Author's Note: Idk the exact reason why, but this chapter felt the most "Sword Art Online-y" to me when I wrote it. A lot of the other chapters I wrote like scenes from the Star Wars movies, but this one I came from the direction of an SAO episode/scene. Anyway enjoy!

Also, I do not own SAO or Star Wars".

Chapter Twenty-Three - The Sith Academy

"Absolutely not. The Sith Academy will no longer take new recruits into its halls at this time."

A pair of imperial guards stood in the office of the Sith Academy Headmaster. Darth Barristan had done a fine job at ushering in new Sith recruits through the campus on Korriban before letting them fight in Emperor Lusac's war, but now that the game had stopped accepting new players for a short period of time, he was ordered to stop admitting acolytes for the time being.

Kirito was away in a holding cell while two guards from the Empire's Wrath Office were sent to speak for his case. He had no real desire to enter the academy anyway. He simply preferred spending time alone in a cell away from all the distractions.

One of the guards spoke again. "Lord Barristan, you have been ordered by the First Imperial Legion to admit this last soldier for screening into the Imperial Academy. It is with the upmost importance that this player is granted entry."

"And why is that?" Lord Barristan protested while filing a stack of papers on his desk. "He doesn't even have a faction. I have no message from the Emperor to admit this child into the service of Our Lord."

He had also seen Kirito that morning in his prison cell, and made a note of the boy's skin looking like the same color of his grey trappings. "Besides, it looked as though he'd taken part in his last fight already. Our army has no need for a boy of his stature."

"I disagree." The office doors opened, revealing the Empire's Wrath, Asuna Yuuki. "I'm not sure you fully understand the potential this student will have."

"Lady Rose?" The Sith Lord Head Master sat up in his chair, and put his papers down to deliver his full attention. "I'm glad to have received you and your request, but I'm afraid that Emperor Lusac would not want this boy to fight in our army."

"The Emperor was the one who put me in charge of locating him." Asuna declared. "I'm admitting him into your academy through my own recommendation. In fact, I'm so confident in his abilities, I believe one duel assessment is all he'll need to fight for the Empire. That and a chance to hunt down his own lightsaber."

"One assessment?" Darth Barristan was growing testy in front of his superior. "You want me to accept this Kirito into my academy, and pass him after one single test fight?"

"I do." Asuna grinned, and turned swiftly for the door. "And I'd like you to be his test administrator."

"Me!?" Barristan stood up with offense. "I'm the one who proxied your exams! I'm not fighting a new recruit I know nothing about."

"You will do just that." Asuna let the door open, and left him in his anger. "I'll gather an audience for the dueling chambers. We'll see you this afternoon!"

"Insolent little brat..." the elder Barristan had lost most of his respect for the Wrath in that moment as the gloomy Kirito was now named to fight him in a duel. The Dark Lord stood still, and looked down at his paper work with deep disdain.

"Alright boy. I'll see what you can do on a dummy before I take you into the arena."

Silica sat alone in an empty cell, with Klein next door aboard the Sith Space Station looming over the planet Korriban on the Outer Rim. She was trying to power on a small device that held the internal computer known as Pina to scan the space station's map, but she had received no luck ever since being moved from Correlia to here.

"Come on, Pina! You have to work!"

"Kid, they probably jammed the signal in these rooms. Or there's some code that stops items from working." Klein laid back on a cot bed in the next-door cell as he listened to Silica's whimpering. "Face it, we're just going to have to wait for the Republic to win the war, or for the Sith bozos to kill us."

"How can you say that?" Silica yelled back. "We have to help Master Amun-din and Agil win the war. Plus, those creepy girls are all looking for Kirito. We need to find him before they do!"

"Yea, that is true..." Klein felt slightly concerned for his bizarre friend Kirito's safety, and decided to guess how long it had been since he left for Dagobah. "Well I mean come on! Kirito might have left Dagobah by now. He could be one step ahead of those gals!"

"I hope he is." Silica sadly admitted to herself. "I'd hate to be the reason he gets captured."

"Nah, you had nothing to do with it, Silica. It's all on me." Klein rolled over on his cot and stared at a wall. "I was the one who brought him into this mess in the first place. Kirito's one hell of a fighter, but I hope he can use the Force well enough by now to get himself out of trouble."

"Hehe, well I really hate to burst your bubble there, tough guy, but Kirito is all ours now."

Klein sat up from his bed, and Silica ran over to the bars on her cell to look at the guests greeting the two of them at Klein's door. It was two players, a Bounty Hunter named Lisbeth, and an Imperial Officer named Sinon.

"You! Klein pointed at the pink-haired bounty hunter. "You're that nasty girl who tricked me on Coruscant! YOU BLEW UP MY SHIP!"

"No way!" Lisbeth howled. "That was your lame ship!? Man, this is a small universe. Ta think I could have killed you in that explosion, then you would have never been able to lead me to Kirito."

"No!" Silica yelled out. "You have to let him go! He's your friend in the real world!"

"We know." Sinon awkwardly admitted while looking toward the ground. "According to the Emperor, we all play with one another in other games. Things change in the world of the Old Republic, I'm afraid."

"Why?" Klein stood from his cot. "Why does it have to be like this? Look, I can't say I recognize the two of you either, but something inside me just feels familiar talking to you. I can't quite put my finger on it..."

"Ah, stop giving me that load of crap!" Lisbeth yelled out as Klein was trying to reach her. "You're Light Side, we're Dark Side. This is a PvP war. It's game-on until one of us wins this thing, and right now your side is looking pretty sad if you ask me."

"Precisely." Sinon agreed. "Plus, we have Emperor Lusac's weapon now. It's only a matter of time before we win the game."

"And then what?" Silica spoke with watery eyes. "What happens when one of us wins the war. Have you guys ever asked your Emperor that?"

Both girls were silent, and let Klein take over his partner's thoughts.

"No kidding. Amanda tricked us into fighting her war at first, but she came out pretty honest about everything soon after. We know we're all fighting to get back to the real world. What the hell are you guys trying to win here except fame and glory?"

Sinon remained still and Silent, while Lisbeth walked forward, and looked right into Klein's very angry eyes.

"What we fight for isn't your concern, Smuggler. Right now, your only goal is to rot away in this cell until your screen switches to Game Over."

Lisbeth stormed off, and Sinon slowly followed behind as a series of guards trailed the two commanders, and left Klein and Silica alone with one single sentry standing between their cell.

"AGH!" Klein punched a railing on his prison cell, and Silica began tinkering with her mechanical toy once again as she tried cracking the code to getting them out.

"Klein...uh can you keep it down...I'm trying to concentrate on...er, something!" Silica tried to keep her words coded as she looked down at her tiny Pina device with no luck coming out of her effort.

Klein spun around and slid to the floor as his hands crossed over his knees. "Sure kid, go crazy on your little toy there. We're not getting out anytime soon, unless that stupid Pina device can mimic the cloak on your ship."

"Well I doubt that's possible, but I went ahead and made sure to recharge the cloak on your ship!"

Silica's ears perked up, and Klein raised his head as he heard a very high-pitched voice laughing underneath the Imperial guard's helmet stationed outside their cell doors. The guard unclipped the chin guard, and revealed a medium-length head of golden blonde hair framing a youthful tan face with a smile.

"Silica! I can't believe I found you here!"

"Alicia!" Silica ran toward her gate as the so-called Alicia unlocked her cell, and quickly undid Klein's, letting the captain of the Pina continue. "I can't believe you're here at Korriban!"

"Shhh!" She laughed as the doors unlocked. "Don't speak so loud! I'm still undercover on that mission from Amun-din. Her teleport code really is a work of genius! I've been here for a week taking info from the Empire!"

"Well, what do ya know." Klein laughed too. He did not know it at the time, but Alicia was actually another comrade of theirs from back in the game of ALO, fighting for the Cait Sith race in ALfheim. "That's a new way ta smuggle information."

"It's what I do, handsome." Alicia winked at the two fellow smugglers, then tossed them imperial issued pistols as make-shift weapons. "I'd say most of your stuff is still aboard the Pina. It's in Hanger 12. The Imperials knew you cloaked your way through Aldreaan, so they decided to bring her on board after all."

Klein took two guns from the smuggler girl, and tucked them away in his belt, while Silica stuck with one and held it high in defense as they followed their savior Alicia around the corner and on to the hanger bay. They emerged, but stopped swiftly behind some crates as the superior Lisbeth was talking with an Imperial guard outside the Pina's entrance ramp.

"No!" Silica shook her gun with anger. "She better not mess with my controls!"

"Not good..." Alicia looked around to see if there were any closer ships to their area. "Your cloak was the best way for us to get out of here. I guess we can try to find an Imperial ship to sneak out..."

"Not gonna happen." Klein stood, and reached for one of his guns. "I've taken that ship on too many adventures lately against Silica's request. I'd hate to be the reason she loses it for good."

"Klein..." Silica let out a smile, and stood with him. "Thank you."

The cocky smuggler nodded, and then looked to his allies. "Silica, keep an eye out on our rear flank. Alicia, you keep an eye on the guards standing beside our old friend..."

Back at the Sith Acadamy, Master Barristan had left Kirito with a testing dummy to practice his swings alone in a single chamber. Kirito was rather dull at the moment, and let the academy's droid do all the talking.

"There is a certain appeal to Lightsabers. It is an all-cutting weapon. No matter what part of the blade you touch,it is going to cut something." The droid powered on its electro-covered arms to defend itself from Kirito's test swings. "It's an item of martial prowess; you are skilled enough to wield a weapon only a fraction of the Galaxy could use."

"I don't need trained." Kirito said with an expressionless attitude. "I've mastered all my weapon skills. I've even killed people who use lightsabers too."

The droid remained smug, and started to deliver more lines. "Well that is what a lightsaber is, a weapon; it is an item designed to kill other people. It is usually designed to resemble a sword, although there are several different variations on it which I may very well go into during the duration of these activities."

"Ugh..." Kirito's wit was slowly returning to him as his blood began to boil.

The droid carried on, and held its electric hands up in angles. "Like with real life weaponry, there are differing views and designs on how to use them effectively. Every feint, every dodge, every block is a trap to the unwary. First, we'll go over Form I, known as the..."

*SLASH*

Kirito decapitated the head from the instructor droid, and turned off his sabers as he went to do the same to the chamber door. "Yea, I'm not here to learn how to fight people. I'm here to learn how to save people."

Now, inside the grand Sith Academy Arena, a very concerned Darth Barristan stood alone at the center of the grounds while a small crowd eventually turned into quite the mass, because Korriban in its normal state had appeared to be quite a boring planet to be stationed on.

Asuna emerged from a door on the other side of the arena, and a passive Kirito walked behind her with his head hanging low and a set of cuffs locking his wrists. Two guards followed them in, and gave time for Barristan to clear his throat before greeting his next opponent.

"Player Kirito, in accordance with a request by Darth Rosario...I have been assigned to proctor your entrance exam into the Sith Army, to join the Dark Side on our fight for control of the Galaxy."

The crowds cheered, and Asuna let out a small grin with her arms crossed as the quiet Kirito stepped forward. Barristan nodded to the guards, who promptly unlocked his cuffs, and handed him two purple lightsabers for the duel.

He was surprised to already see a clear difference in Jedi and Sith philosophy. Suguha would never let Kirito use his lightsaber for training unless he begged her to. Darth Barristan gave Kirito a bow forward after turning on his single lightsaber, but looked up in anger as Kirito took his time to respond. The black swordsman awkwardly caught on, and took a bow for his opponent, then powered on the derelict purple lightsaber blades at his side.

Kirito channeled a dozen different duels from his past inside his head as he prepped for the readied Darth Barristan. His fight with Heathcliff in Collinia's glorious arena, the duel against Eugene over the fields of ALfheim, his one-on-one skirmish with Death Gun in the Battle of Bullets with Sinon aiding him from a distance. He tried remembering all the different single fights that he had inside the virtual world, and picked them apart quickly to find useful pieces of information for his current situation.

Kirito favored his speed above all, and moved first toward the tankier Darth Barristan. The Sith Juggernaut had modeled his build after several powerful NPC characters from the main game storyline, and held up his single red blade to counter Kirito's flurry with a few calm parries.

Barristan grinned, and saw the fire grow in Kirito's eyes as each violent slash waxed with more and more heat and pressure against his own lightsaber. "You're an angry one, aren't you, boy? Something on your mind?"

"Nothing worth telling you!" Kirito found time between his attacks to reply back, and squeezed in a few breaths to keep the assault up on high.

The Headmaster howled. "Well keep it up! Let that hate and anger grow inside you! Use it to defeat me! It's you're only way out!"

"I don't want out!" Kirito sharply replied. "I came to Korriban by choice."

"What Republic scum would come to this dreary rock on their own choice? Drommund Kaas is far more...oh, I forgot, you hold no faction."

Their skirmish broke, and both fighters shot back as the Dark Lord carried on. "So why would a factionless fool wonder out to this planet on his own mission? What were you trying to find?"

"..." Kirito collected his breath, then looked forward with bangs dangling over his furious eyes. "I'm here to get back something I lost."

"Hmm?" Barristan studied the boy for a moment, then looked over his shoulder to find the Empire's Wrath grinning with her arms crossed over her Dark Side chestplate. He studied the two figures for a second, then laughed to himself yet again.

"Oh? You know the Wrath? A friend from the real world?"

"What?" Kirito stood up from his lower stance, but kept the anger firmly in his eyes.

Barristan slashed his saber outward. "You're that boy who was sent here by Peter Mathis! Emperor Lusac said the factionless boy would come to save his wife. You know Lady Rose from the real world. It all makes sense now!"

Darth Barristan put both hands on his lightsaber handle, and powered on a field of dark red and black energy underneath his feet. "Strike me down to save the girl! If you fall, she's lost to the Emperor forever!"

Kirito felt the world around him grind to a halt at the Headmaster's threat. His eyes widened, and all the people and noises froze in place, but he wondered all that time if Asuna could hear their conversation.

It did not matter though, for the sake of ending the fight. Kirito closed his eyes, then opened them up to reveal a black energy radiating from his body. The frozen energy that surrounded his meditation quickly captured Darth Barristan, and locked the great Sith Lord in a solid stance like a statue trapped in time.

Barristan's lightsaber was raised over his head at that time, and it was in this stance with a face of fear and confusion that froze for the entire audience to see. Asuna's smile grew infectiously as her brown and yellow eyes opened with intrigue. Kirito bolted forward, and took his two purple lightsaber's to the gut of his enemy, slicing the man's body in half, and killing him to end the duel.

The Sith audience roared with applause, and the guards behind Asuna quickly charged forward to seize the young Kirito as the boy fell to his knees and dropped his weapons from his hands. The each picked up one of his purple lightsabers, and sliced them into pieces with their own blades. Asuna came forward soon after, and brushed the guards aside, quickly grabbing Kirito's right hand to raise him to his feet.

She held their united hands up high as the crowds grew louder, and while Kirito's face was stolen by the confusion of the scene, Asuna's eyes filled with rapacious greed.

"You're my key to defeating the Emperor." She whispered to him quietly as the voices of Sith fans drowned out the stadium. "Together, we can rule the Sith Faction and win this war once and for all."

I remembered! I used inspiration from a few scenes in SWTOR at Korriban, but my main inspiration came from the sword academy in the Alicization arc of SAO.

Anyway, new chapter soon. Until then!