Taris Part 3
"Welcome to the lower city dueling chambers. These chambers are not for the weak of heart, as two men enter the arena and one man walks out under his own power. The other gets carried out and thrown into the fire after the fight. Many can watch, but hardly any can survive. Tonight will be the end of the fighting. You would be the last entrant and have to fight and kill everybody else in order to live yourself. You can stop at any time. You get paid after each fight. Are you ready to go?" the Hutt asked.
"What is the payout?" Revan asked.
"Same as the upper city 10% of wages" Zax responded.
"Who is the best?" Revan asked.
"Bendak Starkiller is 2nd only to Tanglow" Zax told Revan. Pondering for a second, Revan just nodded without smiling.
"I will fight them all at some point today" Revan told Zax. The Hutt let out a bellowing laugh but stopped when he realized that Revan wasn't joking.
"I like your spirit, Stranger, so lets get you out there as soon as we can, before the money goes away" Zax said. Revan nodded and moved into the arena, seeing a gamorrean standing in front of him.
Revan scoffed and took out his vibroblade. Once the battle started, Revan ducked and rolled around the blaster bolts until he was close enough to engage the gamorrean in a melee battle.
In close quarters combat, the burly gamorrean didn't last for ten seconds against the former Jedi weapon master and Revan stabbed the gamorrean through his chest, effectively ending the gamorrean's hopes to win the big money.
Revan rolled his eyes and motioned for the next competitor to come out. The next fighter was a twi'lek who Revan defeated without any sort of a problem.
"Marl could have defeated this guy" Revan muttered.
Suddenly, Revan felt a tremor in the Force and dove to his left to feel a couple of blaster bolts brush past his back. Revan got in position and threw a dagger at the new attacker.
Revan was surprised to be looking at Bendak Starkiller, as the Mandalorian attacked Revan without honor. To a Mandalorian, the punishment for attacking another Mandalorian dishonorably means death. The punishment for attacking another living being without honor was banishment, but death would have to do in this case.
Driven even deeper with that new knowledge, Revan attacked the masked Mandalorian with callous disregard for anything else. Once they started dueling with each other in a melee battle, the masked Mandalorian was no match for the master of all seven lightsaber forms.
Revan didn't hold back until he had knocked Bendak Starkiller to the ground, his sword falling away to the edge of the arena.
"You have disgraced your people. You don't deserve to live. Just like at Malachor V, I will restore the honor to the Mandalorians!" Revan shouted, though it was not loud enough for the arena to hear.
Ignoring what Starkiller was going to say, Revan stabbed the Mandalorian right through the heart and stormed out of the arena, re-sheathing his sword as he exited the arena.
Revan stormed up to Zax, glaring at the Hutt. If looks could kill, somebody would need to buy a large coffin for the Hutt.
"What the hell was that all about?" Revan demanded, his anger clear on his face.
"You told me that you wanted to face everybody today. You didn't mention to me that you wanted to have a break, so I sent out your opponents in a gauntlet style match. But now you have a break before you fight Tanglow in the final battle tonight. He is ready so just come back when you are ready to fight" Zax told Revan, shockingly calm despite the angry man glaring at him.
The former Sith Lord nodded curtly and walked out of the cantina, searching for Carth and Melina. When Revan saw the looks on their faces, he gulped.
"Something tells me I am not going to enjoy this conversation" Revan muttered, walking up to meet Carth and Melina between the cantina and the Hidden Bek base.
"What's the plan?" Revan asked his two allies.
"We need to break into the Vulkar base and retrieve the prototype swoop accelerator that the Vulkars stole from the Beks" Carth told him.
"If we do that, then one of us will be allowed to ride in the swoop race as a representative of the Beks and we would have a chance to save Bastila" Melina explained.
"And how do we get into the Vulkar base?" Revan asked.
"Gadon sold us some Sith security papers that can get us past the guard into the Undercity. When we get there, Mission can lead us through the sewers and into the back entrance to the Vulkar base" Melina answered.
"I was right" Revan muttered, though he just shrugged and walked toward the Undercity after Carth and next to Melina.
Carth showed the Sith trooper their security papers and they got in the elevator, descending right into the Undercity.
When they got out of the elevator, two men in ragged clothes ran up to the group.
"You there! This is our elevator and anybody who uses our elevator has to pay the toll!" the first beggar demanded.
"5 credits! That is what it costs to use this elevator. 5 credits!" the 2nd beggar demanded, sticking out his hand.
Melina reached for a credit stick but Revan held out his hand to stop her.
"And when you get these credits, all you are going to do is hoard them over everybody else in your village, right?" Revan asked. The two beggars looked at each other with shock before running away, getting scolded by a young woman who came over to talk to Revan, Carth, and Melina.
"I'm sorry about that; those two give everybody in the village a bad name. Most of us aren't like that though; most of us are good people" the girl responded.
"I'm sure you are, miss. Would we be able to trouble you for some information?" Carth asked.
"I am not the best person to ask for information. I can take you to Rukil and Gendar if you would wish. They probably have the most information out of anybody here" she suggested.
The three former members of the Endar Spire followed the young outcast girl off toward the center of the village where a dark skinned man was standing across form an elderly looking man.
Revan walked up to Gendar, Carth walked over to Rukil, and Melina continued to talk to the young outcast girl.
A few minutes later, Revan was leading Carth and Melina toward the edge of the outcast village. They exited the village and saved one of the outcasts before moving to try and find Mission.
When they did find Mission, she looked to be panicking and was talking too fast for Revan to understand.
"Settle down, Mission. What's going on?" Revan asked.
"Zaalbar's in trouble. We were in the sewers and we were ambushed by gamorrean slave hunters! Zaalbar yelled at me to run, and I did, expecting him to be right behind me, but he couldn't get away from them!" Mission shouted, nearing hysteria.
"Do you know where they are holding Zaalbar?" Melina asked gently.
"Gamorreans make their camp in the sewers. The stink reminds them of home, I guess. I can take you there if you can help me" Mission begged.
"If we help you find Zaalbar, you have to get us into the Vulkar base" Revan told her.
"It's a deal. You help me get Zaalbar back and I will get you into the Vulkar base" Mission agreed.
"Alright, then we should split up. Carth and Melina, you two find those Promised Land journals that Rukil wanted us to find. I will go with Mission. We will find the accelerator in the Vulkar base" Revan said.
"Alright, Avner. Be careful, we'll meet you back at the village in four hours" Carth said. Revan stood there, stunned that Carth wasn't getting upset about being ordered around by a man over fifteen years his junior.
Carth had made no secret about his obvious distrust for the smuggler who had done many things that Carth would never have been willing to do.
Because of that, Revan was extremely surprised that Carth didn't put up a fight to splitting up.
Revan shook his head out of his thoughts and nodded at Carth, allowing the Jedi and pilot to go search for Rukil's journals.
Author's Note: I am trying to make Carth a little bit less of a hard-ass in my story, because he is really a good guy who has been betrayed one too many times, so I am going to make him a nicer guy. But he will still be Carth; nobody needs to worry about that. If anybody has a problem with that, please tell me in a review. I like to take the reader's opinion into account when I am writing, so tell me. Thanks everybody!