A little over half an hour after they all established their bonds with each other, and they had discussed the plan that they would execute upon arrival in the Korriban system, Jacen, Tahiri, Nelani, and Tekli all headed to the Solo Quest's cockpit. There, Jacen seated himself in the pilot seat, Tahiri in the copilot seat, Tekli in the navigator's chair, and Nelani in the spare chair behind Jacen as the latter began inputting the hyperspace coordinates for Korriban.
After that, Jacen had the Quest soaring off. Two hours later, they arrived in the Korriban system with no sight of the combined Jedi-GA fleet.
And then all four Jedi felt an incoming danger from the barren, dark world ahead; from one of the Sith who inhabited this desolate planet.
The Sith attack came in the form of trying to teleport the Solo Quest and her four occupants toward Korriban's sun. Immediately recognizing it as a technique of the Aing-Tii, Jacen just as quickly countered it while his ship, his fellow Jedi, and himself were in transit toward the nearby star by teleporting the Quest right to the source of the attack.
He managed to do it within the half-second that the teleportation technique would have needed to transport his vessel toward the sun; in teleportation transit, time slowed down to the point where half a second was five seconds. And that was all the time Jacen needed to counter this attack.
When Jacen and the others next materialized, they found that the Quest was now flying all throughout a dimly-lit underground laboratory. Looking through the forward viewport, Jacen saw that his ship was uncontrollably plowing through rows of lab benches and other equipment as beings of different species - Jacen figured them to all be Sith - rushed out of the way.
Not knowing what else to do, Jacen erected a Force-shield to protect the Quest from its imminent impact with the wall up ahead; at the speed that his ship was going, there was no way he could have slowed her down in time.
The Force-shield resulted in the Quest nevertheless plowing right through the wall anyway, but without any significant damage that her energy shields couldn't handle. The ship continued to plow through layers of durasteel and concrete, slowing down in the process, before coming to a stop.
Silence permeated the air in the Quest's cockpit as Jacen and the others sat frozen in their seats from what they just experienced. When they recovered mentally, Tahiri looked at the Quest's stats to find that the damage that the ship went through had all but destroyed her engines.
Before Tahiri could tell Jacen anything, the latter's eyes widened as his danger sense spiked again; one of the Sith were going to try to use the Aing-Tii teleportation method on himself and his fellow Jedi again. But recognizing it for what it was, he erected another Force-shield around the Quest that was designed to redirect the teleportation-user's intention right back at him or her.
Half a second later, he sensed a presence - imbued with inner darkness - wink out of existence in the proximity of Korriban's sun.
When that was done, Tahiri found herself able to say something.
"Jacen?"
"Yeah?"
"How are we going to get outta here?"
"Hopefully, this'll work," Jacen replied.
Then he widened his arms to either side of him and heaved outward with the Force, blowing back the durasteel and concrete away to create a sizable tunnel that Jacen and the others could leave the ship through.
From there, the Quest had enough room for Jacen to extend the landing ramp. Without needing to tell her anything, he and his fellow Jedi unbuckled themselves from their harnesses and headed out to the ship's rear, their lightsabers drawn but not active.
After they jumped out of the hole in the wall that the Quest had created, the four Jedi found themselves faced by what seemed to be dozens of Sith in the now-wrecked laboratory. In the center of the group, Jacen saw Garis standing next to who Jacen assumed to be the leader of these Sith.
And Jacen found it particularly interesting that the leader was coated from head to toe in vonduun crab armor; the very same armor used by the Yuuzhan Vong. Also, Jacen could sense that he was the one who used the Aing-Tii teleportation technique to try to send the Quest to Korriban's sun.
"Welcome, Jacen Solo," the Sith leader announced. "I am Darth Krayt, ruler of the One Sith. And I must say, you are quite formidable; countering those Aing-Tii teleportation attacks was as brilliant as your actions were quickly executed. Which, of course, leads me to execute you the old-fashioned way."
Darth Krayt then ignited the red-bladed lightsaber that he had in hand and rushed up toward Jacen.
But before he was halfway toward him, Krayt abruptly halted in his charge and froze. His lightsaber then dropped from his hand, deactivated, and then he fell to his hands and knees as he began groaning in pain.
Garis and the other Sith behind Krayt looked at their pained ruler in silent distress.
"What I'm doing to you right now, Krayt," Jacen said, "is using my Yuuzhan Vongsense and manipulating that vonduun crab armor that you're in. Specifically, I'm having it kill you by allowing it to spread to your insides and extremities. I can, however, spare you right now if you agree to surrender yourself and the entirety of the One Sith to the Jedi Order."
Krayt's agonized groan turned into a hateful growl. "Never."
A second later, one of the One Sith - a male Chiss - in the crowd was suddenly teleported away. Everyone in the room felt his existence wink out somewhere in the vacuum of the Korriban system's space.
"Don't any of you think that just because I'm not using the Force right now that my fellow Jedi and I are vulnerable to an Aing-Tii teleportation attack," Jacen said. "Because she's defending the both of us from it." He cocked his head over at Nelani.
Anyone looking at Nelani's face right then could see that her expression was contorted in the determination of making sure that anymore potential attacks could be easily countered. Tahiri and Tekli's expressions were similarly determined.
"Perhaps... you can... fend off... the attack... of one Sith..." Krayt rasped. "But... you cannot... fend off... the One Sith."
Jacen had already switched from his Vongsense to his Force abilities before Krayt had finished speaking; against any one of these individuals, Nelani and the others may be able to defend themselves and Jacen, even with their relatively limited training. But against the combined forces, he knew that he had to resort to a different method.
And that method was a White Current illusion.
Before any of the Sith - with the obvious exception of Krayt, who continued to heave in pain even after Jacen stopped the manipulation of his crab armor - had a chance to combine their use of the Aing-Tii teleportation method, they all began to scream, flail, and run about in panicked fear.
They all began to see demons and monsters that even after all their Sith training, their minds couldn't begin to fathom the horror of it all.
Seconds after the pandemic began, the Sith began to activate their lightsabers and slash at the non-existent terrors around them. In the process, they began to cut each other down.
"Now's your chance!" Jacen said to Nelani and Tekli. "Go and find Jaina and Jag!"
The two Jedi then rushed ahead in the onslaught of panicking Sith, where they activated their lightsabers and began cutting several more down before they had a chance to kill any of their brethren. Soon, both women reached one of the turbolifts, where Nelani pressed the button that went up; she and Tekli felt a void in the Force in the Sith Temple distinct from Darth Krayt's Yuuzhan Vong vonduun crab armor. Knowing where that void was, they guessed that it was no doubt caused by ysalamiri.
Ten seconds after Nelani pressed the up button, the door opened, and both Jedi rushed inside, where Tekli pressed the button that led to Subbasement 2, which was just above them. The doors closed, and the turbolift then rocketed them to the next level.
Meanwhile, as Jacen continued to have the One Sith in the lab kill each other with the White Current illusions, only one of the Sith was able to reach out to the White Current and use it to clear away the illusions: Garis.
He looked out to the carnage around him and growled in anger as he looked at Jacen and Tahiri, who now took notice of him and his sobriety.
Knowing that one of the first things that he'd do would be to warn his fellow surviving Sith about the illusions, Jacen sent a current of Electric Judgement for his former apprentice. In response, Garis had his new crimson-bladed lightsaber out, active, and deflecting the volley of electricity through his blade.
But it was enough to act as a distraction as Tahiri unhooked her lightsaber from her belt, activated it, and then leaped into the air to come down on Garis.
Seeing that his rape victim was coming for him, Garis pivoted out of the way of Jacen's electric volley, prompting the Jedi Master to cease his attack lest he strike Tahiri upon her landing.
When she did land and her blade struck the floor, she immediately spun around and blocked off Garis's attack. From there, their duel began as Tahiri adopted Form V - Djem So - to defend herself from Garis's attacks while the latter adopted Form II - Makashi - as he searched to find an opening to strike his opponent down. During their proceeding duel, they continued to dodge the wild attacks of the mad Sith around them that continued to cut each other down because of the non-existent terrors around them.
Meanwhile, as Jacen continued to direct the White Current illusion to the surviving Sith around him, he forgot about Darth Krayt, and barely managed to react in time as the armored Sith Lord rushed toward him, his red-bladed lightsaber Force-called back into his hand and blazing for Jacen's heart.
Having to quickly drop the Fallanassi illusion, Jacen pivoted out of the way of Krayt's impaling strike and ignited his green-bladed lightsaber to block off his opponent's next attack. The two then began their own duel as Jacen adopted Form III - Soresu - to protect himself just as Tahiri was against Garis, while Krayt directed his energy into Form I - Shii-Cho - to try to strike down Jacen's own lightsaber before killing the Jedi himself.
However, as soon as Jacen and Krayt's duel began, the surviving One Sith in the lab who weren't in agony over lost limbs or severe lightsaber injuries - which totaled up to about fifteen, not including Garis - ceased their frantic slashes and saw the scene for what it really was.
"Attack the Jedi!" a male Chagrian cried out to his fellows. "They must pay for the deaths of our brethren!"
Upon hearing that proclamation, Nelani immediately disengaged from her duel with Garis, executed three back-flips to get away from him, and launched a Force-wave that blew him back across the lab. He knocked over to of his fellow Sith while seven others rushed towards her. Meanwhile, the rest, including the Chagrian who voiced the proclamation to kill Jacen and Nelani, rushed to aid Krayt against his opponent.
Above the duel in the lab, Nelani and Tekli broadcasted more White Current illusions against the few Sith they encountered down the corridor they proceeded. Taking advantage of the non-existent horrors that plagued the Sith's minds, Nelani and Tekli promptly struck them down, all while going from cell to Force-repressed cell looking for Jaina and Jag.
Eventually, halfway down the corridor, Nelani and Tekli found the two Fels standing up and looking at the two Jedi in expectation; they had no doubt heard the terror-filled screams from the corridor outside.
"Come on!" Tekli said as she waved her friend and her husband from the cell. "We need to help Jacen and Tahiri fight the Sith down below!"
Not needing anymore convincing, the Fels joined the two Jedi as they made their way back to the turbolift that would take them back to the lab one level below.
"Oh, and here," Tekli said as she deactivated her own lightsaber and hooked it back to her belt. She then pulled out a lightsaber and a hand blaster from within her robes and tossed them over to Jaina and Jag respectively as they all continued to run for the turbolift ahead.
As Tekli then unhooked and reactivated her own lightsaber, Jaina activated the one that she was given, which emitted the familiar purple glow. She grinned, knowing through their twin bond that Jacen had some spare lightsabers aboard the Solo Quest just in case she ever happened to lose hers for any reason.
And here I thought he was the foolish one for thinking about something like this, Jaina thought to herself.
Back in the lab, Tahiri, thinking quickly, used the Force to gather up the ruined lab equipment around her and launched them at her potential Sith opponents. She managed to knock three of them down - two of whom died from severe impacts to the head, the other simply unconscious - while the rest managed to slash through and dodge the incoming projectiles.
Readying herself with her blade, Tahiri was ready to die fighting four Sith at one time.
Meanwhile, noticing the incoming Sith at the periphery of his vision in the midst of fighting Krayt, Jacen similarly disengaged himself from his opponent and leaped through the air. Krayt and the One Sith who came to his aid followed suit, only to be met by a volley of Electric Judgement from Jacen that none of the Sith, not even Krayt, had the time to counter or evade, sending them tumbling back for the hard laboratory floor below.
But when they recovered, they found that Jacen was nowhere to be seen. At the same time, Tahiri's Sith pursuers suddenly found themselves rushing at wind just as their Jedi quarry disappeared into thin air. They stopped in confusion as they stared at the spot that Tahiri stood on, ready to die fighting.
As Krayt and the sixteen other Sith in the room began wondering where the two Jedi could have gone, one of the Sith in Krayt's ensemble - a brown-haired female Wookiee - was suddenly impaled through the chest by what looked like a lightsaber wound, but without a lightsaber. Simultaneously, the four Sith that were about to engage Tahiri all had their heads sliced clean off with cauterizing wounds, as if it had been done in one sweep of a lightsaber.
"Solo is using another White Current illusion!" the same Chagrian - Darth Wyyrlok - announced to his fellow Sith. "We must break out of-"
But before he could utter another word, he was bisected from head to crotch by an invisible lightsaber slash. Elsewhere, where Tahiri would be, a male Jenet Sith was slashed diagonally across the chest and fell to the floor dead. But Garis, who was beside the Jenet, blocked off the next invisible strike, for the lightsaber attack was no longer invisible to him; he had broken out of the White Current illusion as he had before, and Tahiri was clear to the eye to him as she was before.
And right then, the nine other remaining Sith managed to use what Garis taught them and broke out of the illusion that Jacen was casting. However, Jacen was still able to impale a female green-skinned Twi'lek through her head before he had to to face Krayt and his remaining party.
Once again, Jacen leaped back and ended up back-to-back with Tahiri, who executed her own retreating leap from Garis and his assisting Sith. The two of them adopted their defensive poses again as the surviving Sith rushed toward them.
"Anymore bright ideas?" Tahiri asked.
"Just one," Jacen said. "Get down!"
Tahiri dropped flat to her stomach without hesitation as Jacen executed a ballerina-like spin and flung droplets of sweat toward his and Tahiri's incoming opponents. Krayt, Garis, and four other Sith - two on Jacen's side, and two on Tahiri's side - managed to dodge the sweat, but those who didn't immediately fell prey to the lethal toxins that quickly secreted in their bloodstreams. The remaining Sith continued their charge for the two Jedi.
"Now what?" Tahiri asked.
Before Jacen could think of anything to say, the turbolift that Nelani and Tekli took opened, and the two female Jedi, along with Jaina and Jag, came rushing out.
Grinning at the prospect at backup, Jacen engaged Krayt again in combat while Jaina, Nelani, and Tekli all managed to engage the remaining Sith. Tahiri, naturally, resumed her revenge-driven duel against Garis. Jag, for his part, decided to aid his wife in trying to shoot down her opponents, confident that he wouldn't hit her. Sure enough, one of his shots was able to down one of the Sith.
A minute into the duel, the Jedi were all able to cut down their Sith opponents, leaving Jacen with the aid of Jaina and Tekli against Darth Krayt while Nelani went to aid Tahiri in trying to defeat Garis. After a few shots against the nearly-indestructible crab armor, Jag decided to keep out of trying to shoot Darth Krayt and instead switched to trying to shoot down Garis, knowing, like before, that Tahiri and Nelani would be able to deflect any shots that he incidentally fired upon them.
But before either of the two remaining Sith in the lab could be killed, all of the turbolift doors to the lab opened, and dozens of Sith arrived, sequentially unhooking and activating their lightsabers as they surrounded the Jedi and Jag to aid Krayt and Garis.
Understandably, the Jedi, and Jag, disengaged from their efforts against Krayt and Garis and fell into a tight circle in the center of the lab, their expressions determined and weapons held up in defense.
Krayt grinned wickedly at Jacen. "Now you're finished... Jedi."
But before the horde of Sith could attack the five Jedi and Jag, every Force-sensitive in the room, Jedi and Sith alike, felt the arrival of so many more Jedi and the non-Force-sensitive presences of a fleet of Galactic Alliance military personnel drop out of hyperspace into the Korriban system.
"Jag, almost the entire Jedi Order and a fleet of the GA military is here!" Jaina told her husband.
As Jacen expected, Krayt merely smirked. "This isn't a problem," Krayt declared.
All the members of the One Sith, with the exception of Krayt who had already used the Aing-Tii teleportation trick on the Solo Quest, focused their efforts on sending all of the Jedi and various GA military personnel into space.
Knowing that he and his fellow Jedi and Jag wouldn't be able to stop them all, Jacen, Tahiri, Nelani, and Tekli all erected a Force-shield toward the Jedi-GA fleet to stop at least some of the Sith attacks and redirect them at their users as before.
But then Jacen felt the defense that he, Nelani, Tahiri, and Tekli had erected suddenly increase; and Jacen knew that that was because Luke, knowing that the One Sith might have been preparing for a special attack even if he didn't know what exactly it might be, had all of the Jedi in a battle-meld accept Jacen and his fellow Jedi's defense.
Luke knew of this not only from his experience from expecting the unexpected from Sith, but also because he knew that having Garis in their midst would have given these Sith formidable powers... such as the Aing-Tii teleportation method.
As Jacen deduced how his uncle could have found out about this, he also felt Jaina joining the battle-meld and lending her own strength to it.
Feeling what was happening, Krayt widened his eyes in shock and sent a Force-call to all of his fellow Sith that he replicated with his own voice throughout the lab. "Stop!"
And although most of the One Sith in the Korriban system heeded their Master's orders, some didn't. Hence, those who didn't were transported from where they were to the vacuum of the Korriban system's space, where they died almost instantly.
Amidst the special feeling that he was experiencing from such unity with all the Jedi in the Korriban system, Jacen grinned at the fuming Darth Krayt.
"Looks like that's not gonna work," the Jedi Master gloated. "And I think you may wanna save your energy on a White Current illusion; I'm pretty sure Uncle Luke prepared for that, too."
Krayt growled angrily. "Then, once again, we'll have to do this the old-fashioned way."
Jacen then felt, through the Force, Krayt sending a direct command that sent various Sith throughout the Korriban Temple, which included many Sith down in the lab, to rush out of the Temple toward its hangar bay for the starfighters there.
But once the Sith whom Krayt sent out of the lab were gone, that still left Jacen and the others a few dozen Sith to contend with.
It was Krayt's turn to grin now. "You will still die now."
"Well, not now," Nelani said wryly.
And just like that, she sent herself, Jacen, Tahiri, Tekli, Jaina, and Jag out of the lab via Aing-Tii teleportation method to the surface of Korriban. There, they had ended up about a klick or so away from the Sith Temple.
And up here, they watched as what seemed to be hundreds of starfighters launched from the Temple to the skies of Korriban, where StealthXs and GA starfighters were already zooming through the atmosphere to contend with their Sith opponents.
In only a matter of moments, each side fired a volley of projectiles that resulted in a series of explosions that signified the battle between the Jedi Order and the One Sith.
Jacen, Tahiri, Nelani, Tekli, Jaina, and Jag could only watch the battle above them for a few moments before the Sith who had just surrounded them, which also included Krayt, suddenly appeared to surround them again.
"Did you think that you could escape us so easily?" Krayt asked with a laugh.
"Not really," Nelani spoke up as she did before. "Only difference is, we now have air support."
The next thing they all knew, the One Sith surrounding the five Jedi and Jag were suddenly peppered by laserfire from three StealthXs that swooped low from the battle above. Many One Sith bodies were rendered into superheated chunks of meat while the survivors, which included Krayt and Garis, scrambled to relative safety.
After the three StealthXs made their pass, Krayt looked up and Force-leaped toward the central Jedi starfighter. He landed in a feline-like crouch on the closed canopy just as the central StealthX turned around for another pass with its wingmates. In the process, the Sith Master anchored himself so that he wouldn't be blown off from the ship's exterior quite so easily.
Krayt raised his lightsaber to plunge its blade through the canopy only for it to open on him, prompting the Sith Master to leap up again and block a strike from the green-bladed lightsaber of Luke Skywalker.
The elderly Jedi Master, who had just leaped out from the StealthX that Krayt had landed on, had his ship slaved to autopilot so that it could land on the ground elsewhere. In the meantime, he traded lightsaber strikes against Krayt as they tumbled to the ground in a Force-controlled descent.
Nothing changed in their duel once they landed; they simply continued to duel without exchanging a word.
Around the leaders of the Jedi Order and the One Sith, however, things were changing; various One Sith members and Jedi Masters and Knights alike leaped from their starfighters with their lightsabers ablaze and began to duel each other to support their Masters and comrades on the ground.
And in a matter of minutes, all of the Jedi Masters and all of the Jedi Knights were on an expanded battlefield amidst the wastes of Korriban. The One Sith who weren't on the ground continued to battle the Galactic Alliance forces up in the air and throughout the Korriban system; and even more One Sith came to the system just as a fleet of Imperial Remnant Star Destroyers also entered the system.
Having been healed from the debris blow to the head, Saba Sebatyne was back in action as she combined her lightsaber and Force training with her natural reptilian agility to not only cut down Sith, but also to use her immense strength, reflexes, and tail to bring down Sith and, as she would put it, render them "forever harmless." As her fight went on against the opponents that she was practically downing like flies, her enthusiasm was heightened, for she began to shout for joy in the heat of battle. Next to her, Kenth Hamner's efficient yet brutal fighting style looked tame in comparison, but for the fewer Sith he did kill, he was still a force to be reckoned with by the Sith.
Corran Horn interchanged the length of his blade from purple to silver at intervening moments to throw off his Sith opponents and cut them down. Meanwhile, Kyp Durron and Octa Ramis used their aggressive fighting styles to take down their own enemies in a more restrained but no less effective fashion than Saba's method. Tresina Lobi, one of the least violent Jedi Masters in the Council, was still nevertheless as deadly as she was kind, and her wild yet simultaneously controlled attacks made her no less of a threat than her fellow Masters to the Sith around her.
And Kyle Katarn, Luke Skywalker, Mara Jade Skywalker, and Jacen Solo were among the deadliest Jedi Masters, for Jacen, Mara, and Kyle seemed to kill Sith around them by the half-dozen at a time with their skills. Luke, meanwhile, though he didn't kill any of the One Sith around him, showed himself to be the deadliest as he held his own against Darth Krayt.
The present Jedi Knights, which included all of the survivors from the Mission to Myrkr (except for Raynar Thul and Tenel Ka Djo), managed to hold up their to the Sith around them. And for every one Knight who died at the feet of a One Sith member, three more One Sith would die at the hands of either one of the Masters or a Knight.
As one another Jedi in a sea of her brethren fighting a sea of Sith, Nelani managed to cut the legs of a female Bith Sith and quickly ended the poor being's agony by decapitating her bulbous head once she was on the ground. But the second that was done, she looked and saw Tahiri still dueling off against Garis; and she saw that even though Garis was still using his own anger and hatred to try to kill Tahiri, the latter was still fighting just as hard to try to murder him for what he had done to her back in Csilla.
While Nelani had no love for Garis, she didn't want Tahiri to do something that could be potentially self-destructive in the long-run. So she then rushed ahead toward the fight between Tahiri and Garis, where she began aiding her fellow Jedi against their Sith counterpart, hoping to kill him before Tahiri got the chance; amidst this battle, simply getting Tahiri out of the way would have been a bad idea, Nelani thought.
Soon, Nelani joined Tahiri in dueling Garis, and in a quarter of a minute, the two female Jedi began backing the male Sith across the battlefield, gradually overpowering him with their graceful yet unrelenting strikes against Garis's angry yet vicious defense.
But instead of allowing her anger to take hold of her in the battle, Tahiri felt Nelani reaching out to her through the Force.
Tahiri, please, Nelani communed. Don't kill him in anger. If you have to, do it for the good of the galaxy. Look into your heart, and feel what you know is right.
And it was then that Tahiri, in lieu of disregarding what Nelani had to tell her, looked into Garis's eyes and realized that she could very well be as evil as he could be; and the thought sickened her.
From that, she resolved not to kill him for what he did to her, but instead, if she had to end his life, it would be because she would have had no other choice.
After a minute of dueling Garis with Nelani at her side, in which his attempts at defending himself became more and more difficult as Tahiri and Nelani fell into more calm, the former managed to catch Garis off-guard and struck the top of his pommel, slicing it off and extinguishing his red blade.
And Garis instinctively raised his hands in surrender just as Tahiri rose her blue blade near his throat. Nelani, meanwhile, raised her own blade near Garis's chest.
The triumphant grin that Tahiri gave to Garis was a bigger blow to him than her striking him down in her hatred could have been.
And it was what prompted Garis to unleash a volley of blue lightning from each hand to Tahiri and Nelani. In response, the two Jedi raised their blades and channeled the deadly energy through their blades to dissipate the lightning into nothingness.
But Garis's volley was soon ended when a green lightsaber blade pierced him from behind. He seized up as his volley of lightning stopped, and when the blade was pulled out, he collapsed first to his knees before dropping to the sandy ground dead.
And in his stead, Jacen stood there, having finally put an end to one of his greatest mistakes with more regret than victory in his expression.
However, there was no time to lament; Jacen only exchanged a nod with Tahiri and Nelani before they turned to engage more One Sith.
Meanwhile, where Jacen, Tahiri, and Nelani managed to overpower Garis together, Luke wasn't receiving any of that kind of help in his fight against Darth Krayt. The hulking monster before him was managing to overwhelm him in their duel, which had been going on for a few minutes at this point; inwardly, Luke was summoning all the strength he had in the Force in countering the vortex of darkness that was beating him, but for all of that power and all of that skill, he was still being beaten back by this beast.
He could sense that his opponent was an old being; he had lived for far longer than Luke had, and was probably as old as Obi-Wan Kenobi might be if Luke's first Master were still alive. But where an age range such as that would be crippling even to a human, which Luke sensed that this Sith was beneath that Yuuzhan Vong armor, it seemed to give him even more power, as if it were the reason that he had so much at his personal disposal.
"You are an elderly fool, Skywalker," the Sith said in between slashes. "Where age makes me, Darth Krayt, ruler of the One Sith, strong, you fall prey to it as weakness. It will be your undoing, for your time has come, and you know that you feel it, just as I do."
As much as Luke wanted to dismiss Darth Krayt's comments as nothing more than a feeble attempt to lower his inner guards, he knew it to be truth; he could feel it in his being, as Obi-Wan and Yoda must have felt it by the ends of their lives. He could no more deny it than when Darth Vader told him that he was Luke's father all those years ago; his generation of heroes had come, and though they were still here, fighting against an implacable enemy as they had always done, it was clear that that generation was all but gone in the face of the burgeoning new generation; a new generation heralded by Jacen and his support of the Unifying Force.
But Luke and his fellow old heroes could still fight on; and Luke would do just that, for as long as he had breath in his being, he vowed never to let evil win.
So he fought on, with all the energy, skill, and power that he could muster, interchanging defensive and offensive strikes at various intervals, depending on where there were openings in Krayt's respective defenses and attacks.
But then, just as Luke thought that he would never get any help in the duel, Mara, having just cut down a female Togorian Sith to meaty pieces, jumped away and rocketed for Krayt. But the large Sith managed to quickly find an opening in Luke's defenses and kicked him several meters away. And right before Luke landed, Krayt reached into the air with his free hand to grab Mara's midair form through the Force and then shot a volley of blue lightning that rendered her unconscious before he threw her form down to the ground nearby.
"Mara!" Luke cried out.
He then looked back over to Krayt, leaped up, and charged the Sith with wild, uncontrolled slashes that were unbecoming of a Jedi Master.
And that was what led to his fall as Krayt took advantage of his opponent's wild distraction in so viciously attacking him; he pivoted past Luke's guard and impaled the Jedi Master right through the chest.
The moment that happened, the battle ceased entirely; even above, the non-Force-sensitive GA and Imperial Remnant forces halted, none of them knowing exactly why, and the survivors on the ground that weren't unconscious looked from where they were at the sight of Darth Krayt having skewered Luke Skywalker on his crimson blade. Utter silence fell over the damaged, corpse-ridden laboratory.
"Nnnnn-oooooo!" Jacen cried out.
His nephew's scream was barely heard by Luke; he simply looked up into Darth Krayt's smirking form.
"Your Order will die with you," Krayt whispered.
With that, he pulled the red blade out and let Luke collapse to the ground on his back.
Krayt then looked over to the only person in the battlefield who broke the silence: a crying Jacen Solo, tears streaming down his face.
"Come and get me, Jedi," Krayt taunted Jacen.
Jacen didn't say anything; he didn't even move. All he did was just shut himself off from the Force and began using his Vongsense to continue letting the vonduun crab armor kill Krayt.
But the Sith Lord was ready; having learned what the young Jedi Master could do to him, he took Jacen's control of the armor and used it to his advantage to begin ridding himself of it. Through the use of an ancient method from the dark side of the Force that he learned decades before, Krayt slowly shed himself of the cumbersome armor, much to the fascination of Jedi and Sith alike in the room. Only Jacen remained unfazed by Krayt's transformation out of his armor.
Then, when Krayt was finally out, the lithe yet still muscular form of A'Sharad Hett, who was so much smaller than the crab armor made him appear to be, was free.
"Thank you," he called sardonically to Jacen.
With swiftness not afforded to him by the armor, he raced toward Jacen, ignoring the numerous Jedi he could have cut down in his path, and began attacking the youngest Jedi Master alive with such quick, deft strokes of his lightsaber. Jacen barely managed to keep up as he started to once again employ Vaapad to defend himself, even as he was backed across the battlefield.
And the Jedi and Sith remaining and conscious could only watch in stunned amazement as they believed that Jacen would meet an end similar to his legendary uncle.
But then... Jacen suddenly stopped fighting.
In the midst of Krayt's wild slashes, he let his lightsaber, now deactivated, fly free from his hand before grabbing Krayt's blade in both hands. The lithe Sith Lord looked in astonishment at what Jacen was doing; yes, he was obviously using the Force, but he was doing it in a way that was so... in tune.
"Go ahead, Krayt," Jacen said. "Use your darkness against me."
Krayt's blade was then extinguished; and not even a press of the activation stud could bring it back now, for the focusing crystal had been completely robbed of all its power by Jacen.
Krayt himself, after dropping the useless hilt, began attacking Jacen wildly with his powerful arms and legs, putting all of the energy that he could muster into it. Naturally, he was summoning all of the strength that he had in the Force, as well.
But Jacen didn't block or defend himself - at least not with his body. No, instead he was simply using the Force, and all of the physical attacks - attacks that made up an unstoppable force - that Krayt was sending him were simply absorbed by the immovable object that Jacen had all but become.
This was not another experience of oneness with the Force for Jacen, as he had experienced it with Onimi; no, this was different. This was simply learning to completely accept the Force as something that he could put utter faith into, even if he were to never have that experience as he had with Onimi ever again. And for that, his complete faith was rewarded as Krayt's attacks slowly drained the Sith Lord of his power. Yet, from the outside, one would not think that given his increasingly desperate attacks, which made him seem to grow more powerful.
But in the end, Jacen had taken all of the power that Krayt tried to use against him and blasted it towards him in a blinding inferno of white, righteous light.
When the light had dissipated, not even ash remained of Darth Krayt, the killer of Luke Skywalker.
Everyone on the battlefield felt Krayt's demise when the light had appeared. And Jacen knew more that he killed Krayt not out of vengeance for Uncle Luke's murder, but for the fact that the Sith Lord was an irredeemable threat, just as Onimi sadly was, that needed to be eradicated for the good of the galaxy.
"Our Master!" a Sith cried.
"He is gone!" another added.
"We are nothing without him!"
"There is no further reason to go on!"
And with that, one by one, the remaining Sith reversed the grips of their lightsabers and turned them on themselves, ending their own lives. Above, One Sith starfighters either self-destructed or fell to the ground away from the battlefield, eliminating their pilots.
Moments later, the Jedi felt the dark presences of the remaining One Sith all but vanish completely; they were all gone.
But the fact that this seemed almost exactly the same as the end of the Yuuzhan Vong War was lost to Jacen; after the deaths of the last of the One Sith in existence occurred, he rushed across the battlefield, past his fellow Jedi, and all remained still and silent as Jacen reached his dying uncle.
"Jacen," Luke's weak voice whispered.
"Don't try to talk, Uncle Luke," Jacen said. "I'm going to try heal this wound here."
But as Jacen reached out through the Force to inspect the wound, he realized that even if he were to repair the damage done to it, his uncle's life-force was already far too weak to be restored - by the time Jacen had that wound properly repaired, his uncle would join the Force anyway.
"Don't... try to," Luke whispered, knowing that he was far gone, as well. "Know this: I trust in you to let the Jedi Order continue on the path that you had set up. If you accept, I will confer unto you the title of Grand Master of the Jedi Order."
Even under the circumstances of the moment, everyone conscious and alive, including Jacen, was shocked at what Luke was telling him. Not even Luke gave himself that title, which was last held by Yoda; so why was he giving it to Jacen, the youngest Jedi Master alive? Was it because of the delirium that he was suffering in his dying moments?
No, Jacen realized. He knew that Luke was doing this because he did have that much faith in him. Even with other Masters like Mara or Kyle Katarn or any of the others, Luke trusted Jacen implicitly; and for his connection to the Force, unrivaled even by his grandfather, Anakin Skywalker, Jacen had earned the title of Grand Master as he had with Jedi Master.
"I... I accept... Master Skywalker," Jacen said.
"Good," Luke said. "Good..."
Luke then breathed his last, and was no more.
Jacen then grabbed his uncle's body in a tight hug and cried against him. Soon, Jaina broke down into tears and rushed over to join her brother in their shared pain.
Finally, Mara woke up and looked like she was about to faint when she saw what happened to her husband; the death of one of the closest people to her had gone by without her even sensing it while unconscious. Yet she still mustered the strength to join her niece and nephew in crying over Luke.
And Leia and Han, who just had the Millennium Falcon parked nearby the battlefield, were the last ones in the battlefield to rush forward and join the tearful, tragic reunion; where this had once been a joyous occasion when the Yuuzhan Vong War had ended, and Jacen had saved his uncle from dying, now it was nothing but sadness and grief for all.
Meanwhile, on Denon, Ben broke down into sobbing fits when they felt that their brother and father respectively pass into the Force; something that not even Masters Kam and Tionne Solusar could remedy as they joined the boy in sobbing over Luke's demise.
And then all of the other Jedi, whether in the depths of Korriban or elsewhere in the galaxy, wept profusely over the loss of one of the greatest Jedi Masters who ever lived.