Chloe fell into the cavern, past the sarlacc's mouth, flipping over acrobatically, in the air, and landing nimbly on her feet, bending her knees on impact with the cavern floor. She immediately noticed that, somehow without her knowledge, she had let go of Rachel and Max's hands, and that they, along with the rest of their friends, were nowhere to be seen. She immediately called Force shenanigans, much quicker than Rachel and Max did.

"Okay…" Chloe quietly reacted to the strange phenomenon, taking in the eerie glow of the kyber crystals, all around her. "Let's go crystal hunting…"

Chloe began her descent into the twisting caverns. Unlike Max, she didn't bother to chart a course. She was famously good at 'winging it', which sounded reckless and irresponsible, coming from the young Dathomirian, but was functionally no different from when adult Jedi claimed to 'trust in the Force'.

It wasn't long, before Chloe caught sight of the caverns' monstrous, eight-legged inhabitants. Sensing them coming, she had leapt silently up to the cavern's ceiling, where she darted between the hanging stalactites, as though she were a spider, herself, effortlessly vanishing from sight, as several of the monsters went scuttling past.

Eventually, Chloe found the cavern stretch outwards into a chamber so massive, it could almost fit a republic star destroyer. She could barely see the glittering kyber crystals, on the other side. Although she was very high up, she could make out, glistening in the crystal light, a strand of spider's thread, stretching out, from nearby, to the centre of the chamber, vanishing into the darkness, after a few feet.

Chloe acrobatically flipped forwards, landing on the thread, which bounced and rippled beneath her. She held her arms out for balance, and began walking to the centre of the chamber, as though she was balancing along some of the temple handrails for fun, except there was no risk of getting yelled at by a Jedi, just eaten by a giant spider…

As Chloe got deeper into the chamber, she began to see more threads, either also heading into the centre of the chamber, or perpendicular, adjoining the longer threads. As Chloe had suspected from the beginning, the chamber was home to a gigantic web. Of course, most web-spinning species were extremely sensitive to vibrations on their webs, which was their purpose- to alert their owners that food had been ensnared. Chloe trod as lightly as she was able, which wasn't much of an improvement, as the thread bounced beneath her toes, sending out tell-tale tremors.

As much fun as it was, playing acrobat, the diminutive, often overshadowed voice of reason, in Chloe's brain, strongly advised she drop to the chamber floor, and stop advertising her presence. She was about to yield, and do just that, when she was startled by a voice.

"H… hello? Is someone there?" A frightened, adult, male voice called out.

Chloe span around to its source. She was anxious about remaining on the web, but not as anxious, as she would feel guilty, if she left the stranger to his fate. Chloe leapt from thread to thread, with the confidence of the spider who'd span the web, and soon found the distressed captive. Stuck to the web, with several strands binding his arms and legs to his sides, was a blue twi'lek.

The twi'lek were a hairless, humanoid race, distinguished by their lekku (or head-tails), the pair of tentacles emerging from the back of their heads, reaching just below their shoulders. Female twi'leks ticked most of the boxes for most species' beauty standards, making them popular dancers or slaves, male twi'leks, with their stocky builds and unsightly bumps, beneath their lekku, not so much.

"Hey… hey you…!" The twi'lek whispered, as he saw Chloe approaching. "Help me!"

Chloe slowed down, climbing over the web of her hands and feet, and carefully inspected the man, as though she were one of the spiders, weighing him out, as an option for an afternoon snack.

"Nah…" Chloe eventually decided. "I'm not buying it."

"Buying it?" The twi'lek replied, in distress. "What are you talking about?"

"So… you're some dude, looking like you've been down here for a few hours…" she ran her finger along the man's leather jacket, inspecting it for dirt. "Who's just stumbled into a cavern under a sarlacc, that's only accessible to Jedi? I don't think so."

"What does it matter how likely it is!?" He whispered angrily. "I'm here, aren't I? Cut me loose!"

"Are you here though?" Chloe challenged. "I've heard some weird things can happen in these places. I already got separated from my friends. I bet you're some kind of test, the cave is throwing at me. No way are you real…"

"Real or not, I'm gonna die if you don't save me, please!" The man begged.

Chloe rolled her eyes. "Fine, but I want it on record, that I'm not falling for this. I'm only helping you because there's like a one percent chance that you're actually some idiot who bumbled in here."

The twi'lek sighed in relief. "So, you got a knife in that robe?"

"Really dude? You've noticed the robe, but you figure a knife is my weapon of choice?"

It was the twi'lek's turn to roll his eyes. "I know enough about how Jedi laser swords work, to know that a kid Jedi would probably come to a kyber crystal cavern, because they don't have one yet."

Chloe lifted her eyebrows suggestively. "Well, I won't tell if you don't…"

From under Chloe's robes, she produced a thin, narrow lightsaber hilt. She had snuck off and assembled it, during the flight from Coruscant. It wasn't the double-ended saber she knew she was destined to wield, but a discrete one she had made, out of an over-eagerness to see her crystal in action, the moment she found it.

"Haven't found my crystal yet, but I'm sure some future padawan won't mind me borrowing theirs."

Chloe reached out her hand, and focused as hard as she could. The nearest cavern wall, and the crystal imbedded in it, were still significantly far away. It took several seconds of Chloe calling on the Force to the best of her abilities, before a crystal tore free of the rock, and flew at Chloe like a bullet, ducking and weaving between threads of the spider web, before flying into her waiting hand.

"Oh god, did you feel that?" The man whispered, in a panic.

Just like the spiders could, Chloe could feel vibrations running through the web. Something besides the two of them, was climbing the web, sending tremors their way, most likely something hungry….

Chloe took a deep breath. "There is no emotion, there is peace… There is no chaos, there is harmony..." She told herself, as she opened a compartment on her lightsaber. Despite her penchant for breaking the Jedi rules, she couldn't deny that the Jedi Code had some helpful advice, especially when it came to navigating high-stress situations.

Using the Force, Chloe carefully levitated her 'borrowed' crystal into the lightsaber, and attempted to turn it on, producing nothing more than a small shower of purple sparks.

"Uhhh, lil Jedi!?" The twi'lek anxiously prompted, as the vibrations got more intense.

"Hold on!" Chloe spat.

She fanned her hands out, and the lightsaber floated in the air, before disassembling into its base components, which Chloe studied, carefully, before slapping her own head in frustration.

"Crystal chamber goes BETWEEN the cycling field energiser and the power cell, duh!"

The pieces rearranged themselves. The click, announcing their reassembly, had barely sounded, when Chloe seized he hilt, manifested a gleaming, purple blade, and span around, slashing through the web at her feet, tearing a chasm, into which a giant spider fell, moments before devouring the young Jedi. Chloe turned around and threw the blade. It span through the air, cleaving off another spider's horn, and two of its legs, before boomeranging back into Chloe's hand, sending the predator fleeing, in distress. As a finale, Chloe slashed through the twi'lek's bonds, sending him plummeting from the web to the cavern floor, where he would have met his end, if Chloe hadn't leapt after him, and cushioned both of their falls with a Force push, allowing them to land gently, by the splattered remains of the first spider.

"You're pretty amazing, kid." The twi'lek said, breathlessly.

"Yeah, I know." Chloe smiled, as she ran for the nearest tunnel, leading away from the sinister web.

The two ran for several minutes, before they were comfortable that they were free of the macabre feeding ground. Taking a moment to catch their breath, Chloe finally took a good look at her new companion. At a guess, she put him in his late twenties or early thirties, he had a weary look in his eyes, that Chloe saw a lot, in Coruscant's slums. It was the look of someone who'd got a lot of crap from the galaxy, and had learnt to give it back. His casual, leather jacket said he meant business, but also suggested he wasn't affiliated with any stuffy company or military, like the Republic. Most interesting of all, though, was that he was missing his left arm. It ended, just after the shoulder, and his jacket sleeve was shredded and torn, implying it had happened recently, although there wasn't a drop of blood in sight.

"So… I guess I'll humour you. What are you doing down here?" Chloe asked.

"Humour me? You still don't think I'm real?"

"No. Answer the question."

The Twi'lek opened his mouth, but froze, then frowned in confusion. "Okay, admittedly, I'm not sure how I got here, which is strange."

Chloe nodded, with a knowing smirk. "Uh huh."

"But listen, I feel like I am supposed to be here… I can't explain it, but I feel like I'm missing something… and… it's down here?" He looked at Chloe, who was looking at his arm stump, wearing an awkward expression. "Not my arm…" he sighed.

"Well, Jedi prophesies and messages are usually pretty vague like that. So all I know, is that somewhere out there, there's a twi'lek who's looking for something, and somehow, that has something to do with me." Chloe said, with a confused frown. "Seriously, why are you in my crystal quest? Have we met?"

"I don't make a habit of associating with Jedi…"

"Why not?"

"I had a bad experience with one once."

"What happened?" Chloe asked, tactlessly.

"Do you know what Cho Mai is?"

"Yeah, it's the Jedi practice of cutting off someone's…" she looked again, at the stump of the twi'lek's arm. "Oh…"

"Yeah, big, noble Jedi…" The twi'lek said, sarcastically. "They'll cut off your arm to neutralise you, because killing would be evil! Less painful is what it would have been…"

"Cho Mai is usually only used on Dark Jedi or other lightsaber users. Why would a Jedi need to dismember a normie like you?" Chloe asked.

"Maybe because I was persistent. They were trying to…" He breathed out loudly through his nose. "They were trying to royally screw me over…"

"Dude, I know I am a Jedi, but don't worry, I've got my beef with the Jedi too… dish." Chloe ordered.

"They were trying to take my baby sister. The Jedi always indoctrinate people as babies, but apparently, when it comes to street rats, they're fine with taking those babies at the end of a lightsaber."

"Korriban…" Chloe swore quietly. "Dude, that's messed up… Guess they got lucky with me, my stepbrother basically sold me to the Jedi."

The twi'lek took his turn, forgoing tact. "What about your parents?"

"Killed by a mugger, two months before."

Chloe kept walking through the tunnel, without noticing that the twi'lek had stopped.

"Wait… you're not… Dathomirian, are you?" He whispered.

"Yeah, why?" Chloe asked, in confusion.

The twi'lek's eyes widened in astonishment, and a tear welled up, beneath one. "Chloe!?"

Realisation hit Chloe like a train. "Xaren!?" She cried.

Chloe's head was in turmoil. Essentially all she knew about her step-brother was his name and species, and the story of how he surrendered her to the Jedi, which she now knew to be false. Like most Jedi, she had no concept of family, but, like most Jedi, this was only because she had never had one. She was familiar with the concept, of course, and while she loved Max and Rachel like family, a part of her had always wondered what it would have been like, to grow up with her older brother.

Chloe stepped towards Xaren, not knowing if she was going for a hug or not, although the longing look in her brother's eyes seemed to suggest it was on the table. As Chloe drew closer, though, the inevitable happened, Xaren slowly began to fade away, vanishing with a wisp of blue smoke.

Chloe stopped in her tracks, slowly sank to her knees, and pursed her lips in anger. Like Rachel, she felt the Force change within her, like the boiling ingredients of a soup. Unlike Rachel, Chloe was used to emotional outbursts. She had had personal sessions with Master Qui-Gon, in which she'd been taught to fear the Dark Side, and manage her feelings, before she lost herself. Dirt and pebbles began to rain from the tunnel ceiling and the cavern trembled slightly. Before Chloe brought the whole cave collapsing down on her, she forced herself to acknowledge that her vision mightn't have been a direct message from her brother, just a manifestation of her own suspicions. This was something she'd definitely have to look into, but for the time being, it wasn't worth losing herself over...

Chloe ejected the crystal from her lightsaber, and made to throw the crystal away, in anger. Just as she was about to though, she felt something resonating from the crystal, through her arm and into the core of her being. She opened her palm and looked at the crystal. Purple. Of course, indicative of Jedi who wielded the Light Side and the Dark Side ferociously in battle. What else should Chloe expect?

Holding the crystal tightly, Chloe threw the lightsaber, sending it clattering loudly off the rocks, before turning around and making her way back to the surface.