Hey everyone! We are back with another! And just in time for the new Kenobi series to come out! Read, Review, and Enjoy!

Part 1: Chapter 1- Betrayed and Beaton

Cien coughed, soot and ash was clogging the air around them. A firestorm of flames were visible through the hole in the cellar they had cut with their lightsabers to get to safety. They had seen the bomb in the booth Selina had directed them to sit at whenever they had visited before. If the old man hadn't drawn them further into the bar they would never have seen it. With only a few seconds to spare they had cut a hole in the floor, down into the well built cellar below. They had half fallen into the space as the explosion happened above, and they had used the Force to keep the explosion from caving in the roof and the gout of flame from shooting through to them.

That was the last thing Cien remembered. She looked around groggily, and she saw Sasha nearby, where she had brought the old man down with them. Cien got to her feet, rushing to Sasha's side as she coughed, and felt tinges of injuries from the fall to the hard floor. "Sasha?" She asked as she knelt down, worried.

Sasha didn't respond at first, but after a moment awoke coughing before wincing at her own injuries. Not only from the fall, but also from when she had destroyed the escaping ship earlier as they flared with worse pain than before. After a moment, Sasha peeled her eyes open and looked around in an unfocused haze. "Cien?" She croaked before coughing again.

"Can you move?" Cien asked, she looked around, then up. The only way out of the space was upstairs and it was still a blazing inferno.

"I think so," Sasha said before moving to sit up. She winced at her bruised body and the broken ribs she was sure she had protesting the movement of sitting up. "Are you okay?" She asked before coughing again.

"I'm not injured." Cien growled. She could feel tinges of bruises and aches, but nothing she couldn't ignore. She looked around, her helmet was covered in soot and ash laying on the floor. She looked down at the rest of her armor as she called her helmet to her hand with the Force. What gleam of light it usually had, it was absolutely covered in soot and dirt now, obscuring the usually radiant silver gold color to a dark, dirty ashen colored grey.

"That's good," Sasha said with a nod before looking at the old man lying near her, unmoving. "Is he okay?"

Cien almost growled at Sasha for asking the question, and wasting the time saving him, but she held back. She went over and checked him. "He's still alive." She stated.

Sasha nodded. "We should get out of here then," she said as she winced, pushing herself to her knees, and an arm around her midsection. "The building could collapse any minute from the fire."

Cien put her helmet on. "Stay here." She commanded Sasha. She looked up at the hole, and then lept. She landed in the middle of the inferno on what used to be the floor of the bar, there was a small pocket here where there was just enough space for her to crouch on top of the vaulted stone roof of the cellar. Her armor would protect her for a few moments. She stood in the flames, gathering her strength, and then she burst out with the Force, sending the burning wreckage of the building scattering away like another explosion.

Sasha looked up and watched for a moment before moving to help the older man. She winced as she wrapped his arm around her shoulders and hers around his waist. She almost dropped him, though, when she pushed them both up to a standing position. Her broken ribs aching. After composing herself, she then moved slowly to follow Cien. She looked up and prepared to Force leap up with the man.

"Is it clear?" Sasha asked as she prepared to leap.

"Yes, it's clear now." Cien called back, "I can lift him up, stand clear."

"Okay," Sasha said as she adjusted her grip on the man so Cien could lift him up and out. Cien floated him up using the Force, trying to be as careful as she could even though she held a smoldering hatred at the moment for the world in general. And most of all for this man's granddaughter. She reminded herself that he wasn't the one responsible for this. At least not directly. He settled into the soot on the roof of the cellar.

"Do you need help?" Cien called down to Sasha.

"No, I think I can handle this," Sasha said, a strong hint of uncertainty in her voice. She moved into a position to leap. She managed to get air, thanks to the Force, but she barely gripped the edge of the hole. Normally she could jump much higher than the hole, but her aching body barely let her get this high. She held a tight grip as she released a yelp of pain from her protesting ribs. Cien immediately reached out for her hand, and used the Force to augment her strength as she pulled Sasha the rest of the way, and they both fell back to the destroyed ashen floor.

"Thanks," Sasha coughed as she laid on her side.

Cien just grunted in ackowledgement as she got to her feet. Her senses started making her aware of more danger. Her head slowly turned towards where the front entrance would have been, and above the din of the still burning rubble she could hear people shouting and running.

Sasha took a second before moving back to her feet and moving back over to help the old man. They needed to get him out of this burning hell hole as much as they needed to get themselves out. She winced with every movement, but she too heard the sounds of shouting and running.

Cien growled and started walking towards the voices. Her armor was so covered in soot and smoke from actually standing in the flames that it was an ashen black now. The flames still lit the night, and as she cleared the wreckage she stood there as a ghastly silhouette to the approaching men. There were five of them, obviously cartel thugs that were approaching the building, they had blaster rifles and pistols out, and they stopped short when they saw her emerge.

Supporting the old man, Sasha sluggishly followed after Cien.

Without a second thought, but with a snarl, Cien used the Force to pick up the five men. They yelled in surprise as they came floating towards her, and tried to orient their blasters and aim at her. With her other hand she made a batting gesture, and their blasters went clattering out of the hands, hitting the pavement. She brought them face to face with her and they looked at her in terror. She twisted her head slightly to the side as she regarded them, and then flung them into the burning wreckage of the bar. Two of the men were impaled on splintered beams, the third was thrown into a spot where the fire still raged and he screamed as he burned alive. The fourth was thrown so hard into a wall panel that he didn't move, and the fifth sailed over the wreckage, smashing against the building on the other side of the road behind where the bar had once stood.

Sasha emerged a moment after Cien dispatched the men, coughing from the smoke. She moved away from the burning building and laid the old man down nearby before taking a knee to catch her own breath. She looked up and towards Cien, a look of worry clearly etched on her sweat and smoke stained face.

Cien stalked back to where they were. "Should I call the ship in?" She asked, almost growling the question at Sasha.

Furrowing her brow at Cien, Sasha frowned. "Call the ship in. We need to go. The sooner the better, right?"

"Yes." Cien stated. She hit a button on her gauntlet and looked to the distance where the Spirit should be appearing within a few minutes. The feed from its sensors appeared on her display, and she was able to guide it in remotely as it took off and overflew the town.

They heard the sound of alarms and klaxons approaching, and speeder craft approached out of the night coming in. Cien looked up at them, readying herself for a fight as she turned to put herself between them and Sasha. Pushing herself to her feet, Sasha stood looking at Cien then at the approaching speeders, unsure of who it was coming to greet them. She wasn't sure she could fight back right now as she wrapped her arm back around her waist, but she was also sure that Cien could easily handle them. Especially based on the anger Sasha felt coming from her.

Cien raised her arm as the speeders landed, preparing herself to kill whoever was coming here to threaten her and her family. Militia uniforms came out, and Cien didn't lower her guard, she actually tensed, preparing to strike.

"Cien?" Sasha questioned. "It's just the Militia. They aren't with the cartel."

"Yes they are." Cien growled, "they're the reason they got shot down in the first place." Cien stepped forward, calling her saber to her right hand and igniting it, the red light spilling out and fighting with the flames to light the dark night around them, and she started gathering Sith lightning in her left gauntlet, the play of its energy adding its own shimmering light as the electrical arcs raced across the beskar.

"Cien, stop!" Sasha begged as she realized what her friend was about to do. "They are not our enemy here." That's when Sasha noticed Colonel Ceros appear from one of the speeders further proving her point.

Cien just stalked forward toward the approaching militia men, who balked at her approach. In the odd play of light from the flames and her blood red saber in her blackened armor she looked like a vicious vision of the dark side as she approached them. A true Sith Lord out for blood.

"Cien!" Sasha called out again trying to get her attention.

The militia men raised their blasters, and Ceros held out his hand, stopping them as he walked forward. Cien just raised her left hand, toward the men and snarled at them, her helmet amplified the sound, and it echoed off the buildings around them.

"Stop!" Sasha cried out again before ignoring her own body's protests and rushing towards Cien. She reached her and placed herself between the Militia and Cien while simultaneously grabbing Cien by the shoulders. "Please stop!" She urged looking Cien in the visor.

Cien did stop, her saber still in hand and the electrical arcs still playing up and down her beskar gauntlet. She stared Sasha in the eye.

Colonel Ceros stepped to Sasha's side. "What has happened here?" He asked.

"After you pulled Kyr into a trap we left him here where we thought he might be safe. And we delivered him into the hands of Maldesto's child. His daughter, Selina." Cien growled before Sasha could say anything.

Ceros looked at her aghast, and then to Sasha.

"It's true," Sasha said looking at him with a frown. "Selina played all of us for fools and she got what she wanted." She then looked to Cien. "And we are going to get Kyr back. I promise."

Cien turned to look at Sasha. A hundred dark rejoinders flew through her mind. She knew people like this. She knew what was happening to Kyr. Or what should be happening to him right now. And for his sake a small part of her hoped that it would end quickly for him. And she felt tears brim in her eyes. In the back of her mind she could still feel his presence. And it was her fault that Kyr had been delivered into the hands of that monster. She was glad to be hidden behind her visor. Though her body language showed the fact that all of this ran through her mind, and she recoiled slightly as if hit by a terrible, awful blow. Her saber lowered slightly, and the Sith lighting retreated into her hand from her gauntlet.

Sasha frowned at her. She wanted to pull her friend in for a hug, but she was sure Cien would protest at the moment with the Militia watching. Instead she looked back to the Colonel.

"We will be going and hunting her down as well as looking for Kyr," she explained. "Please look after the old man." She gestured to him as he still lay where she had set him down. "He was injured in the blast and needs immediate medical care. And we are sorry for any disturbances we have caused."

The Colonel looked Sasha in the eye, and then glanced to Cien, not able to meet her gaze. "Whatever I can do to help, I will." He gestured to his men, pointing to the old man. "I am sorry for what part I have played in this. And I wish you the best of luck in your hunt."

"Thank you," Sasha said with a nod. She then looked back to Cien, offering her a hand. "Let's go. I hear the ship approaching."

Cien gave a last look at the Militia and then walked away, down the street a little ways, trying to bring her burning anger and growing despair under control. The Spirit came in, and it settled in for a landing on the roadway. Cien waited for Sasha to start heading for the ship, to make sure she was safe. She wouldn't leave any more family behind in this place. Sasha followed after Cien, towards the ship, moving at a reasonable pace despite her injured ribs yelling at her to stop moving so much. Once she reached the ship, she looked at Cien.

"I don't think he's on the planet anymore." Cien said numbly as she keyed the hatchway open.

"Then we will start searching nearby systems. Maybe get the New Republic to help," Sasha suggested. "But we need to get Vir and Op medical aid first. If we could kill two womprats with one stone that would great."

Cien merely nodded, and gestured to Sasha to precede her onto the ship. Sasha frowned at her before moving up the ramp. She briefly stopped by Viran and Op's bunks to check on them while Cien closed the hatch and moved up to the pilots seat.

As Cien settled in, she absently checked the scopes and saw that there was a ship in orbit. A big one, and it hadn't been there before. She looked over her shoulder, "Sasha, come take a look at this." She realized that it ended up coming out as an order. "If you can."

Sasha appeared a moment later. "What is it?" She asked as she settled into the navigators chair behind Cien.

"What kind of ship is that?" She asked, highlighting it on the scope so Sasha could see it on her console. It was a huge ringed torus around a central globe. It had a huge set of antennae at the back above the engine housing. Cien had never seen anything like it.

Sasha paled in her seat. "That's a Trade Federation ship," she said, her voice shaking with shock. "I haven't seen one of these since the Clone Wars…" A pit formed in her stomach as she stared at the scopes.

Cien stared at it for a moment as the Force called to her in the back of her mind. "I think Kyr's on board." She immediately ramped the engine power up, not caring about proper procedure as she took off, blasting the area around them in exhaust as the Spirit shot up towards orbit.

"Wait, what?" Sasha asked as she braced herself. "Can you sense him?"

"Yes." She stated in a half growl. If they could get aboard she would tear the ship apart if she had to.

Sasha gripped the edge of the seat and the consoles in order to keep herself in her seat as she didn't even have a chance to strap in with the safety restraints. The ship shuddered as it cut through the atmosphere. Off to their left they saw the sun rise as they got to a high enough altitude to see the sun cresting the crescent shape of the plant.

Cien saw none of that, she was focused solely on this ship in front of her. As they clawed for altitude it appeared as a white speck in the distance, already catching the sunlight. It grew quickly as they approached at full engine power, growing from the speck to an ugly torus shape that sat in space.

With a flash of pseudo motion it jumped to hyperspace.

"Kriff!" Cien yelled as she smashed her fist into the top of the console before her. So hard that the bobblehead of the droid jumped and fell off the surface, clattering to the floor. Cien slowly closed her fist in absolute rage as the feeling of Kyr's presence diminished in her mind, as he was torn away from her.

Sasha released the breath she had been holding as she relaxed her death grip of the controls. She frowned as she looked at Cien. "I'm sorry," she mumbled softly, unsure of what else to say.

Cien didn't acknowledge her. She sat in the pilot's seat looking blankly at where the ugly ship had been only moments before. She didn't have any words, any way to express this horrible feeling washing over her. She tore her ash covered bucket off and threw it to the floor as she brought her hands up to her face, unknowingly smearing ashen soot from her fingers across her cheeks and forehead. Sasha grimaced at the sound of the bucket hitting the deck. She then moved from her seat and knelt down beside Cien's chair while placing a gentle hand on her arm.

"I'm so sorry, Cien," Sasha said softly. "I promise we will get him back. We will find where that ship went. And I'm here for you every step of the way."

Cien stayed still for a moment, breathing heavily, and tears brimmed in her eyes. She pulled her hands away and looked at Sasha. Seeing her covered in soot, seeing her injuries, feeling the pain radiating off of her. And thinking back to Op and Viran in the back of the ship, still in their own dire state after being held prisoner by these people. They were her family, now. She had married Kyr, and they were brothers and sister in every sense of the word. He would want her to take care of them.

"We need to get some sort of medical care for you guys." She said quietly. Her anger still seething underneath, but being overcome by a terrible despondency. She adopted her flat facade, bottling her emotions up and putting them aside, in the same way she had done for so much of her life.

"Where do you suggest we go?" Sasha asked after a moment. She wanted to argue that she was fine, but her sore body, finally relaxing, said otherwise.

"I don't know." Cien said despondently. She looked down and saw the bobblehead fallen to the floor, and she called it to her hand with the Force. She swallowed and turned back to her console, still clutching the little figure in her hand. She scrolled through a list of options numbly as she looked through the navicomputer.

During the upgrades over the last year, Viran and Kyr had installed an updated fleet deployment package that Kyr had tied into the New Republic. As she scrolled through the navicomputer listings, she noticed that the 19th tactical, as Kyr had called it, was nearby, just one sector over. Kyr and Tac had personally customized the setup for her computer, cloning it over from the Shadow Runner. And she noticed that the 19th was tagged in the same IFF color as he gave all the ships that were part of the Xiv clan. The Forerunner, the Spirit, the Shadow Runner, the other family ships that populated the hangar, all of them were tagged in the same teal color, and they had also tagged the 19th the same way. She remembered a few stories that Kyr had told her when she had asked, she remembered when they had come to their aid when they had taken out Ikari's Star Destroyer.

"Have you ever met anyone from Kyr's old fleet group?" Cien asked quietly.

"I've met a couple of them once before. Hassen, I think, was one of their names," Sasha answered. "We met them when we returned from the World Between Worlds. Other than that, I've only heard stories of the others."

"They helped us with Ikari, they took over from us. Kyr seemed very friendly with them." She swallowed. "They're just one sector over, should we go see if they can help?"

Sasha looked at Cien then back to Viran and Oppie in the compartment beyond. "We need to get them medical care sooner rather than later. And Kyr trusts them." She looked back to Cien. "I say let's go for it. What other options do we have?" She asked that last question carefully.

"None, really." Cien said quietly. She input the course into the navicomputer. "They're only forty minutes away." She pushed the lever forward and the Spirit smoothly jumped to hyperspace.

Sasha nodded. "I'm going to go check on the guys," she then moved to push herself to her feet. That was easier said than done as she winced at the movement, but tried to hide it from Cien.

Cien didn't notice. She stared into the hyperspace tunnel roiling before them and in her hand she absently played with the bobblehead figure. Sasha frowned at her as she gave her shoulder a comforting squeeze before moving back to the bunks.

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