"We all have our heroes and when they fall, we die" – Atris, Jedi Historian

Lek was brought to consciousness not by the deafening roar of crumbling rubble; nor was he saved by the sound of the ancient platform splitting asunder, teetering uneasingly above the neon-green glow of the centre of the planet. It was not the familiar humming and rumbling of the ship which, until recently, had belonged to a greater man than he; his Jedi training had nothing to do with it either. It was the thought of her that brought him to.

"My life for yours."

Visas.

There she was – alone. He saw her outline very clearly, but her features were blurred by shadows. Strange shadows, they were, blacker than most, without form, without… rationality? Did that make sense? No, it didn't. Somehow. Her lightsaber was drawn and ignited, but there was something wrong… She was waving her weapon, mindlessly, without the extreme finesse that was so characteristic of her, normally apparent in everything that she did. Rain pelted down on her, soaking that exquisite headdress that covered the space where her eyes would have been, had she been human, and ran past her full, deep red lips. The shadows around her started to form shapes, strange forms. Not human, not like anything Lek had ever seen. Visas took a sweep at the air, the glowing blade humming, but cleanly missed all of the forms. A cry of frustration escaped from the depths of her lungs… before it was replaced by a scream of pain. Whatever it was had got her, exerted whatever deadly sorcery they possessed on her.

No.

"My life for yours!" She screamed.

Her fall took an age and the dull thump of her lifeless body was reflected with an opposite action nearly a galaxy away, in what would otherwise have been the grave of the man she had loved since she first saw his face.

He woke with a start.

She was in danger.

Malachor V, dying for a second time around him, came slowly into focus as one of the five pillars surrounding the dark centre of Trayus Core cracked and crumbled. Lek's super-human, some would say even super-Jedi, reflexes brought him to his feet. The pillar collapsed inches behind him as he struggled to see through the dust that engulfed him. Through the chaos, a yellow glow on the near horizon, a glow that was well known to him. Lek scanned around the platform – where was Kreia? Despite all that she had done, he still had respect for her. She knew more about the Force and, more importantly, of Revan's fate, than of any other sentient being in the galaxy; she was also, judging from her effective dispatch of three Jedi Masters, potentially dangerous for the entire future of the Jedi… and of the Sith. He could not allow her to slip through his fingers, not when she was so close. His head snapped in the direction of the glowing centre of the platform, where he had met Kreia for what he hoped would be the only confrontation in which he would ever fight his former mentor. There she was, her lifeless body strewn. His willed himself to push his protesting body to the limits of his endurance as he ran to her side.

"Warning: Master, you are in danger!"

That all-too familiar tinny voice, now slightly alarmed, the one that always sent a shiver down his spine. HK-47, once Darth Revan's personal assassin droid, now only a battered and chipped shadow of his former glory (though Lek and his companions knew better than to point this fact out to HK), leapt with surprising agility, leapt from the Ebon Hawk's boarding ramp. The droid's ability to completely ignore even the greatest dangers had stunned Lek so often now that he wasn't surprised that it was so eager to leap onto a crumbling platform to save it's new master.

"Statement: Master, if you continue towards your intended destination, you will place yourself in unnecessary danger!"

Lek paid no notice to HK, knowing that it was imperative to get Kreia back onboard the Hawk. He deftly dodged the remains of the third pillar, soaring straight over it. He hit the ground and found himself standing before Kreia's body – or was it a corpse? She's traded her plain, practical brown traveling to those a Sith Lord might wear. Lek had to remind himself that that was, ultimately, what she was. What she had always been, what she would always be if she was still alive and not brought to the path he walked. He approached the glowing red orb where she lay, seemingly lifeless, with caution. Despite the hazards of the disintegrating academy, there was a dark power in that orb that he was wary of. So he knelt before it and meditated.

"Disbelieving Query: Master…?"

Lek blocked out HK-47's attempt to stop him from doing what had to be done. He had to see before he could see, hear before he could hear, understand before he could understand – what this strange woman had meant to him.

"Are you surprised? All that talk of hatred, manipulation and standing on your own two feet…you don'tget any more Sith Lord than that."

That had been Atton's voice. Lek couldn't remember the entire conversation, but it had been just after he had returned from the Jedi Enclave, the grave of Masters Vrook, Zez-Kai Ell and Kavar, men Lek had known and respected, particularly Kavar. It had been a grave created by her. By Kreia. They had been the last bastion of hope for the dying Jedi. The Sith had believed Lek to be the last remaining Jedi. Malak, Nihilus and Sion – not to mention Revan - had killed and turned so many that it had not been an unreasonable assumption. Still, Lek had known that it was not true. He knew there had been hope. He knew that the Sith could be defeated, order restored to a troubled galaxy, albeit a galaxy that generally welcomed the death of their own protectors.

"All that talk of hate…"

Of course. That had been all that Kreia had ever been, all she had ever had. Hate for the Council and for their teachings had driven her to the power of Trayus; hate for Sion, whom she had betrayed and been betrayed by; hate for Nihilus, a pretender, who felt himself to be the most powerful Sith Lord to have ever lived – she had known better, he was neither truly alive nor was he truly a Sith Lord. And she had hated, above all things, the thing that gave her power, that had placed her above ordinary beings in the natural order of things: The Force.

But, despite this life of hate, there had been one love. It had been more than the love that normally developed between a Master and an Apprentice. It had been, on Lek's part, a love built entirely on respect for her wisdom, her knowledge of the Force and how it found its way into the lives of each and every living creature. It had been her understanding of the subtle consequences of the tiniest actions and how she interpreted the natures of concepts such as good and evil.

"Does it matter? Of course it does, such titles allow you to break the entire galaxy into light and dark, categorize it."

That had been her response when he'd asked if she was a Sith. His ignorance had astounded her, just as it astounded him now. She had transcended the gap between the Dark and the Light. She was neither and yet she was both. She could control those impulses that weak good and evildoers could not – she could be both, be whatever was required to achieve her goals. Lek had been wrong to call her Sith. That she was not. Maybe she had been once. Or maybe she had never truly been consumed by the Dark Side

"Perhaps I am neither and I hold both as they are, parts of a whole. Know that I am your teacher and that is enough."

Yes, it had been enough.

But the love on her side? What foundation had that had? One of respect…or something darker?

Atton would probably have claimed that Kreia's only trained Lek to serve her own purposes – to show both the Jedi and the Sith what she had become and to bring about the death of the Force. But it had been more than that. Lek knew that, just as he knew that Atton and his other companions would never accept it. While she had sought him out for these reasons, seriously risking her life along the way, something had developed between them.

"You are not a Jedi. Not truly. And it is for that that I love you."

Was that it? His individual philosophy, his approach to the Force? How he had gone to war against the Mandalorians, defying the Order, sot that he may save lives? That he had come back, stood before the Jedi Council for judgment, and defiantly defended his actions? And despite all this, he had remained true to the light, true to himself? Was that the reason?

Maybe not. Maybe the answer would reveal itself in time. But not now.

Lek was pulled out of his thoughts by a heavy metal hand.

"Extrapolation: Master, it seems likely that this platform will not remain stable for much longer." HK was right; the glowing red light at the centre of the platform was dying. Trayus Academy had conceded – the shadow field generator had done its job well - machines would win this time.

Lek disregarded HK, and reached out for the dark, cloaked form. His hand was shaking, a poor testimony to the Jedi training he had received which was supposed to help him resist strong emotions.

But when he pulled the hood of the cloak from Kreia's head, the rest of the cloak fell to pieces and disintegrated into a million pieces, then ten million, then a hundred million, revealing nothing underneath. He'd been too late.

Their bond had weakened to the point of non-existence and she had become one with the Force, leaving him with so much to learn and no-one to learn it from.