A/N: So would you believe I was gonna update the weekend before last... and then I got fucking COVID? I busted my ass for 3 years to keep this household COVID-free, and then my 90 year old grandmother goes to fucking CHURCH and gets COVID and gives it to everyone else. I'm not bitter at all.

Anyway, updating in the middle of the week FINALLY because I can focus less on compiling Warframe conspiracy theories and sleeping for 12 hours straight on the couch and more on, you know, actually doing shit I need to get done.

Visas had not been surprised to find herself separated from the others.

The Force, especially its darker side, behaved unexpectedly — but, always, in the way that would be least convenient for all involved.

It was easier for her to see through the mist, though it hid any of her companions. Unsurprising. But it provided her enough of a perspective that she could follow the rough path as it wound through the caves.

Then it parted. Not to the hot Korriban sun but to gray dust, unblackened by fog. To rubble and debris, the feeling of absence. Of being the sole life left on a dead world.

And her Master, looming out of the darkness.

For a moment, instinct and survival struck her, and she dropped to one knee before him. As she remembered where she was, she stood, shaking dirt off the bottom of her robe.

"So quickly you have betrayed me," he said, the whispering barely audible even in the silent cave.

"I have not."

"The echo does not lie dead at your feet, nor you at hers. You have betrayed me."

"I have not," she repeated. "I have found the hope he has denied me. And you are not my Master, merely a trick of the darkness that infests this place."

She walked toward him, measured, her sight locked on the wall behind him.

"As my feet walk from the ashes of Katarr," she breathed. "I shall not fear."

She stepped through the Nihlus-specter, and it disappeared in a puff of fog.

"For in fear lies death…"

She stepped forward again. As if reacting to her rebuff, the energy of the cave pressed down until she nearly collapsed under its weight. It took every ounce of willpower she had to step forward again, then again.

Between determining that Nihlus wasn't there and deciding to act upon that knowledge, Visas thought she stood a chance at fetching the others, even if she could not see them. She knew this would be a new experience for them, except perhaps Trista. As strong in themselves as Atton, Mical, and Mira would be, Visas knew the darkness. She had lived within it for so long that she could meet it with confidence. But now, as it bore down on her, she was no longer as confident.

If she left, perhaps found one of the droids, they wouldn't have the same issue with the energy. T3 would be the more agreeable choice. All she would do by wandering was pose the same liability, the same danger, that they posed to her.

It was with that knowledge that she first stumbled across the warmth of the sun, following it into a light that overwhelmed even her Force sight. A gray, droid-shaped figure revealed that HK-47 had already escaped, but had (unsurprisingly) not ventured inside to locate them.

"Query: Are your fellow meatbags close behind you, or should we abandon them and return to the other meatbags?"

"Stay here," Visas said. "If they exit, tell them I've returned to the ship in search of assistance."

"Statement: Very well, meatbag."

"I do not believe your master would be opposed to you halting any Sith resistance you encounter."

"Agreement: I am already prepared to do so."

Visas responded with a nod and forced herself back down the sloping hill towards the valley, the blistering sun barely chasing the frigid chill of pain still lingering on her.

It would be a long walk.

"Is anyone copying me? Atton? Visas, Mical? Mira?" Trista slapped her comm back onto her belt with a growl of frustration. She must either be deep, or her message hasn't gotten out. If it hadn't, three of them were probably having a great time.

She figured Visas could hold her own, and Atton would have caught on, but the other two… well, she wasn't hopeful. Mical was good, albeit untested, but Mira was completely unprepared.

This time, the mist cleared to a room that felt… real. A pylon-like structure dominated the center, but only caught her attention for a second — because standing in front of it was a diminutive figure, clad in black, an iconic mask covering her face.

"Oh, fantastic," Trista said, motioning at the Revan as she looked up. "This is the best you've got? This is what you're going with?"

She looked back down as another figure had joined Revan's. It was easily herself, in black, the veining of corruption tearing apart her ashen skin until it was barely recognizable.

Dark-Trista lit her lightsaber, loud in the silence. Trista laughed as she ignited her own.

"You underestimate how much I hate myself."

She didn't even wait for the specter to move first — she lifted a massive pile of rubble behind it and dragged it forward, bowling her off her feet. Her lightsaber followed, parried off by the other. She caught it as it rebounded and had it ready in time to block her dark self's first real attack.

Revan crossed her arms by the pillar and watched. That only pissed her off more.

Trista danced away from her parry, bringing her lightsaber up the specter's back before she could turn. The thing turned fast, and she hurried to parry it away from her arm. It slashed across her stomach before she could respond.

It didn't feel physical, but Trista still stumbled backwards, clutching her stomach as pain exploded through her. It felt like she'd expect a full hit from a lightsaber to feel, but it didn't deal the same damage. Just mind-shattering pain.

She looked up, finding the specter grinning.

That was just insulting.

Trista wrapped the Force around her like a shield and reached out, picked the specter up and threw her across the room into the wall. The decorative fresco above her followed next, burying her in a pile of fractured rubble. The joy she experienced at this small victory was quickly quashed as the specter stood up, passing through the rocks.

"Damn it."

Trista parried back the specter's thrown lightsaber, jogging forward to meet her halfway as she charged. She almost complained that the fight was far from fair — after all, the specter didn't seem to experience pain the way she did — but knew that would fall on deaf ears. Not like the Dark Side cared.

This time, she dodged another strike from the specter. A swift kick to a strangely solid leg sent the apparition staggering, and she drove her weapon through its chest. As it fell, she turned back to Revan.

"So, we going to talk? Or…"

She wasn't confident. If the Force knew how her sister fought, which it no doubt did, this would end in a stunning amount of pain. While she'd almost always been able to hold her own against Revan in the Force, lightsaber combat — and using the Force in combat despite favoring Jar'kei — had pushed her sister over the edge.

Part of her was hoping she'd talk first, and let the burning pain in Trista's stomach subside before attacking.

"Why'd you do it, then?" This wasn't Revan, of course, but she figured opting for a dialog might delay the inevitable. "Falling, trying to take over the Republic… it isn't a stretch. But—"

For the first time, Revan responded with a snort of derision from behind the mask.

"Assuming I fell is quite presumptuous."

The voice that emerged was only barely recognizable — she either toned the vocoder down, or the Dark Side had made her voice drop.

"It's the word on the street."

"There are a lot of words on any street," Revan replied. "I'd argue you can believe a quarter of them."

"So? What happened? Or are you just another cheap facsimile?"

Revan cocked her head. "Cheap? When it comes to Revanna Galon-Morace, I know much. She walked deeply in the darkness both before and after."

Trista frowned. "Then where is she?"

"I have little inclination to tell you."

"So, you don't know."

"She crusades against the Nothing, a threat you have not dared to imagine. Too distracted, I am sure, to assist you with what is coming."

"Then she's alive."

"As far as I know. But that could change." The smug way she said that made Trista's hand tighten on her lightsaber. "But that is enough conversation. I wish to see if you have advanced past the memories locked in her shattered mind."

Trista had just choked out "what" before the Revan-specter threw her lightsabers.

Mandalore sat at the top of the Hawk's ramp, going over his blaster with a liberal amount of gun oil. It wasn't the best place, given the occasional driving wind slinging Korriban's dust everywhere, but at least here he knew nothing was getting on board.

"They've been gone a while," he commented without looking up.

The Handmaiden was not as calm as him, pacing at the bottom of the ramp like a caged animal as she stared out into Korriban's empty desert.

"They should have been back hours ago. I'm—"

"Staying here. You heard her, this place is dangerous."

"Like you would know."

Mandalore scoffed. "For the record, this is my third trip to this damn world. I would have told you if you weren't hostile all the time."

She turned back, already ready for a retort, but he held up his hand and stood. The Handmaiden followed the tilt of his helm to the desert ahead, where a lone figure had appeared out of the haze of Korriban's oppressive heat. He tapped the side of his helm, the HUD zooming in before he aimed.

"Where are they?"

The Handmaiden turned back, her staff coming into her hands as Visas stumbled to a stop and collapsed to her knees. Mandalore lowered his gun.

"Mandalore, I need assistance." She didn't even bother with the Handmaiden. Her soft voice was even quieter, almost hoarse. "Vash died moments after we landed here, and we encountered one of the Lords — Sion, not my master. They forced us into a cave when we tried to retreat. I—"

"Catch your breath, Sith." For the first time the Handmaiden didn't sound hostile towards Visas, and she looked warily toward her.

"The cave is flooded with darkness," Visas continued. "I barely escaped it, and I fear they will not." She pointed back toward the Academy. "I left the droid at its exit into the valley, just in case. I thought that perhaps T3 could—"

"And how did you escape?" The Handmaiden's hands tensed on her staff, the slightest flicker of electricity lighting at the ends.

Visas took a moment to breathe again.

"The Force can do nothing worse to me than what has already been done."

Mandalore glanced at the Handmaiden as she shockingly lowered her staff.

"I'll go," he said. Visas hesitated, but nodded and pushed herself back to her feet. "Show me where this thing is."

"I am going too," the Handmaiden interjected, and he held up his hand.

"If she's right, then that means a full-fledged Jedi Master is getting mindfucked in there. If that's the case, you and him—" He jerked his thumb at the Hawk. "—are the last two who should go. I'll manage."

"And just what defenses will you have against the Force?" she bit back in fluent vitriol. Mandalore stepped past her, turned back, and tapped his helm.

"You're gonna have to trust me."

Without waiting for a response, he hefted his gun over his shoulder and strode out across the plains, stopping Visas from following once she'd pointed to a dark spot in the valley's far wall.

Nothing had changed in the past several years — less Sith, and the archaeological sites were covered with dust. But the walls with their tombs still lay silent, and the canyon ahead still echoed with wind. This side was far removed from Dreshdae. For a moment, he wondered if the shitty dive was still open, or if was aging its way back into the desert too.

"Shitty place for a tombworld."

As he reached it, he frowned at the rockfall hblocking passage through the canyon. Fortunately, HK-47 standing near the canyon's entrance, where the blast had revealed a hole leading to the caves beyond, let him know that tearing the entire thing down was unnecessary.

"HK, anyone else get out?"

"Report: Negative — only one meatbag has left this cave."

"The Sith, right? You've got to be more specific."

"Affirmative: That meatbag, yes. You all look the same to a droid."

Mandalore grumbled behind his helm and clapped the droid's shoulder. "Stay out here. I'm going in."

"Resignation: I will wait here for you to not return, meatbag."

He missed whatever else HK-47 said as he ducked into the caves, crouching along until he could stand. Mist swirled inside, eddying around his legs and rising until it covered the glass of his visor. He waved it away.

Years ago either Mandalore the Ultimate or Mandalore the Indomitable, after one too many run-ins with Sith or Jedi, had hardened the mask to the Force. He'd learned that by dropping it onto Anna's head after they'd found it, insisting he had to take it from her for it to count, and it'd stiffened her up like a scruffed cat. Force-dampening, she'd called it — like she'd been suddenly blinded and deafened.

It'd have to do. No way was he sending either the Echani or the off-limits Iridonian into this thing.

Mandalore waved the fog away from his face with a huff. He could hear it whispering at the edge of his hearing, but whatever blocked it from reaching his ears kept him from leaning in, from listening to it. From wanting to hear what it said.

"Jedi!" he called into the fog. It was a risk, if the Sith were hanging around, but he didn't fancy the idea of blundering around. But when he didn't get an answer, he sighed and strode forward.

A few minutes in, his HUD pinged to his left just as it picked up the sound of running steps. He threw out his arm. Atton ran into it, the force of his chest hitting the metal winding him.

"What the f—"

"Exit's that way." Mandalore turned him by the shoulders. "Get out and back to the ship."

He gasped, struggling to catch his breath. "Have you found Trista?"

"I just got here."

"I'm not leaving—"

"Yes, you are, if I have to frog march your ass out." He gave Atton a push toward the exit for emphasis.

"I'm—" Atton's strange protective instinct seemed to lose the fight with his better senses, and he grimaced. "Fine. But I'm waiting, I'm not going—"

Mandalore shrugged. "Fine, sure — just don't come back in."

He gave the pilot another more forceful shove towards the exit and headed in deeper, willing himself to ignore the wispy fog around his feet and drifting across his visor.

It took several minutes before his HUD pinged again, sensing heat in the swirling mists. Otherwise, he would have tripped over Mical as he knelt, otherwise silent, in the middle of a passageway.

"Up you go." He hauled him up by the back of his robes, jerking him out of whatever meditation he was in.

"Whoa — Mandalore?"

"Yeah. Come on."

Mical didn't voice the same protests as Atton as he guided him to the cave exit, one hand gripping onto Mandalore's armored forearm like his life depended on it. At the same place he'd found Atton, Mandalore pushed him forward.

"Straight ahead, and don't stop. Head back to the ship."

"The others—?" Mical asked, still breathless.

"The droid, the Sith, and your pilot are out. I'm headed back for the other two." Mical nodded and staggered forward, and Mandalore headed back in.

It took far longer for his next find. Mira must have taken off running at some point, like Atton had, and found herself deep within the cave. When she finally registered on his thermal she was bent over, panting, against a cave wall.

"Hey." She leaped a foot away, turning back with her gun up and ready. "I'm dragging your asses back to the ship. Take it or leave it."

She squinted and, the second her gun wavered, Mandalore had her hoisted around his shoulders and was headed back toward the exit at a quick jog.

"I can walk—" she protested, the statement laced with a series of Mandalorian invectives.

"If you want out of this fast, you can't," he said. "Only one still missing is Morace."

"Yeah," Mira scoffed. "She's probably fine."

"Doubt it. None of you have been." He reached the last cave to the entrance, where the fog was thinnest, and set her down. "Exit's that way. Head back to the ship."

She straightened her jacket and started towards the sunlight just visible through the mist. "No arguments here."

Mandalore, meanwhile, headed back in with a sigh.

"The things I do for you, you red-headed bitch," he grumbled, only half meaning it.

And quickly, the hunt felt fruitless. After a few minutes, he fiddled with a setting on his HUD on a hunch, having it direct him to where the fog was the thickest. If he knew Jedi — by now he was an expert — that was where she would be. Especially if she was Revan's sister.

He refused to believe that level of reckless stupidity wasn't genetic.

As Mandalore disappeared into the heat-haze of Korriban, the Handmaiden reluctantly held out her hand to Visas. The Miraluka took it, letting her pull her to her feet.

"Why did you abandon them?" the Handmaiden demanded as she helped Visas onto the ramp. "If you could escape, why did you not stay to assist them?"

"Doing so would have only put them in danger, and I cannot have that."

She pushed her back into a wall, holding her in place… barely registering that Visas was gripping her arm to stay upright.

"You only seek to hurt her. You abandoned her to force her to fall, did you not? Answer me!"

Visas studied her for a second. "You echo another's words — and as an echo, it lacks strength. Who has taught you of the Sith?"

The Handmaiden scowled, releasing her. "I will not reveal my mistress, and I will not allow you to harm the Exile before she has fulfilled her purpose."

"I cannot, and will not, harm her." Visas stumbled to the main hold and collapsed at the table. "Her wound lies deeper than any blade could reach, and I could not protect her from this. The energy was overwhelming, even for one who has touched the darkness before."

"I do not believe you."

Visas raised her head. "You do not believe that I would follow her into death? You must have read as much in my movements... as I have in yours." Her second comment was quiet and lacked the judgment the Handmaiden wanted it to have. "There is no shame in your feelings, sister of the Echani."

The Handmaiden recoiled. "You know nothing of what you speak."

"You are alone, and wounded in your own way. I can feel its pulse. But if you will not believe that I mean her no harm, then know this: I wish to learn from her, both what she can and cannot teach. I wish to learn how she walked when her spirit was nothing more than a shell. When she felt as though the Force, as though life itself, had abandoned her."

The Handmaiden sank down into one of the other chairs, glowering, but her resolved chinked. Visas was in pain, that much was for sure — physical and emotional. It had been in her walk as she stumbled back to the Hawk. She hadn't wanted to abandon the others, but she had assessed herself and knew she would only pose a further risk to them.

It was scrutiny that the Handmaiden herself was not good at; a reliance on others that she still lacked. A trust that she still lacked.

"I have a question for you, sister of the Echani," Visas continued. "The Exile… what does she look like?"

The Handmaiden stared down at the table.

"Like a woman, but it is more than that, and I do not have the words," she answered, her voice soft. "She shows kindnesses, both small and great, to strangers, all without hesitation. She accepted me, even though she and my mistress are not allies. She made me doubt the words of my mistress, whom I have pledged to serve… and she gave me answers I had longed for since I knew what longing was."

And then she'd thrown it away, probably, when her doubts became magnified. How had they? She could barely remember.

"Such feelings are not unknown to me," Visas murmured.

"She gave me such doubts," the Handmaiden continued. "Could it be that my mistress had been wrong about her? That perhaps she had not sought to betray the Order? That perhaps my mistress felt as I do, and when she left the Order, found that she doubted it as well? I thought I had resolved so many of these, but—"

Visas simply nodded.

"And... there is something that emanates from her, like a sound from far away that has traveled a vast distance to reach us."

"Like an echo. Your words are well chosen, sister of the Echani." The Handmaiden looked up. "I swear to you, I will not harm her — but it is not me that you should fear." Her head turned, slightly, as if she were looking elsewhere in the ship. "There are darker things in the galaxy than a small, blind one such as I."

They sat in silence for some time, with nothing more than the Hawk's usual underlying idle hum and the beeping of various instruments emanating from the empty cockpit. Eventually, the raging emotion inside her got the best of her, and the Handmaiden moved back to the garage to pace at the top of the ramp.

She shouldn't have thrown away everything simply because of her doubts. Trista had given her everything she'd wanted. She wouldn't have to trust the Sith, at all, but pushing Trista away wasn't the way to protect her. She could not let the Sith get into her head, say what she wanted to hear.

That was how they worked, after all.

"Handmaiden?" The Handmaiden spun back to Bao-Dur in the garage, finishing his post-work ritual of getting grease and oil off his hands. "Is that Visas in the main hold?"

"Yes."

"Wasn't she with—"

"There was a problem. The Mandalorian has left to assist them." A series of uncomfortable emotions shifted across his face, before Bao-Dur replied with an unsettled grunt and tucked the oil-stained cloth back into his belt. "You hate him."

Bao-Dur didn't answer for a moment as he stashed a set of tools beside the workbench.

"Thought that was old news," he answered tersely.

"How are you fine with him assisting them?"

"I did not say I was."

"But you have not gone after him. You have not gone to stop him. Why?"

He shrugged. "Because Trista can handle herself."

Something clattered at the bottom of the ramp, and Bao-Dur's hand fell to his blaster. Mical and Mira appeared, both deathly pale and supporting one another up the ramp, and the Handmaiden stepped back as they reached the inside of the Hawk.

"What happened?" Bao-Dur asked. Mical shook his head as they headed for the medbay, where he started rummaging through the drawers. Mira leaned on the wall, holding her side and panting.

"What happened?"

"Everyone but Trista is out," Mical answered, though he sounded pained. "Atton is waiting back at the cave. I needed to return to prep the medical bay — I tried to get him to return to start the ship, but he refused."

"That cave's bad news," Mira added. "I don't know how Mandalore's getting through it."

Bao-Dur looked around the doorway. "Should I start the ship, then?"

Mical nodded. "We ran into one of the Sith lords in the Academy — Sion, I believe. I imagine that he, and his people, will not be far behind."

Bao-Dur nodded and disappeared, his footsteps retreating to the cockpit. Mical found what he was searching for and motioned, ushering them back to the main hold.

"We should rest and be ready, just in case. We do not know what condition Trista will be in when they return, nor how close our pursuers may be."

Revan's boot stepped onto the dirt by her head, and Trista couldn't even lift it to respond.

"Just do it," she breathed, closing her eyes.

She didn't answer, but the boot didn't move. Trista slit her eyes open to confirm it.

"Would I be that wasteful?"

"Wouldn't you?"

Revan scoffed. "You think so little of me."

Something rustled and, just past the edge of her hearing, she thought she could hear steps off in the ever-embracing fog. But she couldn't be bothered to look. She couldn't be bothered to even move.

When Revan spoke again, it was mere inches from her ear. She could almost feel the breath on the side of her face, stirring hair that had long fallen loose from her braid.

"It isn't the questions you're asking, wound," she whispered. "It's the ones you aren't."

"What?"

When she didn't respond, Trista opened her eyes to a slit again — but Revan was gone, nothing more than shadow in the drifting mist.

"Morace!"

Mandalore's voice boomed through the cave. Trista tried to push herself to her feet, but her elbows gave out and sent her collapsing back to the stone ground.

"Here!"

Her voice was barely a whisper, and she feared he wouldn't hear her. But heavy, booted steps hurried in her direction until a dark mass loomed ahead of her, the shadow blending with the darkness at the edge of her vision until it was all she could see.

If he'd almost tripped over Mical, it was only his thermal vision and having heard her that kept him from breaking a few of her ribs. Trista was curled into a ball on her side and, until his HUD confirmed it, he wasn't sure she was breathing. Mandalore shook her.

"Hey, you good?"

Apart from a quiet moan, she didn't respond. With a sigh, he hefted her around his shoulders.

"I need to stop signing up for these jobs," he grumbled as he let his HUD guide him back through the mist, shoving away the whispers as they threatened, again, to overwhelm him in a last-ditch effort to make him stay. He ignored it, even when it sounded like her voice whispering at the edge of his senses.

Finally, it parted enough for him to see the exit ahead, and he broke into a jog until the whispering was nothing but a memory.

Atton was still lingering outside the cave, eying HK as Mandalore stepped back out. But as soon as his eyes landed on Trista, slung unconscious across Mandalore's shoulders, the droid was almost forgotten.

"Is she okay?"

Mandalore didn't break stride as he headed back down into the valley. "No idea."

"Should we—"

"No time."

He didn't break stride until he was halfway to the ship and the Hawk's guns swiveled toward him. He sidestepped as they opened fire, risking a glance back at the silver-armored Sith troops appearing in the canyon behind them.

"These guys again?" he grumbled, adjusting his hold on Trista. HK pulled out his rifle and one trooper behind them staggered to the ground.

"Calculation: 94 percent."

He fired again as Mandalore backed up onto the ramp, waving Atton behind him.

"Calculation: 94.3."

As he ducked into the Hawk, the last shot exploded a helmet up ahead.

"95."

"Come on, droid."

HK started backing onto the ramp, still firing.

"95.6…"

He was halfway up when the ramp slammed shut. Mandalore looked at Atton, about to bark for him to put them in the air, but he was already gone.

As he headed toward the medical bay the Hawk roared to life under him, taking to the air with a gentle lurch. Mical was there, still ghost-white, but waiting for him.

"How bad?"

"No idea." Mandalore hefted Trista onto the medbay cot. "That's your job. I'll be on the guns."