Chapter 24: The Trap is Set
Mordivai waited with Khem in the shadows. From his vantage point behind this dumpster, he could see the entrance to Paladius's main warehouse. Dunn, the slicer who had helped extract Mordivai from Shadow Town, had given him the location. From the outside, it was nothing more than a skinny metal door, dingy and pock-marked, hidden away in a nondescript alley. Paladius would not be there of course. If it were that easy to find him, Mordivai would have come here first all along. But he was not going to wait to try and flush out Paladius a second time. He'd had enough games. It was time to bring Paladius to him.
He and Khem had endured one false start when a vagabond chose the alley as a suitable spot to relieve himself, but shortly after he left, a cult member showed up, glanced around and approached the door. He raised his right wrist and held it up against the front face of the door, and Mordivai realized that a small scanning device must be hidden in the door itself, and that this cult member likely had a readable chip implanted under the skin behind his hand. The man jiggled the old fashioned door handle and there was a faint pop.
Mordivai drew the shadows around him, imagining the Force as a cloak, and then sped across the alleyway, using the Force to enhance his stride, making him no more than a momentary blur. He appeared at the man's side and pressed his lightsaber hilt against the soft flesh of the man's middle.
"Leave the door open and step inside. Don't say a word."
The man stiffened in surprise and his eyes darted to the side. Mordivai had become more cautious of late, and so the man saw nothing but a metal mask sunken into the depths of Mordivai's hood. He twisted suddenly to the other side, and Mordivai jabbed him deeper with his hilt, but he was only catching sight of Khem now standing by his opposite shoulder. Mordiavi felt the man's spike of panic.
The man was young, and was dressed in the jumpsuit of a warehouse worker. Mordivai had no interest in hurting any of Paladius's cult members, but he didn't feel any such qualms about Paladius's possessions. He hoped this worker would cooperate.
The man swallowed, audibly loud, and finished unlatching the door. He gave it a push and it swung open, revealing a cavernous room whose only windows were high up along the rafters. The bright lights of Nar Shaddaa cast faint circles along the ground, like colored candy drops, and all around were stacks of barrels and crates, some of which rose nearly to the ceiling.
They stepped inside and Mordivai nodded to Khem, who shoved the door closed with one clawed hand and made to stand behind it. The worker flinched at the sound of the door slamming shut.
"Get out your holo," Mordiva instructed. "You have one, don't you?"
The man nodded and fumbled in his pocket. He fished out his comm unit but then nearly dropped it. His hands were shaking.
"I'm not going to hurt you," Mordivai said. "My fight is with Paladius. Get him on the comm."
With a trembling finger, the man punched in the frequency then held out the comm to Mordivai. Mordivai stepped back, gesturing for the man to keep the comm unit in his palm. A moment later, Paladius appeared.
"What's the matter, Vech?"
Paladius sounded annoyed. Vech stuttered a few words before Mordivai decided to interrupt.
"Paladius!"
Paladius turned his head and bristled.
"Thought you could get rid of me?" Mordivai continued. "Guess where I am now?"
"You upstart! Weaseled your way out of Shadow Town did you? And now you're harassing my people?"
Mordivai crossed his arms. "No, not your people. Just you."
"What do you want then?"
"Come to your warehouse and meet me face to face."
Paladius laughed. "Why would I do that?"
"Because I can't kill you over holo."
"My besting you the first time wasn't enough, was it? Go bother someone else. I don't have time for this."
Paladius waved a hand and looked as if he was about to cut the call. Mordivai lit his lightsaber.
"What?" Paladius said irritably. "You going to kill Vech now? He would gladly die to protect his brothers and sisters, wouldn't you Vech? You underestimate my followers."
Mordivai looked at Vech, pale and sweating, his eyes darting between Paladius and Mordivai, and thought, perhaps you underestimate their loyalty.
"I'm not interested in Vech," Mordivai said quickly. He spun and jabbed the nearest barrel stacked behind him, and it hissed as his lightsaber punctured the metal. There was a sizzle as the liquid inside rapidly heated in the presence of his lightsaber blade, and then a popping sound as he withdrew it. Immediately a thick, clear liquid began to pulse from the barrel, slopping loudly onto the floor.
"Hey-"
Mordiavi ignored Paladius and stabbed another two barrels in quick succession. By the time he had finished with the third, a groaning was coming from the first barrel. The metal around the puncture suddenly split, and the entire barrel burst open, sloshing its content across Vech's feet. The second and third barrels soon followed suit.
"The vaccine!" Vech howled. He sounded genuinely distressed, and Mordivai noticed that he had called Paladius's concoction a "vaccine," like Rylee had. Mordivai had no doubt that this was the precious substance being added to their water supply in order to dampen their Force sensitivity. Could it be that Paladius's cult actually saw the Force as something to be cured?
"Stop it!" Paladius was yelling. "Do you know how much each of those barrels cost?"
"You care more about your supplies than you do your members, Paladius." Mordivai stabbed a fourth barrel, and then a fifth. From the corner of his vision, he saw Khem watching him, his eyes aglow as he surveyed the destruction with something akin to lust.
"You're the one hurting them, not me!" Paladius said. "You're taking away their protection! Their very survival!"
Mordivai paused, his lightsaber poised in front of another barrel. "Or maybe I am freeing them, Paladius. Look at Vech here, too afraid to face me and fight, even if it meant fighting for his life! You deny him his birthright as a proper Sith, just as you deny all of your followers!"
"Rubbish," Paladius muttered, then raised his voice again as Mordiavi swung towards yet another barrel. "Enough! I'm on my way to stop your little tantrum. Just you wait." He thrust a finger in Mordivai's direction and the holo went dead.
Mordivai finished off the barrel nearest to him and watched with satisfaction as the liquid drained out. "Good." His boots sloshed across the floor as he crossed the aisle to a pallet on the other side. There were more barrels there, plump with that poison Paladius thought of as a vaccine. He jabbed his lightsaber into the nearest one, this time slashing a wide gash that split open like a grin.
He glanced up at Vech, who was staring at him in open horror, the holo still poised in his hand.
"Leave if you want. Or stay and help me destroy more barrels."
"W-w-what?" Vech went to return the holocomm to his pocket, but missed it entirely. The comm fell and splashed into the large, rapidly growing puddle at Vech's feet. "No! You can't destroy them all! I-I mean, don't, please."
"You don't need this stuff, Vech," Mordivai said. "Paladius is using it to control you, to leave you powerless. You have power in you-" At this, Vech began shaking his head, but Mordivai knew his attempt at a lie was a desperate one. "-Yes, it's in you, and you don't have to deny it. Embrace it, learn to use it. You are its master, not the other way around!"
Mordivai could hear the passion rising in his voice and realized that he meant what he said. This is where the Jedi had gone wrong. What was the use of having this magnificent gift if one was afraid to set it free? The Force was not meant to be meek or humble, it was a power that begged to be unleashed, it was meant to ignite like fuel. After all, it had not been restraint that had saved Mordivai in the tombs. It had only been when he had lost himself in fury and pain and determination that he had bested Khem and found an escape.
"Be what you were meant to be."
Vech just stared at Mordivai, perhaps not yet ready to contemplate what his life might look like without the vaccine as his crutch. Mordivai sighed. "Get out of here." He said it gently, with weariness, rather than malice. "I'm going to burn this place to the ground. If you change your mind, if you want to learn to control your power, or even to just hide it, come find Ur House." That was the name that the Kelethurians had given to the refuge he had created for them.
Vech nodded, then stooped to snatch up the drenched comm, and raced towards the door. Khem stepped aside to let him pass, and then resumed his place as guard. Mordivai busied himself destroying barrels.
Perhaps Paladius's pleasure barge wasn't far, because only a quarter hour had passed before Mordivai heard a commotion outside the warehouse door. He nodded to Khem, who moved into the shadows nearby.
The door flew open, and a torrent of vivid blue lightning cut across the room, quickly followed by Paladius himself, already on the offensive, stalking forward with arms outstretched.
Mordivai blocked the onslaught with his saber. Paladius had some skill with Force abilities, but, as Mordivai had suspected, he was not well versed in lightsaber combat. Mordivai dodged across the slippery floor, gradually working his way beneath Paladius's defences, chipping away at Paladius's guard. Mordivai was faster, more agile, and better practiced than Paladius, and while Paladius fought with grimness and true anger, he soon grew winded. Mordivai danced around him like a shifting spark of light, here one moment and gone the next, using the Force to augment his ability to slip unseen into the corners of Paladius's vision. Paladius spun dizzily, his blasts of lightning chipping permacrete from the floor but failing to find their mark, until at last Mordivai saw an opening and took it. His lightsaber slashed a wide gash across Paladius's chest, and the Sith slumped to the ground, his eyes blinking vaguely, a look of shock etched on his face.
Mordivai bent forward and snatched the sith artifact dangling around Paladius's neck, breaking the chain. He raised his lightsaber to finish the job.
"Master." It was Khem, stepping forward from the shadows into a pool of light. He was gazing at Paladius hungrily. He gestured with an open claw at the dying man at their feet. "You have beaten your rival. Now let me have the feast that remains."
Mordivai knew that Khem grew strong from siphoning power off of Force users, and he'd allowed this on occasion, although he had never lingered to watch. He nodded at Khem and stepped back, some lurid fascination drawing his gaze even as he knew he should turn away.
Khem leaned over Paladius and reached down to sink his claws into the rich fabrics of Paladius's robes. He drew the huge man towards him, easily lifting him upright from the ground, the muscles of his arms shifting like cords beneath his dusky skin. Then he bent close, angling his head over Paladius. To Mordivai's surprise, Paladius didn't struggle. Instead he stared, transfixed, into Khem's red eyes, his arms falling away, and his head lolling drunkenly like a man hypnotized.
"Thank you, Master," Khem murmured, his deep, gravelly voice rippling like a shiver down Mordivai's spine. Then he simply…breathed in.
Mordivai saw nothing at first. Khem was motionless, but the sound of his drawn breath was like a gathering wind, continuing on long after a normal breath would have ended. And then Mordivai saw it, a faint miasma, like a fog or a puff of air in the cold, gathering around Paladius. Khem drew it in, and the cloud unravelled like yarn, disappearing into Khem's gaping jaws. Paladius grew pale, his eyelids fluttering closed, and his head slumped back. Still the siphoning went on, until the cloud gradually diminished and faded. There was a last gust of air and then Khem dropped Paladius's body to the ground. Khem remained still a moment, his eyes closed, and Mordivai fancied that he saw the monster's body actually expanding as it grew physically larger.
Khem turned his head and spotted Mordivai staring. What look Khem saw pasted across Mordivia's face, he could only guess, but the Dashade chuckled deep in his throat and rose to his full height. His eyes glittered.
"Shall we go?"
"Yes," Mordivai said, taking a moment to find his voice. "But I want to set this place on fire first."
They left behind a smoking ruin where Paladius's warehouse had once been, effectively gutting not only Paladius's supplies but any chance of anyone else in his old cult rising up to take the reins. Mordivai returned to his sanctuary and wasted no time calling Lord Zash on the holo.
"It's done," he told her when her form materialized before him. He dangled the necklace from his fingers for Zash to see. Her eyes locked on it and she smiled.
"Well done, apprentice." Her voice was almost breathless with glee. "Come to Kaas City right away. No detours now, I'm eager to see you."
"Of course," Mordivai said, knowing full well that seeing him had nothing to do with it.
He had arrangements to make before he could leave, however. Rylee was still trying to prove herself and was overgear to take on any task. Mordivai set her to work under Ai'lanynn's guidance. Mordivai also had to say goodbye to his old master, which didn't prove as difficult as he had initially feared.
"We will see each other again," Praven assured him. "Even if it's just to check in and see if you have any more aspiring Padawans for me." Behind Praven was gathered a small entourage of refugees whose newly discovered Force sensitivity had showed promise, and who Praven thought would make good candidates for the Jedi Order. Mordivai felt a little strange seeing them go, even if he hadn't gotten the chance to get to know many of them all that well. Those who had gravitated towards Praven were the most focused and dogmatic of the group, many of them easily latching onto the strictures of the Order as a suitable substitute for their former lives as cult members. He hoped they would do well. Such dedication, he knew, would carry them far, but it also meant that any break with the Order would be all the more traumatic should they lose faith in those high ideals.
Mordivai went to sleep that night with Kel'eth Ur's holocron set next to his bedside.
"Help me," he whispered as he slipped under the covers. "I want to follow you but I don't know how."
The holocron stayed closed and silent, its secrets safely tucked away for now.