Author Notes: Hi, I hope you're all enjoying the story! I will do my best to get the next update out on time, but no promises, Christmas is really hectic in my family. Thank you all so very much for reading this, you have no idea how much it means to me. If you care to, I really appreciate any feedback.

Chapter 24

The glittering world of Coruscant seemed somehow drained of color; everything was bleak and monotone, leeched of all hope and promise. For Barriss the Temple had been the epicenter of the world, the universe. Light had come from there, and it seemed that light had come from there alone, for now there was none. There was only an oily blackness that seeped over her, crushing the light that had once been all around. The Dark Side saturated the very ground she stood on, its power undeniable. She acknowledged its presence, but no more. She would never accept the false promises it offered, never take it for her own, even when it whispered that it might save her, might be the answer to everything. She was of the light, and it was her duty and responsibility to hold the darkness at bay, even when all seemed lost and the darkness seemed so very inviting. They were two, two Jedi alone against all the strength and power of the Dark Side. They were all that was left because no one had recognized the danger that had lain right in front of the. The Knights of the Order had paid for their blindness, paid in blood and the screams of the lost. The tears were sliding down her face but she didn't care to stop them. Not when it was certain that the only life she had ever fit into was gone, now nothing more than scattered ashes on the breeze

Barriss looked over to Ferus; he was standing very close to her, his face white as death itself. Conflicted emotions play across it and deep within his eyes. His hand was wrapped around hers very tightly, but she was gripping back just as hard. He was shaking slightly too, trembling with the effort not to burst into tears as she had. He didn't turn to look at her, lost in the terror and sorrow that was the ruins of the Jedi Temple. Guilt was in his mind, he had left of his own will, but if he had stayed… Might he have been able to help? To fix? Could he have been the one that might have turned the balance if only he hadn't left the life he was suited oh so perfectly for. Not following her own thoughts through to conclusion, she wrapped her arms around him, holding him as tightly as she could. His breathing came in sharp gasps as he tried to hold back his emotions, just like the proper Jedi Padawan he had once been, but that Ferus was long gone, replaced by a softer, more human version that would not listen to the training he had once been given. She could feel his heartbeat fluttering, so close was he to her. She pretended not to notice the tears that had begun to fall onto her vest. They didn't move nor speak for a very long time. She knew that they must have looked odd, two people hugging each other in front of a bone yard, a ruin from a bygone era, but there were few people to see, just the white clad troopers that guarded to entrance to a crumbling fortress.

They both pulled themselves together at the same time, letting go and turning around without so much as a backwards glance, she couldn't guarantee what her reaction might be if she dared to look back at the Temple. Formerly, she had never cried, her emotions were too under control for that, but things were very different now, and her once firm hold on herself had slipped and frayed and she knew that she would never again attain that level of mastery again, not without Luminara to guide her. Wiping the tears from her eyes, she looked over at Ferus, not wanting to ask the next, inevitable question. As the silence dragged on however, she knew that Ferus had to be feeling much the same way, and it was up to one of them to make the first move. "So, what do we do now?" Much to her relief, her voice wasn't nearly as shaky as she had expected, trembling only slightly. Ferus didn't answer as they kept walking back to their rented speeder, but he was thinking hard. For that matter, she was too. There were very few options for those with very few credits, even less options for fugitive Jedi Knights that wanted to track down and kill the second-in-command of the Empire. But what are we able to do? She asked herself, mind working through their limitations and abilities, crossing off plans as she went.

Sneaking into Vader's palace would be neigh on impossible, as would be breaking into any high-level place that he was likely to go. If the wanted to catch him, it would be best to do it away from the heart of the Empire, preferably away from this planet, where he would have fewer resources. So, she reasoned, we need to determine his movements, and be ready to follow him when he leaves the world. For that, we will need to find someone who either knows what he will be up to, or is able to hack into something that has the ability to tell us. The former is unlikely; anyone who might know anything relevant will be too high up in the ranks to be bribable with what we have. Reaching a semblance of a solution, she spoke. "We need to find somebody who is sympathetic to the Jedi and also has a talent for hacking."

"I was thinking along those lines too, however finding that specific of a person might be challenging." His voice, though quite was solid, no trace of tears.

Barriss nodded, still thinking until she hit upon someone who might be helpful to them. "Dex's Diner!" Ferus' face lit up at her exclamation despite the tear tracks still on his cheeks.

"Yes! That might work, if he's still alive." The Besalisk had been a notable informant and friend of the Jedi before the Purge, if he was still breathing, Barriss was fairly certain that he could help them.

"His diner was in the Senate District, correct?" Ferus nodded as they arrived once more at their humble and rusty speeder. Barriss slid in, pulling their single bag of supplies and clothing out from a rather well concealed compartment; she had guessed that this speeder often carried more valuable goods than tourists by the sizes of the gems on the dealer's fingers. "Do you recall where it was?" She asked as she rummaged through the bag in search of a map, doubting that there was on inside. She hadn't thought that she would need something like that on the world she had once called home; however Coruscant was no ordinary world. She doubted that anyone knew their way around any great area of the city, there was just too much, too many turns, too many layers and levels. Ferus started the speeder before responding, the sputtering engine to several long moments to start, Barriss feeling the normal gut twist that accompanied faulty machinery before the noise became smooth and the speeder leapt a couple more inches above the ground. Whatever this speeder had once carried, she guessed that it had been long ago, for this piece of rust was not going anywhere fast, now just a part of some sort of front for less savory enterprises.

"I think I do, or I know the general area." They joined the flow of mid-day traffic; the billions and billions of speeders, shuttles and ships all going about their separate business. Again the diversity of life pressed down on her, and for a moment she couldn't remember how she had borne the weight. It had been just all too natural, a habit you never thought about too hard. Closing her eyes, she let go of her fight and the currents of minds flowed around her, when her eyes opened, she remembered what it had been like back then, she was not the rock against which minds pushed, instead she flowed right along with them, a small smile lit her face. It didn't last very long, there was too much on her mind. Too much sorrow, pain and fear, so much to do and plan for. She felt crushed by the weight of responsibility; Barriss had made it her duty to slay the monster, and hers alone. Now she wondered if perhaps she could have given the burden to someone else, but who? Perhaps Obi-wan might have, but he had run away to hide on some far-off world to protect something so important and precious that she couldn't even know what it was. If it had been anyone else, she would have questioned if this thing was not just an excuse. But it was Obi-wan; he was the perfect Jedi, if she couldn't trust in him, who could she trust?

Ferus seemed to know where he was going for the first little while, but as time passed, he grew less and less sure of the route that he was taking. She noticed that they had gone in circles several times before she thought of saying something, so lost was she in her own mind. Even when she did notice, she didn't speak, he might just be taking some sort of precaution, maybe he knew what was happening. She wasn't going to judge based on external appearances, and she didn't have anything helpful to say if he didn't know where he was going. Instead, she retreated back into her own mind for the next hour, the Jedi temple foremost in her thoughts. It was only when she noted that their speeder was likely to run out of power sometime soon that she said anything at all, and still she chose her words carefully. She had been taught, and knew from experience that words were power; they could have dramatic effects on people, Ferus might take offense to her words if she chose the wrong ones. "Do you think we are getting close?" She sensed no offense in Ferus' mind and relaxed slightly.

"I'm not sure anymore," he replied honestly as he bit his lip, looking down the unfamiliar streets. "I don't think we can ask anyone else, we don't know what's happened to him, and he might have been arrested for helping Jedi." Barriss nodded, unsure what their next step should be. "What if we go for one more block, and then if we don't find it, we'll charge the speeder, find a hostel and continue in the morning, we have this rust bucket for two days, we might as well use it."

"That sounds good." Ferus pushed the speeder forwards. Barriss began working through a plan B as he drove. They couldn't afford to do this forever, their credits were already dangerously low, and she didn't really want to spend them on a hotel or on fuel, but if they couldn't find Dex's diner, it didn't look like they would have much of a choice. As their rickety speeder rounded the last corner before they stopped, Barriss saw yet another street full of tall buildings and pedestrians, highlighted by the sinking dun. Yet amongst the glass of buildings she saw a depression, an absence, a void in the city of overcrowding.

"That's it." Ferus pointed out he blackened lot where construction crews worked to replace what had once been a grimy diner. Ferus stopped the speeder and they both stepped out. There was no real reason to do so; it was obvious that Dexter was not going to be found here, likely not anywhere else either. Yet they stood in front of the shell of the blown-out building and watched as the construction droids finished dragging away rubble and their counter parts began to work. There wasn't a single living being present to supervise, at least not here, but that didn't mean that no one was watching. Barriss took that into account as she walked slightly closer to one of the few remaining pieces of wreckage. For an ordinary person, all the evidence had been destroyed, but for a Jedi… Physcometry, or telemetry was a difficult skill to master; it involved an intensive use of the Force and not a little bit of skill or luck. She hoped that it would work, she was desperate for it to work, without it, they would have no way to find him. She laid her hand on the debris, pulling on the Force she focused on what she wanted to see, a thriving diner from a chunk of permacrete.

Barriss was still for several long moments, memories, feelings, blurry images racing through her. Normally this wouldn't have worked, telemetry was usually tied to a personal object, but her shot in the dark had paid off. Dex had but his life and his soul into the diner, perhaps more so than he had realized. The rock fell from her limp fingers and she shuttered, the last sensations of heat and death echoing in her tired mind. For the first time in what felt like an eternity, a fragile hope blossomed in her heart. "I know where we can find him."

Vader stood in front of the grey durasteel door that fronted a lopsided building, water dripping all around. Inside, the presence of the Force user pulsated with all the brilliant light of a sun. The rest of the street was empty, a grey contrast to the light of the surface world. The twilight gloom didn't offer much of a view either than more ramshackle buildings and cracked streets, illuminated by infrequent and faded street lamps. The musty dampness in the air sunk into his suit, chilling him to the bone. This place was filthy, putrescent, one of the few places that would shelter a Jedi Knight. With a word over his comlink, the squadron of storm troopers assembled behind him. Before they entered, he let the Force show him what lay inside. Two other life signs stood out, paling in comparison to the radiance given off by the Jedi. Vader opened the door with a wave of his hand and stalked in, the element of surprise was useless here, as much as he could sense the Jedi, so the Jedi should have been able to sense him. The house was cramped and dark, full of the prevailing smell of mold that saturated the underworld. As they walked down the narrow hall, lights flickered on, allowing for a better view of walls spattered with fungus and a floor covered with debris from years long past. With a signal to the troopers, the streamed into the second room where Vader knew a Zabrack sat, cleaning his blaster, pieces spread around as he worked, oblivious to the danger that stalked him.

Vader left them behind to deal with the alien and continued, making his way up steep and twisting steps to the second floor. Up here, it seemed even more ruinous, if that were possible. The floors groaned as he walked, the slant of the floor making him compensate. The Jedi was up here alone. The final being was still downstairs, its end approaching as blasters fired and a Zabrack died. The Jedi approached, making no sound on the wheezing floor, but the Force kept no secrets. With a hiss, the red blade of his lightsaber sprang into furious existence, singing dark marks into the filthy floor. The Jedi stepped into the light, a Nautolan, female with numerous head tails swinging behind it. Nothing about her was relevant except her blade and what it signified. "Vader," she hissed, her emotions wavering between control and fury. Her own blue-green saber ignited, held in both of her olive-specked hands. She waited for him to begin, a typical Jedi, always unwilling to ignite conflict, too afraid to brave the unknown that was a new opponent. He had no such compunctions or fears; he swung his lightsaber at her, closing the distance between them. Still, she didn't move until the last possible moment where she parried his blade and danced away, her strange hair moving with all the fluidity of water. Her face twisted into the classic Nautolan battle grin that was less an expression of joy and more so an intimidation of sorts. He matched her smile under his mask as he heard shots from below and the noise of storm troopers running up stairs. She flinched as her second companion died, the loss of life giving her a slight punch in her gut. Jedi weakness, it had been a trait that he had always loathed, and now no longer his to bear, death and fear and pain only brought him strength.

He shoved the Jedi with the Force, trying to ram her against the far wall, only she went through it instead, sending cascades of crumbling wall to the floor. He advanced; an oncoming storm of darkness. Instead of falling into an uncoordinated pile as most might have, she skidded backwards to a halt, crouching, one hand on the floor, but still on her feet. With a fluid motion that Vader could never hope to imitate, she rose to her feet. But what she had in water-born agility, he compensated for in brute strength and a willingness to do whatever it took to bring down a target. He quickly analyzed her intentions in the Force, walking forwards to intercept her as she executed a backflip through the window she had been backed up against. Landing on the street below, she began to run, without a backwards glance, her lightsaber a glowing blur in her fist. Without hesitation he followed her, chasing tantalizing glimpses of her head tails as she turned corner after corner in a desperate bid to lose him in unfamiliar streets. They both knew that she could never hope to out run him; in his opinion this woman was a coward, too afraid to fight him, too afraid to die trying. His attention flickered backwards for a second to the Storm Troopers. With a brusque command, the left the building, looking for any transport they could find in order to follow.

When he rounded the next corner, there was no sign of her, but that posed no problem. She had moved to the roofs, hoping to stay ahead of him, knowing that she wasn't hidden in the Force. Vader turned around end, starling the hollow-eyed pedestrians out of their paths, he emerged onto a massive thoroughfare, hundreds of people crowded the shabby-looking market place. She had left the roof-tops and was buying time, but for what he did not know. He stopped running, marching instead as the people parted before him. He searched for her, she was close, tired from the run and the acrobatics that had been involved, but she seemed confidant. What had she done? He wondered as the crowd flowed in a wide berth around him. He disregarded a clump of stands, scattering molding produce onto the ground. It was then that he noticed the presence of two more Jedi, here, in this market place. She had known about them, they were her back up. As soon as she had entered the square, broadcasting her distress through the Force, they would have been altered, and then several seconds behind, they would have sensed the looming presence of a powerful Dark Sider. Inquisitors masked themselves. So, he reasoned, they should know that it can only be me.

Sure enough he was proved right when the crowd parted a ways ahead of him. Three Jedi, one Nautolan, one Human, one Bothan stood arrayed against him. All around the crowd had parted, creating an artificial arena in which to fight. All shopping had ceased, this was far more interesting than anything that their measly credits could buy. Behind him, the squad of troopers arrived and he heard one of them call for back up. With one glace, Vader made the rapid-fire decisions and observations of a man who had seen a lot of combat against far worse odds. There was nowhere for them to run, the crowds were too tightly packed. The ground was fairly level with minor ruts and more than a few cracks. The visibility was better here. He didn't want to take them all on at once; the storm troopers might be able to distract one. The three Jedi advanced slowly, staying together, unwilling to separate and lose their joint advantage against him. Alone, they posed very little threat; together it would be more difficult to defeat them. Vader walked forward too, Troopers in a line behind him, the air crackling with power like a thunderstorm on a hot, dry summer's day. As one, the clones fired at two of the Jedi, green bolts meeting teal and blue blades. Ignoring whatever was to happen to them, he took the Jedi in the middle, the Bothan. Green and red met in a flurry of sparks. The Jedi met his strike, trying to hold his own against the Dark Lord. He lost the contest of strength and was forced to flip away from the red bade that had been dangerously close to his fluffy ears. Instead of attacking again directly, Vader braced himself for the grenade that was just about to be thrown.

An explosion shook the square, fiery winds blowing the bystanders further backwards. The grenade that one of the clones had thrown filled the air with ash and debris from the ground. Visibility suddenly decreased dramatically as his vision was clouded with grey. The Bothan decided to attack then, blade a contrast of color in the swirling cloud of debris. Vader met his attacker, shoving him with the Force back into the gloom as the dust settled. A crater several meters wide and deep separated Vader from his troopers. The damage to himself seemed minimal; his suit had protected him from the worst of the damage. It had been torn in some places, exposing gear, metal and wires that made up his limbs, but it had little consequence and caused no pain for him. One of the Jedi hadn't managed to escape in time. The human was on the ground, covered in blood and soot, punctured by the fragments of permacrete thrown up from the explosion. His hair was matted with blood and ash to his skull; his arms were bent at unusual angles, fragments of bone sticking out. Vader stalked towards him before he could crawl away, twisted and burned legs dragging uselessly behind him. The Nautolan block his path suddenly, her forehead had split open, azure blood dripped down her face, she wiped it away impatiently as it stung her eyes. The Jedi was ready to fight now, to defend her comrade, though it seemed unlikely he would survive regardless of what Vader did. This time she attacked first, blade seeping down over her head, he met it, pushing her backwards, forcing her to leap over her fellow Jedi and down into the crater. She started to run back up to meet him, but she wasn't fast enough. Vader swung his saber, impaling the man through the head.

The human didn't make a sound as he died; still he sent the Nautolan to his knees as his death sent a tidal wave through the Force. She scrambled up at once, running at Vader, her serenity and calm gone, replaced by rage and pain. She might be powerful enough to be worth turning, he thought as he engaged her, feeling her anger, taking it in and strengthening himself. The Bothan was right behind him again, ready to fight once more. Vader shoved the angry Jedi out of the way, turning to engage the peaceful Bothan. This one would die, pushing the other over to the Dark Side. The clones looked ready to fire, and he let them, making them contain her as she danced to deflect their bolts. The Bothan was proficient at Makashi, but he knew that he could still best the Bothan. After all he had defeated the ultimate master of Form Two; Count Dooku had hardly been a match for him. Their blades crackled and sizzled furiously as they met over and over again. It was infuriating fighting a Jedi such as this, one who refused to take the offensive; it seemed more interested in the fate of the other remaining Jedi who seemed to be struggling with some internal conflict. "Don't give into your anger!" The Jedi shouted over Vader's shoulder, "Remember your teachings." The Nautolan nodded, and her breathing began to steady, numbing her anger. That was not what Vader had wanted, this Jedi needed to die.

With renewed aggression, Vader forced the Bothan backwards towards the much dispersed crowd. Wishing he had Arden's mental talents, he tried to push the Jedi backwards into the crater, hoping to trick it into falling and then deal with it. The Jedi was having none of that. It flipped over Vader's head trying to be the one to push back. Thought it was skilled at lightsaber dueling, it was no match for his strength and it seemed to be working that out. Suddenly, it leapt backwards, out of range. "What have we done to deserve this?"

"You are traitors to the Empire." He tried to advance, but the Jedi only backed away.

"But why? What did we do?"

"You betrayed the Empire." Vader hated the ones who tried to convince him with their manipulative words.

"How?" He was done with talking. He lifted up a hand and the Bothan followed, rising into the air, clutching at its throat. The Nautolan yelled, but had to keep her attention on the two remaining Storm Troopers, who had managed to stay alive by launching shrapnel at her that she could not so easily deflect. With an audible crack, the Bothan's furry neck snapped, the lifeless body collapsed to the ground. Now he waited to see what the past remaining Jedi would do, it would decide how long her life might be. She didn't disappoint, with an angry cry, half scream, half sob, the Force exploded around her, killing the troopers and many of the surrounding crowd. The Dark Side was doing its work, corrupting her thoughts, destroying the careful barriers she had created between her feelings and her soul. She was finally feeling everything she had ever denied herself and it was too much. She took the final steps into the darkness as she charged him; instead, he pulled her lightsaber away and threw her to the ground.

"Come with me," unfortunately, she still had to choose her path; she would die if she chose the wrong one. She seemed to think for a time and he added, "You have no choice." She nodded slowly, anger and tears in her eyes. They left together, leaving devastation in their wake.