Chapter 49

Fateful Meetings

Her eyes flickered and then opened, bright light assaulted her eyes forcing her to close them again with a groan, she creaked them open again by just a crack, allowing them to get used to the light so that she could see. A jumble of noises came at her incoherently, making her delicate long ears twitch and her head pound. Instinctively she grabbed a pillow and buried her head under it, quieting the noises by just a fraction until her senses healed themselves.

After a moment her senses of hearing and sight returned and she focused on the noises closest to her hearing which was snoring, gentle snoring. She opened her eyes fully and sat up stark upright in her bed. Grimacing as an aching pain shot through her body. She whimpered and cursed under her breath before looking at the source of the snoring.

Alana Varne, now seventeen years old sat in a chair beside her bed, her head lay on the white sheet, propped up by her arms with long blonde curls spilling over her slender shoulders. Ishta found a smile crossing her face before she subconsciously stroked the young girls, no young woman's strawberry blonde hair. She had never fully trusted humans, but Alana and her master were rare exceptions.

"She has visited you ever since you were allowed visitors" a voice said from the doorway, she looked up from the sleeping human girl and found her heart skip a beat. Gabriel Sabbath leaned against the doorframe, dressed in a simple tunic and pants, his lightsabre hilt ever presently hanging from a black belt around his waist, he smiled warmly before starting to walk into the room "Welcome back Ishta"

"Welcome back" Ishta asked questionably "What happened?"

"You went into a coma for the last six months" Gabriel replied as he slowly walked towards her, his face showing his worry "What do you remember?"

Her pure white eye brows furrowed in concentration as she tried to access her most recent memories and frowned as they came up hazy "We were battling a Chaos raiding force on a fringe world. I tried to sneak up on their leader and…" she suddenly flinched as a flash of near agonising pain and the sounds of shrill screaming, her screaming filled her head. A flashing image of the sorcerer came before her, starring through her as if she were not even there. His eyes seemed lit by a sinister and supernatural fire which made her blood run cold. She wrapped her arms around herself, willing the nightmarish images to go away, she had fought enemies on a dozen planets from the human Imperium to the Orks and even the Necron. But in all her experience nothing prepared her for the raw hate, the raw unnatural and corrupting power that the forces of Chaos could unleash upon a chosen victim.

She gritted her teeth as the images continued on regardless of her attempts to push them away, she continued to try to push the images into a small corner of her mind and lock them away so she would never have to think of them again. All of her training, all of her physical and psychic ordeals that she had to endure to become a warlock of Ulthwe, her near blind following of the warrior path hadn't prepared her. The sorcerer's voice, scratchy and rasping bellowed through her skull, making her head thud with more vigour.

An Eldar amongst us lowly humans, how interesting, and Pathetic!!!

He looked upon her as if she were transparent, but his words were biting, full of hatred and a maniacal glee at watching her suffer. Her forehead, where he had inflicted that wound upon her started to throb painfully. An image flowed through her mind. The sorcerer, suddenly turning away from her and threw her like a rag doll to be impaled upon an exposed steel girder. At that moment she thought she was going to die. But something grabbed her away from that horrible fate.

She suddenly remembered herself being held in a pair of strong arms, her senses falling in and out of reality she softly and weakly called out a name, a name that her subconscious mind had chosen for her.

Gabriel

I'm here Ishta, I'm here

She suddenly found herself being held in a pair of strong arms and opened her tear filled eyes to see Gabriel wrapping her in an embrace that was both protective and compassionate.

"I'm here Ishta" he whispered softly and reassuringly "I'm here"

She could have pushed away. She could have listened to what her entire race had considered the humans for thousands of years and pulled away from him. Instead she found herself accepting his comfort, burrowing her head into his shoulder and letting her tears soak his tunic, a soothingly warm balm of force energy encompassed her and pushed the painful and traumatic memories away, throwing the images of the ruinous battle and the sorcerer who violated her mind into a black abyss, never to bother her again.

As Gabriel eventually put her back to bed and pulled the covers over her she felt him plant a gentle kiss against her forehead, she found herself smiling weakly at his affection. Suddenly the feelings that she had felt every time she had laid eyes on him became far clearer, he cared for her and she felt the same.

"Thank you" she whispered before she drifted off into a gentle sleep, a sleep completely free of nightmares of daemons and death.

Gabriel smiled, and turned to see Alana lounging in her chair, a mischievous grin on her face. Gabriel sighed inwardly and began to worry about the glint that his apprentice had in her eyes.

"Now long have you been awake?"

"Since Ishta ruffled my hair" Alana replied as she jumped off the seat to her feet, that same grin still plastered onto her face.

"Don't grin like that Alana" Gabriel replied with mock annoyance as he walked past her towards the outside corridors, ready to give Ishta the sleep she desperately needed "Your face may become stuck that way"

------

The chamber was fairly dark, illuminated by the dim lights of glow orbs, this was where the small expeditionary force had been assembled, a force that Revan had chosen personally for this mission.

Standing to attention in the middle of the chamber was a line of space marines, their black and silver armour gleaming in the low light of the chamber. This was the elite squad of the Black Fists chapter, the first squad of the first company, the first on the battlefield and the last to leave. They were armed with an array of weapons from their standard bolter and combat knife to chain swords, power-swords and bolt pistols.

Too one side were the cloaked and foreboding figures of four Jedi masters, these four were members of Revans guard. Jedi Knights who had mastered many arts of the force from the mastery of all elements, psychic abilities, meditation techniques and trances, even going as far as mastering immortality itself, each of these four were five hundred years old at least. Mainstay of this small force was three beings in particular, two of which were Sannin and the third was a member of the First.

Revan and Keira, the Grey and the Exile were the two Sannin of the group, both dressed in robes of purest white, they seemed to be a pair of haloed figures in the eerie darkness of the chamber, as compared to the black armoured space marines. The Healer also stood out from the group, wearing a simple skin tight black jumpsuit which did nothing to hide her slim yet ample curves, a cloak of midnight blue draped over her shoulders. Revan couldn't help but smirk slightly within his hood, Twi'leks were always known to be more comfortable in clothes that showed them off and it appears that an immortal like Sasha was no exception. Even the Marines couldn't help but take a quick glance in her direction.

"Gentlemen, ladies" Revan said casually "You have all been briefed about this in detail and know what difficulties may lie ahead, the Emperor of Humanity is expecting the Healer and the healer alone to appear within his central fortress. But for her safety the Master has decreed that we are to be transported along with her. We are not here to start a fight, we are simply here to act as guardians for one of the oldest founders of the force orders, so behave yourselves" he then turned his gaze upon one of the space marines "That includes you Brother Drantiss"

"Sir the last time was an accident"

"Yes destroying an entire outpost was indeed an accident" Revan replied dryly "Just keep your grenades in your satchels and force preserve us if you do use them try not to fire them at a mountain of fuel barrels"

"Yes sir" Drantiss replied, sounding a little disappointed and drawing laughter from the other marines as a result. It was another few hours of silence before the Healer was engulfed in thick blue light, a few moments later the marines and force-psykers were also engulfed by flowing green light and also vanished.

------

It was done, the Master opened his eyes and sighed inwardly, such use of the force had taxed him more than he thought it would, still very weak from his awakening. Besides himself he grinned, but the Dragon had also just awoken, the two of them would be in the same boat, so to speak. If he was going to destroy the Dragon it would have to be now, while he was at his weakest.

Sighing he closed his eyes and released himself to the force, allowing its power to flow through him, rejuvenating his psychic abilities. He then sent his awareness out into the force, seeing a dim chamber made out of a type of mineral that he had not seen before, a metal alloy that glittered in the low light. This alloy covered the floors, the walls, even the ceiling was made of this material. A coffin, made of the same material lay in its centre, at the top of a set of steps, its surface covered in hieroglyphs and ancient runes.

He opened his eyes to find that he was there, in that very chamber that he had seen in his mind. Except that surrounding the coffin this time were four figures cloaked in robes of crimson, the armour that was showing was a gleaming silver and midnight blue. The four individuals turned to him and to the Masters surprise showed that they were half machine, their faces and bodies were covered by a mass of mechanical implants.

"Intruder" one spoke, his voice amplified by the mechanical breath mask covering the bottom half of his face. His robes rustled and then parted, allowing his left arm to reach out with a small hilt, he pressed the rune with his thunb and the grip extended, turning into a long staff. His three compatriots followed suit, activating their long tech-staffs and falling into a fighting stance, slowly approaching his location.

The Master grinned and drew his possessed-sword from its brown sheath, throwing the scabbard aside and experimentally swinging the blade with his hand. He could kill them with a flick of his thoughts, but he wanted to work the kinks from his muscles. As the first Tech-Priest swung his staff the Master swung his sword and both weapons met, the staff shattered against his blade allowing it to continue its swing and tear through his shoulder, cutting straight through like a knife through warm butter.

The sword seemed to sing with delight as he ducked, missing another swing from a staff, he spun while still crouched, jamming the blade of his sword into the second Tech's abdomen and cutting outwards, spurting blood. Bringing himself to his feet he spun again, taking the head off the third Tech with incredible accuracy. But he was still sluggish and the fourth Tech-Priest took full advantage, catching him on the back but failing to penetrate the skin. That's when the Tech noticed that his staff was a few millimetres off his skin, there was some kind of barrier in place. Before he had a chance to examine it further he was suddenly telekinetically thrown across the entire circumference of the chamber, hitting and denting the far metal wall with a bone crunching thud, he then slumped limply to the ground unmoving.

Master raised himself to his feet, the scabbard flying into hid outstretched left hand, he sheathed his possessed sword as he rose and held the scabbard firmly in his right hand. It was only then with the immediately dangers taken care of that he noticed shapes lying across the floor, bodies. Dead bodies of men and women, their forms shrivelled and mummified, to a casual observer it would appear that these people were dead a long time but the Master knew better. These people had their life energies sucked from their bodies, making them age. He had seen the victims of such techniques many times before, but never done to this scale.

Growling at the old and terrible memories he carefully started to step over the victims towards the coffin and eventually lifted himself clean off the ground by two meters and floated over to the top steps at the centre of the chamber. As he landed on the steps he saw the coffin lid slid open, it was then thrown from the casket, its metal surface twisting and bending in midair before it hit the floor.

The figure within floated up out of the coffin, its grey scaly skin partially covered in armour that shined like it was made of liquid metal, the armour was incomplete with patches of exposed flesh here and there. Its face was mostly covered by a helmet with a crown of long bladed spikes protruding from the top. A pair of dragon-like wings shot out of his back, looking like they were two, maybe three times longer than his body if they were fully stretched, the thin membranes of the wings were the same shade of dark grey as its exposed scales and ribbed with thin fingers of bone that extended from the wings front edge, forming a line of several razor sharp talons.

"An impressive display" the Dragon muttered as his feet touched the floor, seemingly creating ripples on its shinning liquid metal surface, his wings fluttered and stretched before wrapping themselves around his body, acting like a natural cape "Defeating four Tech-Priests within the blink of an eye"

"My apologies but if you don't mind can we just get to it" The Master asked as he drew his sword and experimentally swung it around, testing its weight for the millionth time since he had earned it. He had this sword for thousands of years and in all that time it was always the same weight, its blade never dulled and the spirit within never faltered, always there to answer his call when he needed it.

"A pity" a sword seemingly retracting from his outstretched, clawed hands, his hand gripped firmly around the black hilt. The wings spread out like a foreboding shadow blacker than the darkness surrounding them "Perhaps getting rid of one of your power early would be best, it is a shame you would have been a worthwhile ally"

Before the master could respond he was thrown back with such force that when he hit the far wall he blasted straight through the liquid metal and crashed into the wall behind, leaving a deep crater in its thick stone. He groaned and sat up, seeing that he had been blasted into some kind of a storage house, old hulks of tanks and walkers of many different designs lay in columns, many being rusted beyond repair.

He slowly got to his feet, stumbling slightly as he rose to his full height. This Star-god was certainly one to be feared, his power was only a tenth of what it could be yet he didn't even see the strike until it struck him. He grasped the hilt of his sword and walked forward just as the Dragon floated through the recently created hole in the wall.

"You survived?" the Dragon asked mockingly as he once again settled on the ground.

"I manage" the Master replied in a relaxed tone before raising his sword into the air and swung it downwards, as its tip struck the ground a powerful wave of wind blew outward, catching the Dragon and sending him careening back. He blew through the hole and smashed through the opposite ends wall, skidding across the floor of the chamber beyond and crashing into the armoured side of an old tank.

As the long asleep Star-god stood up the Master was right in front of him, surprising the time old Dragon and using the edge of the hilt smacked him in the jaw, sending him flying upwards and crashing through the ceiling. The Master fell into a crouch and jumped up, following his opponent up the several floors he had just threw him through.

------

When the Healer opened her eyes she found herself in a cavernous chamber made out of grey stone with a great many tapestries imprinted on the walls and statues standing to the sides. As she gazed at the spectacle in wonder she heard the whirring of mechanical joints and turned in time to see a massive humanoid machine towering over her by dozens of meters, impressive beam cannons were attached to its arms with a duo of anti-infantry heavy bolter turrets attached to the shoulders. It looked down upon her, making the twenty five thousand year old immortal feel like a bug waiting to be squashed.

She stepped back and flinched as a great light escaped the Titan's eyes and engulfed her, sensors she realised. As soon as the light passed her by it died away, she looked up, expecting the monstrous war machine to level its great cannons at her and tear her to shreds.

"Sasha!"

She turned to the voice in time to see a mass of figures surround her, snap-hisses and the chambering of bolter shells told her that it was her guard of Jedi and Space Marines. Revan was in front of her, his stance that of quick attack with his lightsabre held firmly in his hands.

"Are you alright milady?"

"Yes Revan I am fine"

"Good" Revan replied, not taking his eyes of the gold armoured machine standing before them. He cursed under his breath "I should have expected a Titan to be here"

A great, ground shaking rhythmic boom brought their attention to the other side of the chamber, another gold armoured Titan had arrived at the scene, its armour gleaming in the light of the chamber. The sounds of multiple footsteps and the clanking of armour brought their attention to the sides of the chamber where lines of armoured warriors were appearing, power-swords and bolters held in their hands, they stopped in two lines and chambered bolter rounds into their weapons, raising them at the visitors, ready to mow them down when the order was given.

A Titan in front, another behind and the Emperors Custodians to their left and right, they were surrounded and if it came down to a fight they would be slaughtered in a second. To his relief the Custodes suddenly lowered their weapons and the front Titan turned his back to them to open the great kilometre high set of double doors behind him.

"The xeno woman goes in alone" one of the Custodes said gruffly, disgust in his tone as he spoke, the design of his armour and the power-sword he held in his hands telling Revan that he was a Brother-Captain "The rest of you will remain here!"

Revan felt like mustering some type of retort, knowing that the Custodes would shoot her down on sight in any other situation. Before he could however a hand gently grasped his shoulder and gave it a squeeze, it was Sasha and as Revan turned to look at her he saw her head shake in a negative

No foolish actions Revan she sent to him, her voice soft yet firm in his mind.

Before Revan could retort she started walking out of the line around her towards the recently opened door. Revan watched her go, eyeing the Custodes and Titans for any dangerous signs, to his relief there were none and he let out a breath as she walked through the great doors, which closed behind her with a bang.

------

As the great grey stone doors creaked shut behind her she could see nothing but pure darkness, then floodlights came to life, illuminating the entire chamber in a near blinding light. Her eyes hurt from the sudden change in light but she quickly adapted to the change.

Welcome to Terra daughter of the Force

A voice boomed in her mind, making her wince slightly at the power that resonated from it. The chamber was dominated by a bulbous machine made out of pure gold with a mass of cables and tubes attached to it, pumping liquids, bacta she realised into it. Within this life-supporting machine she sensed was the being that had called out to her, one of the most powerful men in the galaxy, the Emperor of Man.

"Thank you my lord" she replied with a deep bow "It is an honour to stand in the presence of such an ancient and wise being"

The emperor nodded psychically, his consciousness seemed to descend upon her own mind like a blanket, making her skin tingle and her mind relax with his mighty and benevolent presence. Not even the Master, oldest, wisest and strongest of the First could compare to the power that resonated from this man like water flowing down a stream. She felt truly humbled to be in his presence, this man was to be respected but that did not mean that she would blindly submit to his wishes.

"You have called me here for a reason my lord" she said, rising to her full height proudly.

Healer he began. Ten thousand years ago when the Great Crusade was bringing the empire of men back from the brink of annihilation we came upon a planet, a world that was once a colony under the control of a race of alien beings possessed by the forces of Chaos. We freed the world from their oppression and upon searching through their archives we came across an ancient text that was not of their language or culture. It was presented before me by Primarch Sanguineous of the Blood Angels who felt that it was too precious to burn.

"What was within this text my lord" Sasha asked as she sat cross-legged on the cool grey stone floor, listening attentively to the Emperors story.

This text spoke of a place in a galaxy far, far away when man was still young and barely took to the space ways in our own galaxy. It spoke of an order of beings who could manipulate the elements around them to their will, of an energy field that they called the force. This text described the Immortals who had brought this order into being and the struggle they endured in holding it together he paused for a moment and Sasha found herself leaning forward slightly, too interested now to caste it aside, if what he was saying was true then there was a surviving document on the founding of the Jedi Order. It went on to speak of a fierce war that was fought between themselves and a force of evil intergalactic invaders known as Chaos. This war ripped through their home planet and by the time it was finished the Immortals known as the First were all either dead or imprisoned.

Sasha nodded, she remembered that time all to well, and it would be forever burned into her memory. Too many of her friends, her pupils, her children, her family had perished in that war. She remembered the faces of the fallen and felt a tear fall down her check but quickly pushed it away, cursing her sudden showing of weakness.

I offer you this ancient record for the Jedi of the present the emperor continued. And the promise that as long as I rule the Imperium the peoples of your home galaxy will not be invaded, your home is in enough turmoil as it is without Crusade fleets spilling from the Terran wormhole.

"And in return you wish me to heal your wounds" she replied curtly and smiled, the movement seemed incredibly graceful "My friends are not to be harmed"

Of course the Emperor replied, his tone making it sound like it would not be done any other way.

"When would you like to begin?"

When you are ready too

Thanks for waiting everyone. A lot of people are wondering when I'll bring the Yuuzhan Vong back into the story and the answer is quite a while yet. Once I finish the Chaos Wars and Revival story arcs. Changing the subject how was the beginning with Gabriel and Ishta?