the Eternals for my fall and death." Drakus laughed and held his weapon up to swing down. With a gleeful smile and swung down, the slight tensing of the man before him, he put down to a last linger of fear of the death he knew would be coming.
The blade hit Ischuros at the same time as s single blaster bolt flashed and hit Drakus where his heart had been beating moments previously. Ischuros crumpled forward, his slowly dimming eyes watching as the cursed weapon cluttered from dying hands.
Kalé would live. Kalé must live. Such was his last thought.