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Malachor
Damian knelt, placing his hand on the smooth stone. The crater they were in looked oddly formed, like it should be deeper. However, it was also filled with giant spikes sticking up out of the ground, so he was guessing it wasn't exactly a natural crater. He caught up with the others, who were examining one of the spikes, and the writing on it. It was an ancient language that wasn't used anymore. However, just as he arrived, Ezra gained a far away look and reached out to the obelisk.
"No!" Damian said, reaching out to catch his hand, but it was too late.
As soon as his hand touched the spike, red light shone from beneath it and spread downward to the ground. The ground fractured, then shattered and they all fell. They all landed hard and looked around, seeing a pyramid in the distance, the top of it glowing red.
"What is that?" Ezra asked.
"It's a Sith Temple," Damian said. "It's not a good place to visit, but is exactly where we're going to have to go."
"Is it like the Jedi Temple?" Ezra asked.
"Sort of," Damian said. "Except, instead of the Light Side of the Force, the Dark Side rule there."
Ezra nodded. They began to head for the temple, and after a few seconds, Chopper warned them that they might fall through the surface then told them which way to go in order to find the ship. Kanan took the lead and Damian scanned around them, lightsaber in hand. Aside from just the Dark Side permeating the planet thickly, something else felt off. Like there was something nearby, calling to him. They stopped suddenly as they reached an area where the ground was scorched, statues in the shape of people filling the area.
"Kanan look, a lightsaber, and another!" Ezra said, picking one up and igniting it.
A green blade extended from the end, then two more from a small cross-like section, forming a sort of guard. However, just as soon as it activated, the blade flickered and faded.
"As I said, this was a battlefield," Damian said. "That lightsaber's kyber crystal is broken, and the internal components have been fried, I'd wager."
"This place is horrible," Kanan said.
"Agreed," Damian nodded, picking up a lightsaber, images filling his mind from its shattered kyber crystal. "Thousands of years ago, Jedi Knights attacked this temple."
"And the Jedi won, right?" Ezra asked.
"From what I can tell, nobody won," Ahsoka said.
"I hate to break up this history lesson, but we should keep moving," Kanan said.
Damian set the lightsaber back down where he had found it, then stood, only to stop, looking around. "You guys go on ahead. I'll meet you all at the temple."
"What is it?" Ahsoka asked.
"Something's calling me," Damian said. "I'm going to go find out what."
Ahsoka nodded, and she and the others continued while Damian turned right, winding his way through the statues, following his instincts. After a bit, he reached a section of broken ground and slid down it, stopping before a crashed ship with several stasis tanks lying around it. All of them were smashed, and inside were nothing but skeletons with indistinguishable rags left from their clothing, however, as Damian stopped beside one, he stared at the object beside the skeleton. A lightsaber. It had a gently contoured grip, an intricate spiral design on the hilt, and slightly larger ends with three small fingers-like pieces of metal spread around the ends. He picked it up and marveled at how familiar the weapon felt in his hands.
"Who'd have guessed you'd end up here, Satele," Damian murmured, activating the lightsaber, two blue blades shining in the air for a moment before he deactivated it.
He set it down gently and turned back to Satele's skeleton. It would be a useful backup. He ripped some of the rags off of Satele's corpse, apologizing to his ancestor for any possible desecration or offense, and fashioned himself a sling for the lightsaber, slinging it diagonally across his back. He didn't need it, since he had his own, but it was elegant, and beautifully crafter, and he wasn't about to leave a second of his family's heirlooms behind when he could, instead, give it to Alina when she was old enough.
He made his way back up to the surface and headed toward the temple, only for the Fifth Brother to step out in front of him, lightsaber already ignited, his two prosthetic arms clinking slightly as he clenched his lightsaber in one hand and clenched his clawed fingers into a fist on the other.
"You're going to challenge me alone?" Damian asked. "That's very brave."
"No," the Fifth Brother said. "Not alone."
Damian looked behind himself as three more Inquisitors stepped out, none of them familiar. One was a hulking female, Damian was pretty sure, with pale green skin and a pair of short bone spikes from the corners of her chin, and a robotic right hand, one was a female with a rounded helmet with a spike reaching up and back from the center of the forehead, and a red visor reaching all the way across in front of her eyes, then an outfit similar to the Seventh Sister's, and the last was male Trandoshan with an Inquisitor lightsaber in each hand. Damian extended both of his lightsaber blades, separating them, and tensed his muscles, readying himself to fight. The Fifth Brother charged first, striking at Damian rapidly, only for Damian to deflect the strikes again and again, quickly and easily fending him off. After a moment, he blasted the Fifth Brother with a Force Push, then spun, sweeping all three of the other Sith Stalkers slashes aside. He immediately brought his other blade up, blocking the Trandoshan's other blade, then leapt backward as the two females slashed at him. The big one was all brute force, the Trandoshan was a surprising mix of power and speed, and the female was fast. Damian spun, deflecting the Fifth Brother's blade, then slashed at him, only for him to spin around it, all four Inquisitors blasting him with the Force at once, throwing him. He flipped, landing on his feet as the fast female and the Trandoshan reached him, both slashing. He blocked their slashes, shoving their sabers upward, then blasted the female away while blocking the Trandoshan's other blade. Then, Damian slashed at the Trandoshan, only for him to block Damian's blade. Damian flipped to the side as the massive female slashed down at him, slicing through the chunk of rock he'd been on. As soon as Damian landed, he shot forward, slashing.
"Ninth Sister, jump!" the Fifth Brother shouted.
She did as instructed, easily getting over the slash, and the Trandoshan deflected it before his other saber tore across Damian's chest plate in an upward arc, hurling him away. He flipped, landing on his feet and sighed, narrowing his eyes. Something was off. All four of them were stronger than they should be. Together, they equaled about the level of a Sith Stalker.
"It's this place," Damian realized. "The Concentrated Dark Side here is making you all stronger, isn't it?"
"Indeed," the Trandoshan hissed. "Get him."
The Ninth Sister and Fifth brother both charged, slashing at him, only for him to deflect the blades then spin around the Ninth sister's second blade as it extended and slashed upward at him, her saber beginning to spin around the handle. He deflected the blades quickly, backing away, then jumped shoving her arm downward with one hand before flipping, slashing at her head. However, the fast female suddenly held her hands out and Force Lightning exploded into Damian's body, launching him away. He crashed tot he ground and rolled to a stop, shouting in pain and convulsing for a moment before struggling to his feet.
"Dammit!" Damian growled. "Of course someone knows it."
The female shot forward, her blade clashing with his two several times before he fired a Force blast out of one blade, launching her into the Trandoshan, and both into the Fifth Brother. Then, the Ninth Sister reached him, moving to slash at him only for him to step inside of her slash, removing her arm before splitting her up the front. He jumped, blasting her body and sending it crashing into the Fifth Brother. Then, he spun, blocking both of the Trandoshan's lightsabers. The Trandoshan hissed gleefully, pressing down into Damian, only for Damian to grin, his helmet floating up from his pack, being the only thing he actually kept in the pack, and slipped onto his head, the cameras activating. Then, he slammed his forehead into the Trandoshan's, sending him staggering backward, hissing and spitting angrily.
Before he could pursue the Trandoshan, he spun, blocking a blast of Force Lightning with his lightsaber blades, skidding backward as he did, before flipping into the air, out of the way of the lightning, allowing it to explode into the Fifth Brother instead. He shouted in pain, sailing backward, and Damian landed on his feet, beginning to fend off the Trandoshan, striking back when he could. Finally, the Trandoshan grabbed Damian's leg with his tail and swung Damian over him, slamming him down on a boulder, sending Damian bouncing backward off of it. Damian grunted in pain, pushing himself up just as the Trandoshan leapt at him. Damian launched himself forward, just under the Trandoshan, and slashed above himself with both lightsabers as he did. The Trandoshan roared in pain, crashing to the ground with no arms or legs, and Damian connected his lightsabers and turned, drawing his blaster and finishing the Trandoshan. Just as soon as he did, he spun, deflecting the last female Inquisitor's lightsaber blade before push kicking her, sending out a blast of the Force and sending her flying. He turned to the Fifth brother as he put his blaster away and retracted one of his lightsaber blades, then began to fend off the Fifth Brother again.
With his powers constantly growing with the Dark Side from Malachor itself, he was much faster and stronger than before. Damian began to retreat from him as the Fifth Brother pressed him. However, after another moment, Damian sent a Force Blast out of his lightsaber blade, as he had done earlier, and sent the Fifth Brother flying away. Then, he spun, beginning to block the other Inquisitor's Force Lightning. She roared in effort, the lightning growing stronger rapidly. Then, suddenly, agony lit up Damian's arms as the lightning began to hit his lightsaber's hilt and his hands as well. He shouted in pain, his body locking up as the electricity shot through him for several seconds. Then, his lightsaber blade flickered and died, the projector lenses shattering and dark black smoke curling out of them as the lightning sent Damian flying.
He crashed down hard, continuing to be electrocuted as the Inquisitor walked toward him. Finally, he managed to get an arm up, blocking the lightning, through a monstrous amount of effort, and pushed himself up to his feet before shoving, a massive blast of the Force streaking back at her, deflecting her lightning before exploding into her, sending her exploding along the ground. She landed in a heap, slowly pushing herself up, only for Damian to raise a hand, then rip it downward, the stone roof of the cavern they were in shattering above her and plummeting down on top of her, silencing her momentary scream of fear and dismay almost immediately. Damian sighed, dropping to his knees and gasping for breath for a moment before staring at his ruined lightsaber. He could still sense its lightsaber crystals inside, both of them intact, but the lightsaber's components had been fried. He sighed, slipping it back into its sleeve on his blaster's holster and drew Satele's instead, pushing himself back up before turning and jogging toward the temple again.
As he did, the roof of the building lit up, and he felt the Dark Side beginning to resonate. He ignited Satele's lightsaber blades, speeding up just as two sets of red lightsabers a set of white ones, and a blue one all lit up at the base of the temple. Damian used the Force to speed up even more, streaking across the distance before jumping, slamming a kick into an Inquisitor he didn't recognize who had a mask with open eyes, and had blue skin with two fingers and two thumbs, one of which was opposite the normal thumb, and that Inquisitor slammed into the Seventh Sister before both bounced away. Damian landed on his feet and sighed, readying himself with Satele's lightsaber.
"Isn't that Satele Shan's lightsaber?" Ahsoka asked.
"Yeah," Damian nodded. "Mine got fried earlier."
"How?" Ahsoka asked just as the Fifth Brother slowed to a stop beside the other two, who pushed themselves up and formed a line across from Damian, Kanan, and Ahsoka.
"I'll explain later," Damian said, just as the temple door opened, Ezra running out of it, lightsaber in hand, and someone walking behind him.
The person was a Dathomirian Zabrek male with black and red markings over his body, yellow irises, and a cane in front of him with a metal section on the top, a curved metal piece extending from the top and curving outward and up.
"Kanan, Ahsoka, Damian, I brought help!" Ezra said, looking back at the man as he stepped into the light, grinning wickedly.
"Maul!?" Ahsoka gasped.
"The shadow!" the Inquisitor Damian didn't know identified Maul.
"What fun," Maul chuckled. "What fun."
"Ezra, get away from him," Damian said. "He's a former Sith Lord."
"What!?" Ezra gasped.
"So, the rumors are true," the Seventh Sister said. "Darth Maul lives."
"Formerly Darth," Maul said, walking forward, not even using his cane, which Damian suspected was probably a lightsaber. "Now just Maul. You have nothing to fear from me, Jedi. Perhaps my actions will speak louder than words."
"If you ignite your lightsaber, I will become your opponent," Damian warned. "This planet may strengthen you, as it does the Inquisitors, but I promise you I'll win."
Maul smirked, pulling the wooden half of his cane off, then raised his lightsaber, igniting both crimson blades. Damian began to turn to engage him, only to be forced to spin, slashing in a wide arc, the Fifth Brother deflecting the blade with his own before Damian spun his lightsaber, striking with the other blade as well. The Fifth Brother blocked it and Damian deactivated the blade, dropping and slashing with his remaining one, already not a fan of how much longer Satele's hilt was than his.
The Fifth Brother flipped backward over the blade, then blocked Maul's. The other two Inquisitors both moved to attack Maul, but Ahsoka and Kanan blocked their strikes. Damian shot forward, moving to stab Maul, but he flipped backward, over Damian, and instead, Damian's blade grazed the Fifth Brother, who only barely avoided the blade. Damian extended his other blade and swung it at the Fifth Brother but he deflected it. Damian began to helicopter his blades and the Fifth Brother struggled to block them for a moment before bumping into the Seventh Sister. Both instantly leapt away from Damian and Kanan, who had been fighting the Seventh Sister, before readying themselves again. as Maul began to attack the Seventh Sister, Damian once again attacking Maul, this time starting a battle between the four of them with the two Inquisitors being on one side.
"Why would you come here?" the Seventh Sister demanded as she fended off both Maul and Damian's blades with the help of her partner.
"He knows about the artefact!" the Fifth Brother guessed, just before Damian blasted him with the Force, sending him bouncing away.
The Seventh Sister jumped away from Maul's blade and Damian spun outboard, striking at Maul at the end of his spin and Maul growled in frustration, fending Damian off for a moment before Damian was forced to return his attention to the two Inquisitors when the Fifth Brother attacked him again. Then, he spun, shoving the Fifth Brother's blade away and caught the newest Inquisitor by the upper arm, turning and slamming him into the Seventh Sister, hurling them both to the Fifth Brother.
"This is getting rather annoying," Maul said as he once again fended off Damian, only for Ezra to step between them, blocking his blade.
"Deal with him later!" Ezra said. "The Inquisitors come first."
Damian sighed and nodded. "This isn't over, Maul."
"Of that I am sure," Maul nodded.
"Maul, do you have the Holocron?" the new Inquisitor asked.
"You will find out soon enough," Maul said, turning to them, as did Damian, the others stepping up in line with them.
"Fall back," the Seventh Sister said. "We can't beat them when those two aren't at each other's throats."
The other two nodded and they all jumped, their lightsabers spinning and allowing them to fly away.
"Maul, what game are you playing?" Ahsoka demanded, holding an arm in front of Damian to keep him from attacking yet.
"The endgame, Lady Tano," Maul said. "The endgame. I am the enemy of your enemy now, and I have my own reasons for wanting the Empire to fall, but we have little time. The one they call Vader will be here soon."
"How do you know this?" Kanan asked.
"His dogs will tell him where we are," Maul said, deactivating his lightsaber and putting it away. "Two Jedi, a smuggler, and a...part-timer. Oh he will come. He will not be able to resist us."
"Hold on, there is no us!" Kanan said. "Dealing with Inquisitors is one thing. Vader is another."
"There is no us because he's a Sith," Damian said.
"Former Sith," Maul corrected.
"Current enemy," Damian said.
Maul narrowed his eyes at him, one hand inching back toward his lightsaber.
"Enough," Ezra said. "We should trust him! Look." Ezra pulled out a four-sides pyramid of red glass and metal. "He and I took this from the Temple together. This is why we came here, isn't it? To find out about the Sith? To find a way to beat them? Ahsoka, you said we came here for knowledge."
"Ezra there is no way a Jedi can unlock that Holocron," Ahsoka said.
"But you may unlock the temple itself," Maul said.
"How?" Ezra asked. "Tell me how?"
"You shut up," Damian said, glaring at Maul. "Ezra, did you use the Dark Side to get that? Did you use your anger? Or your fear?"
Ezra stared at the ground and Kanan and Ahsoka looked at each other in surprise.
"Ezra, that's not okay," Ahsoka said. "We're Jedi. We never use the Dark Side, especially anger. It's what turn Sith evil. And not all of them mean to do it, they just lose control. And all of them believe they are in control, even after the Dark Side has taken control of them. They think they're still themselves, even after the Dark Side has turned them evil, into the very thing we are sworn to destroy."
"I thought I taught you better than that," Kanan said, sounding defeated and tired. "I'm sorry I failed you."
He turned, beginning to walk away, and Ezra stared after him in surprise and guilt.
"He simply used the strength that Jedi are too prideful and too afraid to use," Maul said. "There is nothing wrong with the Dark Side of the Force."
A powerful wind began to explode off of Damian as fury bloomed on his face. The wind shoved everyone away, all of them skidding a dozen feet before managing to stop themselves, watching Damian in surprise and fear for several seconds as the raw power rolled off of him. He flexed a hand and the ground to his right exploded into debris. He curled his left hand into a fist and a hundred foot wide and deep crater suddenly formed as the ground within was crushed into a sphere, which he then dropped, allowing it to form yet another crater as it exploded into the bottom of it.
"Whoa!" Ezra said. "That's awesome!"
"Oh it is, is it!?" Damian snapped, then took a deep breath, the wind stopping as he stopped using the Dark Side, centering himself. "This is the cost of using the Dark Side." He pulled off his gloves and held out his hands as Ezra and the others walked back over.
His hands had become snow white, but with his veins blackened and spiderwebbing through him, giving a corrupted, rotting appearance to his hands. He pulled his sleeves up to his elbows and Ezra stared at the damage, which had spread up his arms to about mid-forearm before it transitioned back to healthy flesh again.
"The Dark Side corrupts and changes everything," Damian said. "It will corrupt you both body and soul, down to a cellular level. And once the damage is done, it's incredibly hard to undo."
Light began to radiate from Damian's hands and his skin slowly returned to normal, the division between healthy and corrupt flesh creeping back toward his hands before spreading down each finger, then disappearing, leaving Damian completely restored.
"How'd you do that?" Ezra asked.
"I'm extremely susceptible to the Dark Side," Damian said, "allowing my body to be corrupted that fast. However, because my Light Side connection is so strong, I can heal the corruption in my own body by allowing the Light Side to flow through me. Although, curing that actually took a lot of energy."
Ezra nodded.
"The Dark Side is powerful, Ezra," Damian said. "But it's not with the risk of losing who you are. You'll hurt the people you care about, you'll betray everything you believe, and eventually, you'll destroy yourself. Even Maul is suffering from that effect. His body may not show its corruption, but he's a slave to his vengeance. He was betrayed by the Sith and he wants revenge on them. And I sense a deeper hatred, a deeper desire for vengeance against someone else. All Maul has left is his vengeance. Take that away, and he has nothing. Is that what you want?"
"No," Ezra said. "It's not."
Damian nodded, then turned to Ahsoka. "What do you think?"
Ahsoka was silent for a long while before sighing. "With the five of us, we might have a chance to defeat Vader. I think we should take it. Besides, there may actually be knowledge we can use inside of this temple."
Damian sighed and nodded. "Alright. Maul. Show us how to get in."
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