Last time: Kyr and Cien had a heart to heart talk in the dining room.
Now: Sasha and Viran finally make amends.
Chapter 15- The Monster
Once Sasha and Kyr returned into the house, Sasha immediately went in search of Viran. She had an idea of where he might be and checked the training room first. But when she got there, only Oppie was there going through his katas. She had watched for a moment, mesmerized by his intricate movements, before he spoke up and told her that Viran was in the hangar. That was going to be the second place she was going to check anyway, but she had to check the training room since it was on the way to the hangar. With that knowledge at hand, Sasha hustled to the hangar to find the hatch open to the Forerunner. Sasha slowed to a simple walking pace as she moved up the ramp onto their old ship.
Her feet stopped as she stared around at all the old memories that ship held. It looked exactly the same from the last time she had been on board. Sasha slowly moved over to her old bunk and sat down on the edge. She grabbed the warm blanket that she had picked up on an outpost in the outer rim that was known for its frigid winters. And this blanket became her lifesaver when she was ill with the flu as it kept her warm the whole time she was battling a horrible fever. She clutched it to her chest as she then found her holodiary that she had made shortly after they survived Order 66. She would update it with a new passage as often as she could then would hide it under her mattress to prevent Oppie or Viran from peeking at it. Turning it on, it was open to her last entry which was five days before that Jedi and Cien showed up on Vestora.
"So that's where you hid that?" Viran's voice rang from the open hatchway between the passenger compartment and the cockpit.
Sasha looked up at him, blushing slightly, and chuckled. "And now I'm going to have to find a new place to hide it, because you know my secret."
They both shared a brief laugh. As the laughter faded, Sasha set the holodiary down and looked at Viran.
"I'm sorry about earlier," they said at the exact same time.
They chuckled.
"Sorry, you go first," Sasha insisted as she gestured to him.
"I was going to say the same, but since you insist," he teased for a moment. Viran then made his way over and sat down in the chair that still resided by her bed from when she was under attack by Cien. He looked at his hands before him. "Sasha, I am so, so sorry for what happened. I wasn't thinking. It was just…" He sighed and looked at her. "When Cien was attacking your mind last year, I felt so lost in what to do. For once in my life, I could not be there to fight alongside you. I had to sit and watch as you fought the battle in your head. I feared that I could lose you any second and I would have been helpless to help you. That's why I rushed you to Polis Massa without Oppie. I know he was also trying to get help for us, but… He didn't see your last episode." He paused for a moment before looking to the floor again. "I was terrified that we were going to lose you. That I was going to lose you." He corrected himself.
Sasha frowned at him as she hugged the blanket closer to her. He continued.
"Sasha, everytime I hear Cien's name I just keep thinking back to what she did to you and that angers me. I know that Jedi are not supposed to feel those types of emotions, but we are not normal Jedi. I mean, you and I are together in a bond and relationship that I cherish with all my being. I love you, Sasha Monroe. And I don't want to lose you or see you get hurt again." He looked into her eyes as he reached over and took her hands in his. "And yet, I keep forgetting you are the toughest woman I know. You fought off a Sith with your mind. You've dealt with drunken bar patrons like they were nothing but B1 Battle Droids. You saved Oppie and Kyr in the same day, and then proceeded to care for them while you were running on empty. You also stand for what is right on a day to day basis. And that's not even everything! There is so much more!"
A smile now appeared on Sasha's face. "Viran…"
"Please, let me finish my thoughts," Viran asked gently. She nodded. "I want you to understand that I love you and I trust you with every fiber of my being. And I am sorry for my behavior over the last week or so. I should have just talked to you about it instead of letting my negative feelings towards Cien cloud my judgement. And I want to make things right. I still don't trust Cien, but I am here for you and I understand that right now we need her. Or she needs us. Whichever it is. So I am sorry again. Can you forgive this idiot?"
Sasha hopped off the bunk resulting in Viran getting to his feet. Sasha planted the most passionate and heartfelt kiss on his lips as she wrapped her arms around his neck. Viran wrapped his arms around her and pulled her in close. They parted a moment later.
"Yes, of course, I forgive you," Sasha said with a smile as their foreheads rested against each other. "And I am also sorry about everything. I kept telling you to trust Cien, but I never gave my reason why I trusted her. In the time that I have known her, I have learned or at least caught a glimpse of the type of person she really is. I sense that there may be a bit of good in her." He raised an eyebrow at her, unconvinced. She smirked. "Okay, it might be very deep, deep, deep, deeeep down inside her, but it's there." He rolled his eyes with a smirk. "Anyway, I should have been more open to you about her and everything else. So I'm sorry too for getting upset with you earlier. Forgive me?'
Viran placed a gentle kiss on the tip of her nose. "Always." Sasha beamed at that. He then continued. "So since we have kissed and made up, I have a question for you."
A blush spread to Sasha's cheeks. For some reason, and maybe it was just the heat of the moment, but she was taking that statement down a very different road then what Viran said next.
"I was wondering if just you or you and Cien could show me the mind space? Show me what you both experience. Show me what you have seen involving Dracul," Viran asked.
Sasha pulled away more to get a good look at his face. "I don't think my abilities are quite strong enough to pull you in with me on my own, but let's go talk to Cien. Just promise me you won't rip her head off until after we deal with Dracul."
"Fine. Can I at least make faces at her?' Viran asked in a childish way.
She chuckled. "Sure."
"Then yes, I'll be good," Viran grinned.
Sasha rolled her eyes and grabbed his hand, leading him off the ship. They walked back inside with their fingers laced together. A spark almost seemed to course through them as they walked together. A new energy, and a new strength to their relationship. They continued through the house together until they reached the room that Kyr had mentioned to Sasha he gave to Cien for the night. Stopping before the door, Sasha and Viran looked at each other.
"Ready?" Sasha asked.
"Yeah," Viran responded, smiling.
Sasha raised her free hand to the door and placed a firm knock against it.
"Cien, sorry to disturb you, but can we talk?" Sasha spoke up, hopefully loud enough that Cien could hear her.
Kyr walked by at that moment, bucket tucked under his arm, a mostly eaten cookie in the other hand. "She's over in the dining room." He told them around a mouthful of crumbs as he continued down the hall to his room.
"Thanks." They answered at the same time before making their way to the dining room.
When they got there, they found Cien leaning against one of the high back chairs around the table, looking through the window out over the valley in a distant way. She was munching on a cookie as well, which was a strange sight. Sasha and Viran released their hands and approached her.
"Hey, how's the cookie?" Sasha asked, being the first to speak.
Cien looked over at them as if realizing they were there, and looked like she was about to return a scathing retort and thought the better of it. "Good." She admitted.
Both Jedi were taken aback slightly by her response, but immediately regained their composure.
"Glad you enjoy them," Sasha said with a smile. "They are really delicious."
"Yeah, Oppie's cooking has always been really good," Viran added with a nod.
Cien looked between the two of them and looked like she was trying to figure out something nice to say and gave up. "Did you two want something from me?" She asked.
Sasha nodded. "Actually yes, there was something." She then looked to Viran.
"I want you two to show me what Dracul is like. What you both see in the mindspace," Viran asked. "I need to understand in order to trust you in this."
"And I'm not strong enough to do it on my own," Sasha added.
Cien looked between the two of them again, slowly. "Okay." She acceded. She reached out and grasped his wrist, and then looked deeply at Viran for a second, and then as if they had blinked the world around him disappeared. He was in a black void that stretched off infinitely, and he was surrounded by a small pool of light from a source he could not determine. After a second Cien walked to stand in front of him from the darkness, and Sasha walked from somewhere behind him standing at his side just like she had been in the dining room. "No." Cien stated, answering the all too familiar questions of someone who was experiencing this for the first time. "This is my mind, not yours. And yes it is very empty." She said, trying not to roll her eyes, or sound too sarcastic.
"Viran, you need to understand that what we are doing can take a toll on your mind," Sasha warned. "So if you want to stop, say so now, because I don't think Cien is going to stop once she starts showing you any of the memories. Do you understand?"
Viran looked at her determination. "I'm not backing down." He then looked at Cien with a smirk. "Show me what you've got."
Cien smiled maliciously, accepting the challenge. Around them the darkness twisted and faded into the grand hall of the temple on Korriban, and to the side was Cien. The younger, less controlled version of herself, waiting impatiently. The great doors of the room were thrown open as if hit by a blast wave. Dracul strode in, a bound, ruined husk of a man, his tattoos proclaiming him a proud Sith Acolyte trailed behind.
"You are Acolyte Cien." The Dark Lord stated.
"Yes," she responded, "I am." She answered proudly.
"Listen closely, if you are to be my fifty seventh acolyte, girl." Dracul said to the younger Cien. "Your gifts come highly recommended, and that is the only reason I offer you this choice. This will be my sixth century of life. If you serve me well you will witness and command powers you cannot imagine, and if you fail me, you will face the most dire consequences."
Viran watched with a narrowed gaze as Sasha stood beside, looking the other direction.
"I understand My Lord." Cien's younger self said.
"No, acolyte. You do not." Dracul said, "But you will." At that he used the Force to drag the ruined man between them, and then he unleashed Sith lightning on the poor wretch. He fell to the floor screaming in agony.
Cien's younger self looked on curiously, unsure of the lesson as the display continued.
"This was my fifty-sixth acolyte, child." He said with an unwavering voice as the screams continued and the acrid stench of burnt flesh started filling the space. "He failed me. Acolytes are plentiful, worthy acolytes are not. This is what will happen to you if you are unworthy." Suddenly the lightning from his fingertips turned blood red and then retreated into the body, and the screams took on an inhuman sound. Then the red lightning escaped the dead man, shooting back into the Dark Lord's hand. "And if you disappoint me, this is what will happen to you." Again red lightning emitted from the Dark Lords hand towards the heart of the smoldering, burnt corpse that lay between them. Her younger self was unsure what she was witnessing, not quite sure what the red electrical energy meant.
Viran grimaced as he remembered the first time he saw Dracul do that, but he did not avert his gaze. He was going to see this through.
And then the corpse rose.
The eye sockets empty, the eyes having boiled out in the energy storm. The mindless body shambled to stand before her, awaiting its lord's command. Staring at the corpse, Viran remembered the dead troopers at Polis Massa and the temple adherents Dracul sacrificed to make a point on Chikara. It was horrifying and disturbing to look at. Viran felt his stomach twist into a knot as he was sure whatever remained of dinner was not going to stay down for much longer. He gulped with a wince as he continued to watch.
"Through power I gain victory." Lord Dracul said to the young Cien, "and it is my plan to gain the ultimate power and control the entire galaxy in this manner. You will be my servant either way, it is your choice." Dracul regarded her, and the empty eye sockets of the silently screaming soul also regarded her.
She knew fear, for the first time in her life. Deep, true fear. As she knelt before the Dark lord.
Then the scene disappeared, only to be replaced with a new one. A more recent scene. Sasha, who had turned her gaze away from the previous one, now looked around her, her face pale. They were in the throne room aboard what looked to be the Bloodstorm as the walls of the room matched the feeling of the whole dreadnought.
Cien and Kopesh knelt before Dracul at the exact same time, and as one, they both said "My Lord." They shot each other hateful glances.
Sasha noticed present day Cien suppress a shudder as she, too, watched the scene.
Dracul simply regarded them from behind his mask, then spoke in a dark, low voice that carried nothing but malice. "My centuries of planning are nearly at an end. Soon the Galaxy will be mine." He stated. The two acolytes still knelt. "But, I am not the only one with plans." Dracul growled in the voice of death. "One of you conives to overthrow me." The silence after he stopped speaking subsumed the room as if all the air had been sucked out.
Kopesh raged, his body shaking with fury. Viran and Sasha looked at the male Sith with uncertainty.
"YOU BITCH!" Kopesh yelled, his fury erupting as he lashed out at Cien next to him with the Force. She brought her hand up just in time to barely deflect the grievous blow of darkside power. With a flick of his wrist he called his saber to his hand, igniting it and, with a savage scream, lept at Cien with a wild, overhead swing that would have cleaved her in two if she hadn't dodged to the side, igniting her own saber in the process to parry the vertical chop.
Then their duel took place before their very eyes. Sasha and Viran watched with their mouths slightly agape at the strength, power, and anger the two fought with. Cien, on the other hand, scowled at the scene before them, her body trembling with anger. Suddenly, Kopesh gained the upper hand and was using the Force to crush her throat. Cien gripped his wrist, and they froze for an instant, and Sasha assumed that Cien had dragged Kopesh to the mindspace. Viran assumed the same thing as their body language matched Sasha's when she entered it.
Kopesh then staggered backward. Cien fell to the ground in front of him in a coughing heap as she struggled to breath through her crushed windpipe. Kopesh looked at her, as if he was trying to figure out what just happened. And Dracul was standing before them both, having walked over to them. Just a sabers length away.
Cien tried to recover from the racking cough, trying to draw breath as she struggled to get up, to defend herself. She collapsed, half off the ground as she supported herself on her left arm, and called her saber back with her right in between hacking coughs.
Kopesh twisted his features in a fury and swung at Dracul. Dracul's head snapped around, and with a gesture of his hand he enveloped Kopesh in a storm of red lightning. He was killed so quickly his body fell in a heap at the Dark Lord's feet, his saber, clattering to the polished dark stone floor.
Cien looked away. Sasha gasped. Viran was at a loss for words.
Dracul merely stepped away from the smoking corpse and he turned to face Cien fully. She had recovered, and got to her feet, struggling to stand before Dracul.
"I wonder." Dracul said, in a voice that might almost be considered wistful, "If he ever considered that I was talking about you instead of him."
"No, I don't think it crossed his mind." She growled, igniting her saber and assuming a defensive stance.
Dracul merely looked at her from behind his helmet. The saber light was reflected in the glass eyes of his visor, playing off the dark finish of his helmet. She braced herself for the red lightning.
Dracul turned away and looked back at the corpse of his other acolyte. "I had hopes for you, Cien." Dracul finished. "Of all my acolytes, you were the least disappointing." He growled. With that, he threw his hand out, and sent her flying across the room, towards the entrance of the throne room that was so far away.
As she skidded to a halt, she staggered to her feet. Dracul merely regarded her.
And then he looked down at Kopesh. Casting his hand out, he unleashed the red lightning into his body. Cien braced herself to deal with the risen corpse of her fellow Acolyte. After what felt like a cruel amount of time, the lightning stopped, and Cien in the memory looked on with horror. And now so did Sasha and Viran. Not because Kopesh's body shambled upward like a broken corpse. But because he calmly got up. And smiled at the memory of Cien.
"Cien." He said. "You should join us." Kopesh said, as if entreating her to a great feast.
She staggered back, terrified, as her jaw went slack.
Cien then turned to regard the others. Viran was frozen in place, unsure if what he was seeing was real. And Sasha was horrified by the scene, Cien guessed she could sense what she herself had sensed when he came back to life. Kopesh was still there, but not there. Not brainwashed; overwritten. Whatever person he may have been had been turned into something else. He wasn't a shambling, brainless corpse as she or they had seen before, hearing the silent screams of the tiny spark that kept them moving. She had felt nothing but euphoria from this… thing that stood next to Dracul.
Then the scene faded and they were back in the darkness. Cien looked at the two Jedi, especially at Viran. "Do you understand, now?" She asked, no hint of sarcasm or malice in her voice. "Kopesh was brought back, but it wasn't Kopesh." Cien stated. She looked at Sasha, "Did you understand that?"
Sasha was the first to respond. She nodded slowly as she put a hand to her mouth. "How… how is that possible? How…" Her voice trailed off as she tried to comprehend everything that was flying through her mind.
Viran looked from the darkness where the scene had been and looked at Cien. "Yeah. I understand." Even though he spoke with an evenness to his voice, his face was pale and he had a fearful look in his eyes that said otherwise.
Cien snorted in derision. "I don't pretend to understand the extent of his powers. I don't know how it is possible, but it is." Cien said, fear edging into her voice.
Sasha and Viran both nodded, understanding her. Then the darkness faded and they were back in the dining room. Viran gasped and staggered back, clutching his head. It throbbed from the strange pressure he had just experienced. Sasha placed a hand on his shoulder.
"Are you okay?' She asked gently.
He nodded slowly as he steadied himself. "I'll be fine."
They then both looked over to Cien.
Kyr and Oppie walked into the room, Oppie spoke first. "Kitsu and Illara just entered orbit, they're ready to go."
"And I just made a call for some extra… uh... Friends, to help us get past the dreadnought." Kyr added.
"Then is it time? Or are we planning to leave in the morning?" Sasha asked as Viran took a seat in a nearby chair as he continued to recover from the mindspace experience.
"I think it's time." Oppie said. All five looked at each other and saw the same determination in their eyes.
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