Zamila tracks Rast's communicator as she struggles to keep her footing in the soft sand. Before she left the Black Cat she layered as much clothing as she could and the freezing air still bites at her skin.

Zamila finally sees an opening in the desert floor. She jogs over to it but becomes quickly winded from traversing the loose sand and breathing the thin air.

She reaches the opening and can see that the sand around it had been disturbed. A steep, black stone staircase leads down and Zamila hesitates only for a moment before she descends into the dark.

She calls out to Rast every few moments. Zamila feels her heart beat rapidly. She was afraid but Rast, Jez, and 9-LOM we're her new family and she wasn't going to give up on any of them. When she reaches the bottom of the steps she enters into a cavernous structure so large that the beam of her light reaches out and only touches more darkness, more empty space.

"Rast!"

Her voice echoes endlessly. Zamila walks into the dark for around half an hour, watching the ground, calling for Rast, before her light suddenly goes out and she is engulfed in darkness. Panic swells as she aggressively flips the switch on the light to no avail. Zamila frantically shakes it in the hopes of getting a moment of illumination but it is of no use. It is as dead as this planet that was increasingly looking like, would be her tomb. In anger and frustration she sends the dead piece of technology sailing through the air. Moments pass and no sound of the light striking anything is returned. It is as if the air itself had snatched it away.

"Help me," she screams but the only response is her own voice echoing back to her.

Zamila doesn't want to starve alone in the darkness. She wants to run, in any direction, for good or for ill in the vain hope of connecting with something. She feels herself going mad with fear, grief, and hopelessness when she hears a sound. It is soft, gentle at first, just within her ear cones ability to perceive it. It sounded like a whisper.

"Hello?"

She stands perfectly still, and hears it again. A soft, feminine voice, barely audible, in a strange language.

"Who's there?"

A person could be standing beside her and she wouldn't know, it is so dark, vast, and empty.

"Please," she pleads into the void.

"Why have you come here, child," the whisper asks.

"Wha… what?"

"Why have you come to this place?"

"To find my friend," Zamila responds not entirely sure she isn't talking to herself.

"Such a magnificent place, and such a pedestrian quest," the whisper chides.

"Who are you," Zamila asks turning, trying and failing to discern the direction the voice was coming from.

"Who? Such a pedestrian question," the voice utters with disappointment, "What, when, how; much better questions."

Zamila can hear the voice so clearly now. It is no longer a whisper. It's as if she is right beside her.

"Where is Rast? How do we get out of here," Zamila cries.

"How boring," the feminine voice scoffs, "In the time since I had last spoken with another, stars have been born, died, and reborn, and you bore me."

Zamila could feel her fear burned away by anger and frustration. She did not like being toyed with. She wanted to squeeze the breath from this person as she had done to the slaver Andan.

"Oh! Now that is interesting," the voice chuckles, "Who was this man Andan?"

"What?!"

"See," the voice scolds, "You're boring me again. Andan? The man that you murdered?"

Zamila's heart sinks into her chest. She did what she had to do to survive. She did not regret killing the slaver, but she would have lived the rest of her life before telling another soul what she had done. She had already lied to Jez, even after the poor woman had confessed to so much.

"He was a slaver! He was going sell me to be used," Zamila blurts out into the darkness.

"He was, yes, but not in the way you want me believe you were going to be used," the voice says with piqued interests, "Killed your father too did he? Took your home from you"

"Yes," Zamila replies in a whisper, tears welling in her eyes.

"Not so boring after all," the voice says, "I will help you, but you must come to me."

"Where are you? I can't see."

"Good," the feminine voice answers, "your eyes lie to you. Follow my voice."

Zamila listens intently as she places one foot in front of the other. The voice occasionally corrects her. In the blackness Zamila sees a distant reddish glow.

"You're almost here."

As Zamila approaches she sees the source of the strange red light and The Voice. Hovering above an intricately carved black stone altar is a small pyramid shaped object with strange markings.

"First steps, Zamila Ashrand," The Voice calls to her, "First steps."

Zamila is drawn to the object. It's power is palpable, but there is something else, something harder to define. As her fingers come in contact with its surface she is blinded by a red flash that drops her to her knees. She groans as she sits up. She squints as her eyes struggle to adjust to the brightness. Zamila stares in awe at the temple around her.

The chamber is massive on a scale that Zamila could have hardly fathomed. Stone pillars reach high into a vaulted ceiling. A maze of narrow walkways lead to a number of platforms, and all of it is suspended above a massive chasm. Every surface is emblazoned with strange writing that glows red, illuminating the temple. Stone that had seemed black to her only moments before was in actuality white stone that looked pink in the ethereal light. She turns and sees that the path that she had just walked to reach the altar was less than a meter thick and dropped on either side into the seemingly bottomless abyss.

"I told you," The Voice whispers, " Your eyes lie to you. This. What you are seeing. That is the truth."

"What is this place?"

" A temple. Ancient at the time your atoms were forged in the heart of a Star, and then scattered into space."

"What happened to the people who built all of this?"

"Gone to join the dust of every building, every plant, every animal, any of them had ever known. All good things must end. Eventually," The Voice tells her.

"How did it happen?"

"A story for another time," The Voice says dismissively.

Zamila looks out at other paths winding to other platforms and she can see sprawled out across another nearby platform the man she'd come to the temple to rescue. She plucks the strange object from its place above the altar and rushes cautiously down the narrow walkway. She makes her way across another narrow walkway leading to a large red crystal, and to Rast.

On her way she passes a corpse robed in brown cloth. She worried that the woman had been killed by, and possibly killed Rast, but could tell that she had been there for some time and while Rast was unconscious he seemed otherwise unharmed.

Zamila can see over the edge of the platform where it drops into a dark abyss. I wonder how deep it is.

"It goes all the way through to the other side of the planet, " The Voice replies, "But again, a story for another time."

Before Zamila can find out more she hears movement behind her and turns to see Rast regaining consciousness. He fumbles around on the ground until he finds whatever it was he was looking for. He pulls a metallic cylinder from his belt, slides it open, and places the item into it.

"What was that," the twi'lek girl asks as Rast groggily gets to his feet.

"Nothing," Rast replies, trying to stretch out a kink in his neck, "We should go."

Zamila wants to tell Rast about the bizarre object she found, and how it'd been speaking to her but The Voice tells her, "Not to him. Not yet."

The walk back up the spiral staircase seemed to last forever and the air got thinner as they climbed higher, making each step more laborious than the last. When they finally reach the surface they both collapse in exhaustion and lie there in the cold sand for several minutes.

"We've got to keep moving," Rast shouts over the howling wind, "We'll freeze out here."

"Just a few more," Zamila pleads with gasping breath.

"No," Rast says as he struggles to get on his feet, "I'll carry you if I have to."

Rast puts out his hand. Zamila takes it and he helps pull her to her feet.

"I don't really have to carry you, do I?"

"I'll make it," Zamila declares as she follows Rast back toward her ship.

They finally reach the Black Cat where the fine sand has begun to swallow it's landing gear. As they approach they both slow their gait, sensing the same unease.

The Black Cat's boarding ramp is extended and out walks Jez followed by a figure dressed in black. Her hands are bound in front of her and her face is twisted in bewilderment and fear. Jez wears clothes similar to those that had revealed too much skin for Zamila's comfort before, and she shakes violently from the blasting cold. The human woman looks like a perfect mess. She is pale, covered in sweat, and her eyes are swollen. A red mark covers the side of her face. It hasn't bruised yet, but it certainly will.

"Dreyden Shay," the man in black shouts over the howling wind, "You found the first temple it would seem."

The hooded man descends the ramp shoving Jez before him. On his arm, emblazoned in white, the symbol of the Galactic Empire.

"Our sister didn't understand why you'd run off the way you did," the man in black says coldly, "She was surprised you'd want to keep such a prize from our master."

"She's not my sister and Vader is not my master," the man that Zamila knew as Rast emphatically declared.

The man in black continues, "I tried to tell her you were weak, had always been weak, but she insisted I come bring you back into the fold."

The mysterious man shoves Jez and she sends up a plume of dust when she hits the ground. Jez unsteadily leaps to her feet and runs over to Zamila who wraps her arms around the shaking woman, pulling off several layers of her own to cover her. The man in black pulls back his hood and begins to walk around the crew of the Black Cat in a wide arch.

He was human and would have been a very attractive man, Zamila thought, had she not hated him so much already for his mistreatment of Jez. His skin is dark like the rich soil she worked on her farm. His head was shaved bald and his features were pleasing with the exception of a large scar that split his left eyebrow and led down to his chin.

"Qiron," Rast shouts while the two men circle each other menacingly, "I should have known she'd have sent her dog after me."

"Oh, I am nobody's dog, Dreyden," Qiron smirks pulling a round metal ring bisected by a long cylinder from his back, "I will be fully inducted into the Inquisitorius when I return with you, either dead or alive. Be stupid, Dreyden. Please. Say you won't be coming along peacefully."

Rast pulls the cylinder he had so poorly tried to conceal back in the temple from his belt and it ignites with a hiss. A searing blade of red energy emits from it.

"Thanks Dreyden, I am so going to enjoy this," Qiron smiles and ignites his own saber.

"I didn't think being cut to pieces would be so enjoyable to you," Rast sneers.

The two men circle each other and the circle steadily tightens. The two blades sparkle as the cold gusts of fine sand are turned to tiny pellets of glass on contact with them. Zamila didn't know much about lightsabers, but she knew the bad guys carried the red ones. She didn't know what to make of Rast, or Dreyden, or whatever his name actually was, wielding one, or what two men wielding them against one another meant.

Zamila tries to rush Jez back to the Black Cat, but she is shoved back hard by an unseen force and loses her footing. Zamila pulls her blaster but it's as if it is snatched from her hand and it disappears into billowing clouds of dust.

"Not so fast young lady," Qiron chuckles, "I'm here for you as well."

"You leave them out of this," Rast yells with a lunging strike that is skillfully parried by his foe.

"She hasn't told you yet? Oh how delightful," Qiron spins, bringing his blade down towards Rast's head, but Rast brings his own blade in time to block the attack. The blades hiss like an angry serpent when they connect, "She's a child of the force you fool. It's disheartening to see that your skill with a lightsaber isn't the only thing that's gotten rusty.

Rast angrily swings his blade in a combination of strikes, all of which Qiron easily parries.

"He is not going to survive this fight," The Voice whispers to Zamila, "He is no match for this man. Both of them know that by now."

Qiron initiates a series of strikes that Rast struggles to block and is pushed back towards the two women huddled in the sand.

"You see," The Voice continues, "He is toying with him. He relishes in the fear and frustration of his opponent. He is like a bored predator playing with his meal because he can't bear the thought of the hunt ending."

Zamila raises her hand, focuses all of her anger, fear, and hate as she had done to Andan back in the cave on Dargenas, but it only elicits a smile from Qiron.

"I feel a tickle," Qiron chuckles, "I cannot wait to train your little twi'lek waif."

Rast angrily tries at another combination of strikes but Qiron parries and with a twist of his wrist, sends Rast's lightsaber flying from his hand. Rast outstretches his hand, trying to pull the weapon back into his grasp but Qiron force pushes him and he lands hard onto his back.

"Now it will be over," The Voice tells Zamila.

"What can I do," Zamila cries.

Jez, chattering looks up in confusion, "Wh... Wh... What... ttt?"

"You can do nothing," The Voice replies, "If you try you will join your friend in the darkness…However…"

Zamila anxiously asks, "What!? Tell me!"

Qiron stalks towards Rast laughing maniacally while Rast tries to stand only to be force pushed back down again.

"Give yourself to me," The Voice says coldly, "Let go of your will."

"I don't know what that means!"

Jez starts to pull away from Zamila, afraid of the conversation the twi'lek girl seemed to be having with herself. Qiron slashes across the ground in front of Rast leaving streaks of glowing red, molten glass.

"Say yes or he dies, she ends up in a brothel, and you…"

"Yes," Zamila utters.