3951 BBY, Citadel Station, Residential Module 082, Apartment C3

Eden

"I suspect there is news," Kreia said by way of greeting them as soon as Eden and Atton returned to the apartment. Instead of rolling his eyes as he was getting used to when in the old woman's presence, Atton launched into a full-on vent session, eyes wide and near-manic.

"Get this - our ticket out of here? Gone."

Atton was still plenty worked up from their dissatisfying customer service experience at the TSF headquarters to be full of enough ire for the two of them. While she wasn't exactly apathetic, Eden was more concerned about the odd look that overcame Atton at the station, his face going pale as he eyed her, as if in horror – before shrugging it off and gathering his things in an annoyed huff as if nothing had happened. He made no mention of it again the entire way back, so maybe it was just that - nothing.

"Our ticket?" Kreia repeated, nursing an annoyance like a fast-growing headache.

Eden watched the woman, wondering if it were perhaps her fault. Eden spent the trek back from the TSF station with an odd feeling at the base of her skull, as if a headache might come on, only one never did. Instead, everything around her began to mute itself – colors dulled, sounds quieted, even Atton's voice was drowned out by an unexplainable dread that overcame Eden the moment they left the station and endured until they returned to the apartment. Part of her wanted to drink in the sights of Citadel Station, somewhat excited to see something other than sand for once, but another part of her wanted to curl up into a ball and fall into the dreamless sleep she so often took for granted these last nine years.

"The Ebon Hawk," Atton said, rounding on the kitchenette to grab a canteen of water, gulping the entire thing in full before continuing without missing a beat. "But listen to this – it's still on Telos' surface."

Kreia perked up at this, her posture straightening as she strode towards Atton, her interest piqued.

"So, the vessel was misplaced? Or perhaps stolen…" Kreia cradled her chin in thought, her voice growing deeper with every syllable that escaped her mouth.

"Now I wouldn't put it past the TSF to straight up lose a ship, I mean, c'mon, just look at the incident we had in the holding cell."

"True. Though it is suspicious, as I am gathering you were about to explain."

"Exactly."

Part of Eden wanted to laugh, genuinely amused by the display before her, surprised the two of them were almost getting along. But the dread continued to eat at her, her companions' words fading until all she heard were ocean's waves and heavy rain.

Just like on Tatooine, she thought, haunted by the missing holocrons. And the Harbinger.

Breath caught in Eden's throat, panic gripping her so suddenly that all she could do was quietly leave the room and lock herself in the refresher, hoping she was not missed amid Atton and Kreia's volleying theories.

"Shit," she whispered to the empty room. What's wrong with me?

Eden rounded on the mirror, keen on looking her dim-reflection in the eye as if it might tell her whether this was another dream or if this was real life. She desperately hoped it was the former - then maybe she could wake up from it.

Eden looked about how she'd expected. The face that stared back at her resembled the image Eden held of herself in her mind's eye. But something was off.

After sighing, the sound of lapping waves still strong in her mind, she began to comb out the taught braids wrapped in the elaborate bun at the back of her head that she'd avoided in the Ebon Hawk's sonic shower, untangling her tresses and plucking gold beads as she went. Each piece clinked pleasantly as it met the surface of the refresher sink, collecting in a small pool of about twenty pieces by the time she finished. Surprised that the thing was made of stone instead of cheap plastic, Eden swept the beads across the sink's surface with the palm of her hand, eyeing them like treasure.

Now if only I could get my hands on some real money. Maybe then we could get out of here.

Looking at her face again, now framed by her black hair fading to yellow-blonde falling in erratic waves post-braid, she saw the version of herself that had befriended Asra back at Anchorhead. Asra was the closest thing to a friend Eden had in the last nine years. But when she befriended her, she'd been Vale. Not that Vale had been much different from Eden personality-wise - but in acting as Vale she had not been truthful to the part of her that had been Eden. When she'd arrived on Anchorhead, her hair had been flush with blonde locks, root-to-tip. As the months wore on, always keen on leaving after the next season, Eden had failed to keep up with Vale's hair but she'd also failed to leave Anchorhead altogether. As the months grew into a year, whoever Vale had been upon dreaming her up began to bleed into Eden. Upon waking on Peragus, Eden was the only name she remembered, and looking at herself now she decided that it was who she would remain.

"Eden," she whispered, still hearing Atton and Kreia's voices from the other side of the door, thankfully unaware of her imminent mental breakdown. "Eden."

It felt right. Still dream-like, but right.

Finally tearing her eyes away from her reflection, Eden rummaged through the contents of the refresher, impressed to find the place fully stocked with not just the basic amenities but even a few luxuries - one of which being a pair of hair-cutting shears, still sharp by the look of them.

Eden sized them up and then her hair, looking at herself in the mirror again as she measured just how far her blonde hair reached. Without hesitating, she snipped. Hair fell, her blonde strands falling into the sink to leave only the black behind.

She was Eden again. But a version of Eden she had not yet met. A version of Eden that had shed her old self and found pieces she hadn't realized were missing in each of her aliases, the truest version so far being Vale. But Vale was still a lie. This version of Eden would not be.

Eden could still hear the waves, lapping at the edges of her consciousness as she stared into the mirror. They would have otherwise been soothing, a calming comfort to ease her to rest. But instead, the waves reminded her of that day. A day seared into memory, a thought she could not reconcile with what came after.

She'd heard those same waves in the caves beneath the ghost town in the Dune Sea, and somehow, Eden knew the waves she heard were not just any waves, borne of some random ocean. They were the waves as they had been at Cathar - soft, restful, as if in mourning of the Cathar people that chose the sea over slavery, that chose to take their own lives instead of allowing the Mandalorians to take it from them, robbing them of choice.

I know now, Revan had whispered almost reverently, her doe-dark eyes wide and fixed at a spot beneath the water, the foam lapping at her feet under Master Vrook and the Jedi Council's judgmental eye. I know why this name is mine.

It was the first time Alek had held Eden's hand, though it was out of comfort in the face of fear and awe that washed over him as he watched his closest friend become a deity, ascending to near godhood without him.

Eden had not known it then, but Revan had not always been her name. When they'd trained together, her temporary-Master revealed that Revan was a name that came to her in a dream as a child, over and over again, until when asked she'd finally given it as her namesake – as if uttering it into being might make it stick. It didn't, then. It was only when she picked up the abandoned Mandalorian mask on the shores of Cathar, its bronze metal catching the light of the setting sun so it glowed molten orange, haloing her figure as she rose from the shore, that the name made sense, falling into place.

They all saw it: a vision, playing out before their very eyes in real-time, a memory unfolding of the mask's wearer to reveal the last moments of the Cathar race, pinned to the edge of extinction by the Mandalorians as only one of them defected in the name of the Mando'ade creed. If even the Mando'a considered what was happening to be blasphemy, then surely the Jedi would as well, and step in. But instead, the Council further condemned Revan, calling her a war monger, casting all of what she'd done and planned to do in doubt, coloring it all as crime when all she'd wanted to achieve was peace.

Revan only seethed, holding the metal tighter in her hands, her knuckles turning white when she finally affixed the broken Mandalorian mask to her own face.

I saw it then, Revan had revealed to Eden later. I saw what she saw. The Mandalorian whose mask Revan held, the persona she inherited. There was a word on the woman's lips that stayed with her as she died by blasterfire: revanchism, akin to retaliation, recovering what was lost. It wasn't Mando'a, but older. Yet the word rung true just the same. Who had perhaps been the only true remaining Mandalorian on Cathar that day perished with revenge in her heart, and Revan awoke with it, seeing that it would be done.

Revanchism. Revanchist. Revan.

It has always been my name, she'd said. I may not have been born with it, but it was as if… as if it was meant for me. A name I needed to grow into. And that day has finally come.

Eden had felt something akin to what she saw in Atton at the revelation – something between wonder and terror. But unlike Revan, Eden had always felt like Eden. Even when she was Vale. Or Nevarra. Or Iren. Even Lan Rissian during her short stay aboard the Harbinger. No matter what iteration of herself she masqueraded as in her exile, she'd always been Eden.

What did Revan feel like when she awoke as Nevarra? Was it the same as when she was a child, as if her given name were nothing but a borrowed one? A placeholder?

Eden braced herself on the edges of the sink, closing her eyes and relishing in the calming coolness of the stone against her palms, willing the phantom waves to recede. She inhaled, counted, and exhaled. And when she opened her eyes again, she saw a version of herself she thought was left behind forever in the Coruscant Jedi Council chambers. But here she was again - Eden. As she'd always been.

Only this time, she wouldn't run.


3951 BBY, Dantooine Grasslands, Sandral Estate

Mission

"Any idea what we might be looking for?" Asra asked over her shoulder, rummaging through a set of drawers with one hand while the other still held her rifle poised and at the ready.

"Unfortunately no," Mission said through gritted teeth. If only I could remember more of what happened…

Only Mission had blacked out just when her memory needed it most, recalling nothing when she came to in Zayne's arms, like something out of an embarrassing dream.

"All I know is that something here will lead us to where they've taken them," Mission assured, opening a closet and dispensing its contents behind her, half aware of what she was throwing over her shoulder and half aware if any of it were even useful. "Don't ask me how I know, I just do."

If Bastila were here, she would give the Force full credit. But Mission knew she was mute to it. If anything, she'd heard something in her last waking moments before losing consciousness and the memory of discovering some vital piece of information stuck with her even after she awoke into what might otherwise be classified as a teenage nightmare – waking in the arms of an old crush, feeling every inch the fool.

"Any idea what they might have used on me back there?" Mission ventured, hoping Asra's lekku were more sensitive than her own. But Asra only shrugged.

"No idea," Asra exhaled, abandoning the drawers before striding across the room to open the wardrobe along the opposite, swinging its doors wide open. "I sensed something was off, but other than that I have no idea what happened within these walls. And from the sounds of it, Zayne felt something similar."

"Big help the Force is, huh?" Mission tried to joke, only she didn't laugh. "Looks like we were all working with the same butt load of nothing."

At least Asra sounded apologetic. Mission sighed and continued rummaging, wracking her brain for any bit of useful information. We think you and your family are in great danger, was the last thing Mission remembered saying, feeling all the more ridiculous for it, especially knowing what came after. What an idiot.

"Nothing in the main hall," Darek said, poking his head in the room by way of self-announcement. Mission nearly jumped. Maker, Mission, pull yourself together. "I'll check the top-most floor and work my way down. You guys can work your way up and we'll meet in the middle?"

"Sounds good," Mission said, shaking her surprise away as she raised a thumb over her shoulder in mock enthusiasm. "Let us know if you find anything."

I was just here, she thought as she spied the main hall still full of skinned kath hounds over Darek's shoulder, as if no time had passed. What did I miss?

Without announcing it to Asra, Mission swept from the room and into the next, only to stop short once she found Zayne in there stooping over a pile of what appeared to be outdated datapads.

"Hey, does any of this look useful to you?" Zayne said as he sensed Mission approach, barely glancing at her as he held up a datapad over his shoulder for her to scrutinize. She froze for a moment, taken aback by Zayne's presence as well as his nonchalance at her suddenly being there. "Take a look and see if anything rings a bell, these were all just splayed out here on the floor, like someone was looking for something."

"Lemme see," she said, shaking the anxiety from her frame and reaching for the datapad in Zayne's hand. The thing was old but not ancient, maybe fifteen years at most. The contents seemed innocuous at a glance, but something about the location described in its detailed irrigation logs caught her attention.

"Are you sure you're alright?" Zayne asked, "We can head back to Khoonda and make sure you're –"

"I'm fine," Mission said, cutting him off. "I'll be better once we make sense of this. They can't have just vanished."

"Hey, Mission," Asra asked, her voice muffled from the adjoining room before realizing Mission had already left. "Mission?"

"In here," Mission beckoned, eyes still scanning the datapad. Zayne handed her another, the notes describing a similar structure not far from the Sandral farm as an obstacle to their irrigation plans.

"I have an idea," Asra said, bracing herself in the doorway as her eyes volleyed between Zayne and Mission, neither of whom shared her gaze. "The only time my lekku have felt off has been when there's a dampening field nearby. Now, I know that's not exactly what happened here, but—"

"A dampening field," Zayne echoed, standing up to pace the small room. "No, I think you might be onto something. The Golden Company has been stealing Jedi artifacts, no? What if they've taken something with the ability to affect the Force like a dampening field would affect power emissions?"

"But wouldn't you know about something of that caliber even existing?" Mission said, her eyes not leaving the datapad, something about it feeling important to her though she wasn't yet sure why. "Half the galaxy would be out for something like that, bounty or no."

"You'd think so, but the Jedi aren't just terrible about keeping secrets," Zayne said with a huff, "They're also shit at withholding important information."

"I take it you have personal beef with your own kind?" Asra asked.

"If you count being tried for a crime I didn't commit and nearly killed for it as personal beef, then sure. I usually classify it as Kind of a Big Fucking Deal, but whatever. I'll tell you the story, sometime. That being said I wouldn't go so far as to call them my kind, either."

"Guys…" Mission said, her eyes flitting over the contents of the datapad again, her eyes catching on one word in particular. "Look at this."

Asra and Zayne exchanged glances before each standing on either side of Mission, looking over each of her shoulders in a way that made her feel shorter than usual. Sighing, Mission held up the datapad before them and pointed to the top right corner.

"Casus," she said, tapping her finger across his name as she tried to imagine the man as he was in life and not as the ravaged corpse she'd found in the valley. "He's the one I mentioned earlier, to Khoonda. The man Mical remembered meeting. I didn't mention this part but when I was here with Nevarra, we found the third in this series of datapads – it's what eventually led us to the star maps."

"And the star maps are what remains of some ancient civilization, no?" Zayne said, the thrill rising in his voice as he pieced it all together. "Surely the Golden Company would be interested in something like that."

"Another bargaining chip, if Erebus' theory about the rebels having kidnapped Master Vrook are correct too."

Before Zayne could retort, Asra interrupted them, a look of utter confusion clouding her face.

"Star maps?" Asra asked. "I mean, okay I know what a star map is, but you say the star maps like I should know these specifically. What, are they famous?"

"Remember the rumors of Revan's mystery army? During the war?" Mission offered, to which Asra nodded slowly. "Well she found them through these maps scattered across a few planets, the first of which being here."

"So, what does this mean for us exactly?" Zayne asked. "I wasn't sure what I was handing you these datapads for, to be honest, but I was hoping they might have some secret code hidden in them or something like that."

"That's exactly it, though!" Mission spun around and faced Zayne and Asra head-on, both watching her with wide eyes. "I don't know how they muted our senses or messed with our communications, but I think I've got a pretty damn good idea of where they've set up base."

There was no other explanation. Why else would Rahasia have random farming logs of her brother's splayed out on a guest-room table? The datapads were old, but the logs were last edited over five years ago. And it wasn't like the Sandrals were actively farming, either…

"Hey guys," Darek's voice echoed through Asra's comm. "You might want to come take a look at this."

Mission paused, datapad still held in the air as they all looked at each other, a chill running through the auxiliary room of the Sandral house as if the device Mission had felt earlier had been reactivated.

Reactivated.

Without a word, the three of them raced to the top floor, following the sound of Darek's heavy breathing as he slowly backed out of the room he had just been in, gun at the ready.

Asra approached Darek first, a question on her lips before her eyes fell on what Darek's gaze was fixed on. Her eyes went wide and she raised her rifle. Mission stilled, her blood running cold as she approached the dark room at the end of the hall anyway, anxious to see what was inside. She took a step forward but was grabbed at the elbow just as she was about to look.

Mission turned, expecting to see Zayne, but instead found a woman – dark haired and serious, her face pale in the light or a silver lightsaber, glowing like a beacon in the din before them.

"It would be wise to step away," she said, eyes fixed forward.

Another Jedi.

"What is it, Master Vash?" Zayne asked, his face growing grave as he, too, enabled his lightsaber. Mical had mentioned the woman earlier, as part of the reason he trusted the Sith to remain well-behaved. Vash acknowledged Zayne's backup but instead inched towards Darek and Asra at the jaw of the room.

"It is the same as what you saw on Tatooine, no?"

Neither Darek nor Asra spoke, but judging by their stony faces the answer was a resounding yet horrified yes.

Mission swallowed and looked ahead. At first she saw nothing. But then, she felt it too.

Nothing.


3951 BBY, Citadel Station, Residential Module 082, Apartment C3

Atton

Atton couldn't sleep.

His first night in a proper bed and he just could. not. sleep.

Every position rendered him more uncomfortable than the last, his legs finally thrashing about the sheets in a fit of frustration just as he decided to walk it off and occupy his mind by other means. His brain had shifted from counting the number of times the lights outside the apartment blinked and shuddered before abandoning his task at seven-hundred and thirty-five (when the bulb finally burst, glass glittering up at him from the street just beyond the window) to pacing and counting his steps. But before he could get to fifty, he decided to exit his closet of a room and enter the apartment proper, where Kreia was sitting in utter silence.

"Your steps are heavy," the woman muttered, unmoving. "You might wake her."

Kreia was solemn and almost motherly in her unusual consideration of Eden, who Atton assumed was sleeping in the room just beyond where Kreia sat poised - as if she were waiting for him to enter the common area to have this very conversation.

"I'm just… anxious, is all," he said, wincing as the words passed his lips. He turned away, hoping Kreia didn't see, but the old woman laughed. Too late.

"Afraid the TSF might find something unsavory while they blackmail us into remaining on this station?" she asked, almost sounding bored. Atton didn't afford her a glance or a reaction. Instead, he stood facing Eden's door, wondering if she was sleeping soundly. And if so: how?! Knowing the Ebon Hawk was gone felt less like TSF negligence and more like a sign. But perhaps Atton was giving his guilt, and the Exchange, too much credit.

"I believe this is all a distraction," Kreia continued eventually, her voice low as it slipped into the awkward silence, setting Atton on edge. "This part will be over soon enough."

Atton wanted to ask her how she could possibly know that, but another question bubbled at the base of his throat instead, his eyes still fixed on Eden's door.

"Explain something to me," he began, turning to Kreia again, though before he could return his attention in full, Kreia was already responding, exasperated.

"I do not have the years required – nor the desire – to indulge you," she drawled. She remained motionless on the settee in the common area, having not moved an inch since Atton had entered the room. Had she not spoken, she could have been mistaken for stone.

Atton ignored her ire and asked anyway.

"If she served in the war…" he began, but he sputtered. Eden admitted that she had at least fought in the Mandalorian Wars, ended it even, but despite her affirmations something didn't add up. "Well, Jedi are supposed to be tough, capable."

Capable. Not like Eden wasn't capable, but something about her seemed off-kilter. As if she hadn't held the reins in so long that she doubted herself beyond just uncertainty, but as if it were absolute truth. Not to mention the dread he felt radiating off of her the day before…

"Yes, and what are they without the Force?" Kreia added, a somber smile gracing what was visible of her face.

"Without the Force?" Atton echoed. Kreia smiled wider, the melancholy in her expression growing tenfold as she cocked her head slightly.

"She was stripped of it, cut off from the Force, as a consequence of what she'd done."

"What she'd done," Atton echoed again. Kreia nodded. "Followed Revan?"

"Indeed, though it was more than that. Take the greatest Jedi Knight, strip away the Force, and what remains? They rely on it, more than they know."

Kreia sighed, and stood, the upper part of her hood finally pointing in Atton's direction as if she were looking at him now - her boredom finally overcome.

"Watch as one tries to hold a blaster, as they try to hold a lightsaber, and you will see nothing more than a woman – or a man. A child."

Atton swallowed. He'd always known that Jedi – and Sith for that matter – were just people. Even if it felt safer to imagine that they were somehow something else. It made it easier to blame them – to hate them.

"But to lose so much…" Atton shook his head, his thoughts not translating into the words he was speaking enough to satisfy his inner thought process. "I guess I didn't realize how much they relied on it."

Atton's mind raced with more than just that, and while part of him lamented his lack of grace in expressing himself, another part of him knew he didn't want Kreia to know the true intricacies of his reasoning and just how much he didn't know, or secretly knew, about Jedi. Or how to break them.

"Do not be surprised," Kreia snapped. "In many ways, even you are more capable than a Jedi."

With this, Atton felt the venom more than he heard it in Kreia's words. Her voice was soft, almost vehement in its sense of defeat, but he could tell she did not mean it as a compliment. If anything, it was resentment.

"You could survive where a Jedi could not simply because you do not hear the Force as they do. It is an irony of a sort – and it is why I tolerate your presence now."

Atton wanted to laugh, but he also noted Kreia's use of they and bookmarked it for later. So Kreia was not a Jedi? Or at least no longer considered herself one… Neither did Eden. But judging by the witch's choice of words and her presentation to Eden thus far, Atton feared there was more to the story.

He began counting the blinking lights of the landing and departing shuttles from the common room window before the thought could steep. Whether Kreia considered herself a Jedi or not did not deter her from reaching into his mind as other Force-prone persons had before, so Atton felt it best to protect himself regardless.

"Such a loss of ability," he continued, trying to keep his mind honest lest Kreia suspect anything else. "It seems a bit extreme for the Jedi. Isn't exile enough?"

At this, Kreia eased back into her sour smile, the expression darker than before.

"One would think," she said, her cadence in agreement even if she did not disclose as much. "She has been gone from war for some time, so I assume being thrust into all this as well as rekindling to the Force is more than just a rude awakening. Perhaps more akin to a stress dream, or a nightmare. But it is conflict that strengthens us… and isolation that weakens us, erodes us…"

Kreia paused, as if expecting Atton to chime in. His mind was racing with numbers, but a part of him was also thinking of himself, as Atton. A smuggler that ended up on the wrong side of a betting pool, trying to run away from something but finding himself stuck nonetheless.

"Add to that she turned away from war, did all that she could to forget it, and the last piece clicks into place," Kreia continued, calming his inner paranoia for now, but making him feel guilty about it anyway. "But we have spoken enough of this, and we do her a disservice by not speaking while she is present."

Kreia did not wait for Atton to respond. Instead, she sat back down and lowered her head into what Atton could only assume was a meditative pose. She sat still, truly stone now, and it felt as if Atton was indeed alone in the room. Atton shuddered and looked at Eden's room again, now hoping that she was sleeping through all of this – if not just for the idea that she was getting rest where he could not, but all the better to ensure that she did not overhear his and Kreia's conversation. As much as Kreia unnerved him, the woman was right. It was an unwarranted offense to talk about Eden behind her back, Atton most of all for even asking the question.

He stalked back to his room, numbers crowding his brain, the counting itself even faint on his every breath because he needed to utter the numbers and not just think them. Because the guilt was running thick now, more than it ever had before, and he didn't like how easy it was for Kreia to get under his skin. If he could think of numbers and sequences and patterns harder now, he could, to the point that he almost forgot to blink once he was within the confines of his room, and almost to the point that he forgot to turn the damn light off.

Atton blinked, shut off the light, and promptly counted himself to sleep. All while dreaming of Eden and the sea of questions he still had about her.


3951 BBY, Dantooine Grasslands, Unknown
Mical

"You brought two of them with you?" A voice hissed out of the darkness. The dark, sweet, nothingness of sleep. His body felt heavy, but his mind was blank. Worriless. And he wanted it to stay that way. Mical wasn't sure where he was or how long he'd slept, just that he wished his eyes would remain closed so sleep could take him again into its warm embrace. But consciousness crept up on him anyway, his eyes blinking open as the words fell into deeper focus. "We don't have the equipment for that!"

"You do now, comrade," another voice whispered, echoing despite his murmuring. "Pilfered from the rogue Mandalorian doctor himself."

Mandalorian doctor?

Shaking off the spell of sleep, Mical blinked, sitting suddenly upright as the room came into focus. A force cage stood before him, glittering a pale blue before the silhouette of a cave beyond.

"Oh good," a nearby voice said, annoyed. "You're finally awake."

Mical sensed Erebus' sardonic smile before he registered the man's voice, the realization of what had happened flooding back as Mical acclimated to waking life.

"How did we get here?" Mical uttered, still trying to eavesdrop on their captors but finding none of their mumbling discernable. "We were at the Sandral Estate, and then?"

"Well, it's nothing I'm too proud of," Erebus said, shifting on the floor beside him. The man's face was smudged with dirt and a bit of old blood, but his hair was caked with the stuff. Mical recoiled only to find his own hands similarly dirty. And bloody.

"Please," he implored impatiently. "Do fill me in."

Erebus laughed a hollow laugh, wiping dry blood from his lip before satisfying Mical with an answer.

"I don't know if you recognized the gloves the Echani women were using at the Jedi Temple on Nespis, but whatever those were, these guys have the opposite of that."

"What gloves?"

Erebus only stared at Mical blankly, surprise coloring his face while he awaited an answer, disappointment taking over when he received none.

"I thought you were astute," Erebus huffed. "The gloves the Echani wore made them immune to certain Force powers at the touch. It rendered them neutral."

Neutral. So that's why it was so easy for them to take Mical down when they'd first captured him. Naïve and still willing to hope the better of his aggressors, he'd tried to persuade them to let him go instead of force them to. Now he regretted not at least attempting to hit what seemed like, at the time, a nice woman.

"Okay, so what do you mean by the opposite?"

"They have equipment that render us neutral."

Us.

Mical wanted to ask how Erebus knew, but he also didn't want to admit that he hadn't known about the Echani. The Force was a door Mical had left ajar for so long that he'd forgotten his sixth sense could be picked up by others and not simply remain a secret he could keep forever. He also didn't want to know how Erebus knew, either, having suspected the man since first being sat across the table from him on Nespis what felt like ages ago. But that didn't stop him from doing the opposite now, did it?

"How is that possible?" was all Mical was able to convey.

Erebus shook his head, staring into the middle distance.

"That's what I'd like to know," the Sith said. "All I've gathered is that the Dantooine rebels used some Jedi artifact to trap Master Vrook. But from the sounds of it, it was the Golden Company we have to thank for the both of us getting roped into this, too."

"I heard them mention a Mandalorian doctor just now, I'm sure you caught that as well," Mical said, "Any idea who they mean?"

At this, Erebus balked, his gaze retreating from his inner thoughts to stare at Mical, surprised.

"Seriously?" he said, "You've never heard of Demagol?"

"Who's Demagol?"

Erebus sighed and shook his head before scurrying closer to Mical. Mical tensed, unsure of how he felt about being this close to Erebus, let alone any Sith. His once lustrous dark hair now hung in clumps, held together by dirt and blood, but the man only smelled of pure pheromones. Mical raised a hand to his own head, afraid of what he'd find in his own hair, but forced himself to pause as Erebus began to explain.

"I only heard about the man after the war. Well, after the Jedi Civil War, to be specific, but he was active during the Mandalorian aggression so maybe I can forgive your ignorance." Mical wasn't normally a violent man, but he wanted to throttle Erebus right then and there, were it not for the mingled exhaustion and confusion making both his brain and his body feel slow. "Not sure if he was ethnically Mandalorian or not, but Demagol studied Force sensitives on their behalf, capturing Jedi in hopes of better understanding the Force itself. I think he was trying to figure out how the Force worked or how to negate it, maybe, to end the war once the Mandos learned Revan might join in."

Of course. Mical hadn't been stationed where it happened, but he'd heard of Jedi being kidnapped just when he entered the corps. So many of the soldiers he served under were scared at the time, though Mical had only focused on how best to heal them versus playing detective. He had still been a child then after all, maybe all of fourteen.

"So where does the Golden Company come in?" Mical asked. "Last I heard, they're famously unaffiliated with any one faction."

"That is, unless the credits mean anything to them," Erebus added. "And from what we learned on Nespis, it's someone with a keen interest in Jedi. I might have said that perhaps Demagol was back at it, but I'm pretty sure the man's dead."

"So, if this mysterious employer isn't Demagol, we can surmise that they at least want to find out the same information he did?" Mical ventured, now afraid he'd have to nurse a headache as a searing pain cleaved his skull in two.

"That's what I figure," Erebus said, looking over his shoulder. "It's why they've captured us, isn't it? To cash in on that bounty."

The bounty on Jedi. It was ironic that neither he nor Erebus identified as Jedi, but of course an outsider would not see the difference. Mical had revealed as much to Rahasia back at the Sandral Estate. I trained here as a child myself as well, he'd said, like an idiot. So even if he had no true hold over the Force, we was still captured as if he had.

"Can't you… do something?" Mical asked, holding his head in his hands as if it might negate the pain now radiating out from his skull.

"What, because I command the Dark Side?" Erebus snorted. "Sure, let me just charge my batteries."

"I was hoping yes, but…" Mical shook his head, finding that it hurt with the effort. "What did they do to you, exactly?"

"You don't feel it?"

Mical shook his head, even though he felt the creeping sensation of something wrong. He couldn't pinpoint it. It just felt as if… his senses were clouded, his growing migraine too strong to think through.

"Exactly." Erebus whispered, his gaze sharpening as he recognized the pain on Mical's face.

Mical wanted to protest, annoyed, but then… he stilled. The realization dawned on him as his headache worsened, an aura growing in his peripheral vision until it blended in seamlessly with the force cage now surrounding them, its too-loud hum growing deeper and more pervasive with every breath. Until it dissipated completely.

"Black noise?"

"Precisely," Erebus shot up from the floor now, pacing about the confines of their shared space that was only large enough to allow him one sweeping stride in either direction. "When they captured us, I sensed nothing through the Force, but now I realize why. It's not exactly what my sister experienced, but something fabricated and temporary. So long as our senses are so overwhelmed, as if being so deep underwater that everything is drowned out – literally and figuratively – we cannot tap into the Force unless truly pressed."

"So, were you not still somewhat injured you'd be able to get us out of here?"

Erebus paused, his eyes looking to the silhouettes at the far end of the room until they disappeared from view before turning to Mical again.

"Funny," Erebus quipped, though he shook his head, eyes closed, before continuing, even more annoyed, "But maybe. Normally I would be able to tap into whatever those men were saying over there, as you just had. Yet what I gleaned was a whole lot of nothing. But I didn't just not hear their conversation, I also didn't hear the sounds of this cave, nor the earth beneath us, or you hardly."

Erebus shook his head, pacing again.

"Under normal circumstances, anyone with a Force sensitivity would be able to tap into those things. The environment, any nearby energy. Tell me – do you sense anything?"

Erebus crossed his arms and looked at Mical expectantly, his eyes softer than Mical remembered seeing them – a deep forest green instead of the bright, poisonous lime he was used to seeing edge out from behind the man's dark fringe. The man was truly curious, so far the only facet of Erebus that Mical felt was genuine to who he was in spite of the façade he put up at all times to keep others at bay. Mical furrowed his brow, his head aching with the effort, but otherwise did as Erebus asked. Mical closed his eyes and reached out only to find…

"Nothing," Mical sighed, exhaling as he looked Erebus in the eye again. "I'm not well practiced but I sense nothing. All I can hear is your loud breathing."

Erebus' mouth cracked into a smile, letting out a sharp laugh as he shook his head and made another paltry pass around their shared force cage.

"I'd offer to teach you, but I can already tell where that conversation would go," Erebus said, the spirit of a laugh still light on his voice. "But the offer stands, if you're ever of a mind."

Mical said nothing, his body too weak to come up with something clever. Erebus only picked up his pacing. Whether it was to avoid the awkward silence that followed or because he was actually deep in contemplation, Mical was not sure.

"But wait," Mical said eventually, the events of what happened at the Sandral Estate falling into even sharper relief the more he dwelled on it. "When exactly did your senses cease?"

"I could read energies from just outside the house, but once inside? It's a bit hazy," Erebus said, now picking up a rhythm in his ponderous wandering. "It wasn't until they physically touched me that I truly wasn't able to pick anything up. Before that, the Force felt like static. As if it were a weak radio signal I couldn't quite make out."

"Force dampening," Mical mused, his eyes glazing over as they bore into the floor. He felt his gaze go cross-eyed, the foreground growing blurry, before he realized they were not just in any cave. His gaze sharpened and goosebumps rose along his arms. Without warning, Mical shot up, his eyes still fixed on the floor as his focus zeroed in on the faint design at his feet.

"What?" Erebus asked, his breath practically on Mical's neck given the close quarters. Mical could only stare at the ground just inches from his boot, caked in dust. Erebus looked, too, but hesitated nonetheless. "I don't understand."

Instead of speaking, Mical bent down again, this time swiping his still-grimy hands along the floor. It was still covered in dust and dirt and whatever they'd dragged in here, but after a moment's worth of intense scrubbing while tolerating Erebus' surprised gaze at his back, Mical revealed an odd pattern along the ground.

"These tiles," Mical said, his voice weak but growing stronger as the realization set in. "Look familiar?"

Now it was Erebus' turn to furrow a brow, his irises growing sharper as he neared Mical on the floor. Erebus knelt beside him, reaching a half-gloved hand to the ground to mirror Mical as the latter waited expectantly. The man wiped away more dust to reveal a diamond pattern, his fingers stilling over the sharp edges of the ancient decoration hidden beneath the earth the rebels had likely trodden in over months and years.

"My ship," he said, Erebus' voice barely a whisper, "The design…"

Suddenly Erebus stood, his face paling.

"Do these rebels even know where they're keeping us?" Mical asked.

Erebus only shook his head, the shock clear in his expression, brow still furrowed.

"I hope not," Erebus said, "Though I wonder – did Vash see this in her visions as well?"

That, Mical did not know. Unable to hold Erebus' gaze any longer, Mical looked back at the pattern beneath them. If the civilization responsible for creating Revan's fleet was responsible for this structure as well, where did that leave them? And did it bode well or ill that Revan was gone?