Note: I'm not sure when I released the previous episode, but this one was already up and ready in my OneNote stash. But here is an update on the rest of the season.

Episode 16 - here

Episode 17 - done

Episode 18 - work in progress

Episode 19 - not started

Episode 20 (epilogue) - not started

Naturally this is suspect to change as I find the need.

Something a reviewer brought up was Ahsoka/Galen romance in the sequel. While, I already have in my mind a Galen/OC relationship, I am still open to whatever. So through the end of this season, and the beginning of the next, I will present a vote.

But let's begin with who you want Galen paired with before I start any vote so that we can get as many options as possible.

It is completely viable to pair Galen with HIMSELF, just because he is too much to be contained in any one person. :P (Some people, I swear, they act like they are paired with themselves, they are so full of it.)

Disclaimer: I own nothing. Not even the clothes on my back.

Episode 16 - A Matter of Perspective

Ahsoka woke up to the blinding sun. She was hot, sweaty, and something was heavy on her chest. Correction, someone. Varus laid on top of her, unconscious, Master was to her side, also unconscious, and the three of them were tied together by a rope. Glancing around she saw a few fur cots and they were inside a confined area.

"Master?" She whispered. No reaction. "Varus?" The only reaction was her partner mumbled something and opened his mouth. He started to drool. The liquid in his mouth collected on the end of his lips and a single drop built up before dripping down. It hunt perilously at the end of it, and she glared at it, daring it to touch her. "Varus." She whispered harder. "Varus! Wake up." She squirmed a bit to wake him up, but all that succeeded in doing was swinging the drool around. "Varus. Varus! Don't you dare!"

The fur perimeter parted to show an alien enter in. He was covered completely in brown cloth, including his head. Ahsoka froze. She couldn't pretend asleep, the alien already saw, but she didn't want to make any hostile moves. She couldn't feel her lightsabers on her.

The alien unceremoniously grabbed her Master by his ankles and yanked him back. Unfortunately the tightness of the rope caused a great deal of friction. Ahsoka's arms were pinned by the ropes, and she had to grab her pants to keep them from being taken off in the process. Also, the yanking caused Varus to fall squarely onto her chest. "No no no no-" Varus's mouth opened and the drool dribbled down her front. "eeewww! Varus!" She whispered. "Wake up! You're disgusting!"

The alien left Anakin on a cot and checked him over. He did not appear hostile, if anything he acted like a doctor and applied a makeshift bandage to her Master's bleeding head. Next up was Varus. The alien grabbed Varus by the ankles, pulled him out, and dropped him unceremoniously on the fur cot. With the ropes loosened Ahsoka was able to squirm her way out and wipe the drool off her collar. "Eeeew…" She groaned. Some of it had gone down her torso under the clothes. She would need a shower later! "Varus, you are the most disgusting creature I have the misfortune of dealing with…" She looked up to find herself at the end of a rifle. The alien didn't shoot her, but he also made his intentions very clear.

Ahsoka slowly raised his hands. "Right, no sudden moves. You understand Galactic Basic? No? Great…" Varus was on a cot asleep, so was Master Skywalker, and since there was a third cot… "How about I just get up on here?" She slowly raised herself up onto it. The alien lowered his rifle and placed it to the side in arms reach. He reached into his bag and withdrew a number of razor-thin needles. He grabbed Varus, turned him around belly up, and jammed one of the needles into the young man's leg.

"AAAAAAAAAAH!" Varus woke up, screamed, and punched the man in the face before pulling the needle out.

The fur curtains around them dropped to reveal a whole army of riflemen with their guns pointed at them. "Varus. Your birth was a cosmic joke." Ahsoka hissed through her teeth while trying to smile and keep her hands up.

One of the riflemen walked up to the one remaining team member who was still unconscious and hit him in the face with the butt of his rifle. Anakin's instinct kicked in and he reached out for the rifle, but stopped when he saw the situation.

"Varus." Anakin concluded immediately, and said slowly. "What did you do?" He sees he doesn't have his saber, so he put his hands up.

"I can't help but notice you immediately assume I did something!"

"Varus?" Anakin repeated.

"Nothing."

"If you count waking up, screaming, and punching their doctor in the face 'nothing'." Ahsoka sighed.

"He was stabbing me!"

"That was acupuncture!" She said heavily.

"Well shit, how was I supposed to know that!?" Varus demanded.

Ahsoka had hesitated. She had lacked the resolve to choose one side or the other between Varus and Maris, and could only stare dumbly from the ground as Varus was impaled on the tree. Varus tried to smile to her, that stupid, cheesy-ass, grin that always makes her realize he was about to do something stupid. Something like… like die.

And it was all her fault.

"Maris! What have you done!?" She cried.

"He's a Sith."

Anakin stopped in his tracks. He turned around, and as he did so, he checked around subtly. There was no one. He put his best 'curious' face on Jedi Master Rahm Kota and said, "What?"

"That kid of yours, he's a Sith, and for some reason the other Master's kept that back from me."

Anakin could figure why. Rahm Kota was known for being almost fanatical about the idea that the only true warrior worth bringing to a battle were those with absolute loyalty. He refused to use clones under him, and even supported efforts to give the clones a life outside of war. He would no doubt have a problem with the idea of a brain-washed Sith being subjugated into being a Jedi.

Anakin allowed himself to blink blankly. "And what makes you think Varus is a Sith?"

Kota examined his fingers casually. "That style of his? I caught it instantly. It's called Scarsarin form nine. It is one taught by Sith to apprentices with a life expectancy of zero because it is stupidly wild."

"But what makes you think-"

The Master snapped, "He is very highly trained, and the style would NEVER be taught by the Order. We don't put our apprentices in fights we expect them to lose, and if we did, I'd leave so fast my shorts would have to catch the next flight, boy! That leaves two alternatives. He was taught by a Jedi whose nose I need to break, or he was taught by a Sith."

Anakin allowed the knowledge to wash over him. He knew Kota was a weapon arts and styles specialist, as well as a specialist in just about every aspect of guerilla warfare, which is why he had asked the Master to provide some tutelage to his Padawan, but he had underestimated the Master. He had not expected Kota to have memorized Sith styles.

It was a powerful idea, memorizing the style of your enemy. In fact, Windu incorporated some Sith elements into his own style, but Anakin had not expected this.

He could argue, but while he didn't have personal relations with Kota, he knew him to be as stubborn as anyone could ever be. He was cornered. Kota knew after a single training session that his Padawan was a Sith. (He only got the kid twenty-four hours ago! If that!)

The Knight glanced around. Kota had timed it well. They were in an isolated area. His two Padawans were off having lunch and arguing, no doubt, and no one had passed them. Anakin walked up to Kota and whispered, "What are you going to do?"

"Nothing." The man grunted. "The real question is: What are you going to do?"

"Pardon?"

"The kid has no reason to trust us, and if he ever learns, even less so. He is not under oath. All he has is a contract to learn the Force under you in return for not having it taken away. Hell, boy, even the clones have taken an oath and pledged themselves to the Republic! A stupid pledge born of nothing more than little boys wanting to please their 'parents', but a pledge none of the less. Now I ask you: What are you going to do?"

Anakin understood his understanding. "Studies have always shown that Sith apprentices are highly abused. It breeds their hatred. Your right, he has no reason to trust us, but that is exactly what I plan to fix. I never asked for him to be brain-washed, and if asked, I would have gone against it. It just… it's wrong. But that is in the past. What I have is a broken young man with no ties to anything, past and present. I'm going to fix him as a person. I'm going to show him everything he never had before."

"Attachment is forbidden." Kota recited with a grin.

"I would rather see a healed, happy young man stripped of the Force than a broken old man reciting rhetoric just so he can lift books with his mind… I can't claim to fix everything about him. I can't remake him overnight, and there may be a lot of things I can't fix, but I'll be damned if I let him, now that he is my responsibility, fall through my fingers."

Kota smiled and patted him on the shoulder. "Good answer." With that, he walked away.

"What are you going to do?" Anakin asked.

"About what? He's a Jedi remember?" The old man returned before disappearing around the corner.

Another memory struck Anakin.

Anakin folded a piece of paper in his hands over and over nervously. Indecisiveness was not a common trait with him, but this was one of those times. He had a former-Sith student who had come to realize he was not human. Now, while that was news to Anakin, in that he thought Varus was human just as much as himself, it was not good news. A concept of the Jedi that had been briefly explained to him was how small things, like cracks, can widen and become something greater and eventually break down something much larger. Varus was not supposed to remember his Sith past or what his Jedi Council did to him. Anakin felt disgusted deep down at what his own Council did, but it was past time to argue. What was done was done, but would it be a good thing for him to encourage the 'crack' in Varus to expand? Would he inadvertedly destroy Varus down the road?

These things went through his mind repeatedly, before he remembered what he had told Kota, Obi-Wan, and Windu on two occassions. Varus had Sith instincts and a deeply ingrained Sith background. If left alone, those instincts would pull him down like grasping hands from hell. Varus would never achieve the rank of Jedi Master with so much darkness hidden inside him, but that simply meant for them to try harder, for them to be the ones extending a trustful hand.

For him to tell Varus what he found.

Anakin sighed and knocked on the door. "Yeah." Was the answer.

He entered in to find Varus with a needle in his fingers trying to mend his clothes. The black torn robes with little plates of metal on the shoulders and sides of the chest. The robes he wore as a Sith. Varus himself had pajama bottoms on for decency, but not above the waist. Anakin could see every little scar on his chest, and the sight scared him. Varus's upper body was a maze of little cuts, burns, and impacts. (Impact damage tends to be more rounded and darker from internal bruising.) But Varus did not seem to notice or mind his own scars as he focused on his task.

"Your mending your clothes?"

"Yeap, Ahsoka showed me the basics, but..." He held the black robes up with a 'tsk'. "I don't think I did it right." Indeed, the mending was haphazard at best.

"I think you're better off letting her do it or at least get more practice at sowing first."

"Maybe." He grumbled. Varus' eyes moved over Anakin briefly before resting on the paper. "What's that?"

Anakin shrugged. "Nothing much. Just something I found for you."

"Oh? Lemme see." He reached out for it.

Anakin sat down next to Varus and passed him the paper. Varus opened it. "'2,0000,000, give or take 100,000' Whats this? Repair cost for something? An army?... I'm getting paid aren't I!?" His eyes expanded to the size of saucers and a mischievous grin grew over him.

Anakin scoffed in amusement. "No. None of that. You're not being paid 2 million credits either." Varus lost the grin. "I sent out some feelers, pulled in favors, and did some research. What that is: Is the approximate number of Miraluka left scattered acro-" He was cut off after he had the life being squeezed out of him in a bear hug.

Varus hugged him so hard he was having the life squeezed out of him. Anakin blinked in surprise, as the former Sith wasn't much of a touchy-feely type, rather the mouth-off and keep a distance type. It must have meant a lot more to him than he thought. Anakin reached up and patted him on the back. After a moment Varus released him and returned to his task with renewed focus, and a slight watery dim in his eyes.

Nothing needed to be said. Anakin patted him on the shoulder and left. "Thanks, Master." Was all he heard as he closed the door.

Anakin had seen the death of his mother in a vision before. It was odd, but theoretically he would have seen the death of his Padawan in a vision, he would have gone about this day differently. But there was no vision. There was no premonition letting him know just how utterly SHIT this day would turn. It just simply happened. There was no climatic explosion with doves flying, there was no soundtrack music. There was silence. There was motion. There was death and his heart threatened to burst out of his chest. He was pinned to the ground and could only watch as if it was a holovid.

Varus's stupid grin disappeared and his head dropped.

He had failed.

At last.

The Sith was dead. Maris sighed and felt her exhaustion come over her. She had been pushing herself for so long, and her body almost collapsed right there. She had never considered anything after the Sith's death, because, to be fair, her odds of survival wasn't exactly optimistic to consider. Now she was alive and she needed to figure out what to do.

The red eyes had never appeared, but now she knew for certain they wouldn't. Her nightmares would end, she would no longer be haunted by those hateful eyes, and her master was… if Azhaak was watching her, the woman would be very displeased, but she would eventually understand.

Maris watched the light leave the Sith's eyes, down to the last spark, and nodded to herself. It was done.

But now what? Ahsoka probably hated her, and the Republic agent had shown she was no longer considered part of the Republic or Jedi Order. Her Master was dead. She had nowhere left to go…

She was alone and the thought made her feel cold.

Maris shook away the dark thoughts and turned to leave. She could contemplate what to do with herself later.

"Sorry, 'Shoka." She said as she passed by. She ignored the betrayed expression on her friends face, and pushed away the pain in her heart.

The Iranian didn't know the boy and if asked, he didn't care. He found the chase to be annoying in the number of encounters it took to finally kill the boy cleanly, and he was surprised how much pain the boy could tolerate and still have the will to fight in the end, but a job was a job. The Chancellor would be pleased with his performance.

Not one to waste resources, he took hold of the cleaver-blade and pulled it out of the corpse. The boy fell to the ground. He sheathed it on his back and allowed his hover-boots to let him fall to the ground. He was no longer fighting and no longer needed additional mobility.

"You are afraid…"

Oh, great, this again. I look around in the darkness but see nothing. The oppressive atmosphere reminds me of the Infinite Empire temple in Dantooine with that evil-Sith-freak-illusion version of my glorious self.

"Yeah, yeah, we went over this! I'm scared and all that crap! Of what? Finding out I was given birth by a lizard?"

"You are weak…"

Well, yeah. I did kinda get stabbed. OH CRAP! I got stabbed! I'm dead! I died! "Shit! This has gotta be hell!" I hiss.

"You are pathetic…"

"Shut up!" I yell. "We went over this already! Just come out and fight me already so I can kick your ass! No, wait, I'm already dead… If I killed you, would you just reanimate and keep going?" Crap… this is one of those eternal conflict moments isn't it… This sucks.

A red lightsaber turns on, right on queue, and out of the shadows the evil, half-robot-abomatinion… kid.

…

It's a kid. No wait, I recognize him! Its… Galen? The kid I saw in that vision talking to the Nihilus person. The kid's eyes are red and the pain and hatred in his eyes are fresh with tears. "I HATE YOU!" He roars.

"Whoa, kid, hold up!"

The kid comes at me with the lightsaber, but he's clumsy and fails to hit me. "Galen, stop it! You're going to hurt yourself!"

"BASTARD! YOU KILLED THEM!" He yells. Right, just go on ignoring me. I pull out my green lightsaber and block his attack. He has no strength of his own beyond pure adrenaline and desperation. His form is clumsy and he almost kills himself just in being blocked by me.

I use the Force to pull the lightsaber out of the kid's hands and knock him down. I hold him down, but he is a squirmy little freak of nature. Sparks of electricity crackle across his skin and he spits verbal venom with his every breath. "Galen! Stop it!" I yell.

He wiggles around and rips skin off my arm with his teeth. I jump up and scream in pain but the wound is healed and the kid is gone. "Where are you, you little brat!" I yell.

The kid is gone, but the place is different. What was once a white plane or environment is now dark and grey. I'm in a broken ship of fire and smoke. I hear crying. Disserves the brat right… But the crying turns to screaming and I hear lightsabers clash. The kid has anger issues and bit me, but it goes against everything Tree-Hugger's been teaching me to just let him suffer. Maybe if I walk away I could pretend I heard nothing?

The lightsaber battle turns into small explosions and little booms as though things are hitting the walls. "Bah… forget it." I run down the hall toward the sound.

I run closer and closer to the sound and turn into the room, but the battle is gone. I stand in the middle of… I think it's a training area. The ground is circular with various designs on it and there is a loft around it. But what draws my attention is a closet. The closet is open and standing just in front of it is the lightning-insane-masked-Sith-illusion-freak from the temple in Dantooine, but he isn't wearing a mask. Instead he has the mask in his hands. His face is blank without eyes, nose, or mouth. He has no hair due to scarring across his entire scalp.

He presents the mask to me as if to give it to me. I step back. "No!"

The man growls. "Take it!"

"No!"

"Stop being so scared!"

"I'm not scared!"

"You promised me you would learn!"

"No!" I declare. "I promised myself! That doesn't involve tainting myself with you!"

The man clenches his jaw, a very odd expression for a man with no mouth. "YOU'RE ALREADY TAINTED! YOU ARE A MURDERER AND BETRAYER! NOW AVENGE ME!"

"I AM NOT AND I WILL NOT!" I yell back angrily. "I'm Varus Wynn! I am a Jedi an-"

I gasp as a red lightsaber sprouts out my chest. Breathless, I step forward out of it's path and fall to the ground. The kid appears before me with the red saber on his hand. He looks down on me with red, angry eyes. "He is scared." The kid says. "He resists."

"He will learn." The other states coldly. He stoops down before me and presents the mask above my head.

I open my mouth to scream, but my chest will not rise and I don't have the energy to move. It is like my energy is being sucked out through a straw. I can only watch dumbly as the mask is placed on my face.

The air crackled with electricity and power.

Anakin had felt a lot of power in his time, but this was new. It was huge, it was raw, and it was hollow in how it felt all-consuming, like a vacuum had opened up in the Force around him. He felt his own energy be pulled away slowly, not enough to hurt him, but enough to frighten him in how alien it was. He looked to the source of it and gasped.

Varus was standing.

He felt Ahsoka's stunned state through his mental bond, and felt the raw surprise and anger ripple through Maris just out of his sight, but neither one came to his most immediate attention.

His head was mostly down, his shoulders stooped heavily from exhaustion, his nearly-sliced-off-arm dangled at his side, and he looked drugged out of his mind. Frankly he looked like an advertisement for death.

But shouldn't he already be dead? He should have blood pouring out of the hole in his… wait. Blood was not pouring out of him. Anakin looked into the Force around Varus and realized that along with the sheer typhoon of Force Energy coming off of Varus in waves, the boy was consciously keeping his own blood inside.

Varus, as much as Anakin loved seeing him alive and standing, it almost frightened him how stubborn the boy was. This was beyond stubbornness, it was unnatural. No one should have the knowledge of holding internal injuries and blood inside like this. No one should know how to substitute internal functions and organs with their mind. It was a mockery of life, he felt. It was fake. It was dark.

Varus slowly raised his eyes. They were red, that was the first thing Anakin noticed, but he also looked highly drugged, like he was only half-conscious.

Was this pure instinct? All Anakin could figure was that Varus was subconsciously tapping into whatever it was his Sith Mentor had taught him. It was the only explanation short of being possessed.

Anakin didn't know what to do. He didn't know what to think. The secret had been borderline-out since Maris was spouting it and Ahsoka didn't appear to listen and Varus figured it to be a load of bullcrap, but this was a whole other thing entirely. Varus was tapping into the Dark Side so heavily it was choking the air. Electricity rippled off of his body in waves.

Anakin turned his eyes to where he knew Ahsoka was, and saw her horror, her shock, her fear. It was like telling her up was down and Azhaak was her mother Maris was a Sith and oh! Look! Varus is too!

The secret was out. The only question was how Ahsoka would take it and how Varus would take it, and what he would have to do in response, and… was Varus going to kill them now? Had Starkiller, the Sith Assassin, returned? Or was this Varus, his mouthy Padawan? Or was this a combination due to the experience of both memories?

Anakin had no idea what to do or think of the situation. He could only watch and hope that it could have a happy ending with or without everyone he dead.

"How? I gutted you." He heard the tank-soldier ask.

Varus cocked his head slightly but didn't look at him.

"YOU!" Maris barked. "YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE DEAD! What does it take to just KILL you!?"

Without further notice Maris entered Anakin's vision in a direct charge at Varus. She brought her lightsaber down on him, but was cast aside with a wave of his hand into a distant tree. Maris hovered in the air and fought against it, but her power was nothing in comparison to the sheer tornado of energy holding her in place. Varus's power was so thick in the air that the light grew dark and sparks rippled across the ground.

Anakin had felt a lot of Force users in his time, with a lot of various degrees of power. This was the first time he had felt someone rival his own. If this was how it looked like for other's to look at him, no wonder he was held as special. It also frightened him how that much power felt in its darkness.

The tank-soldier came into view charging Varus at full, blinding speed, and the flying spears darted at Varus' prone form from various angles, but Varus didn't take note of any of it.

"Varus!" Ahsoka yelled. She snapped out of her stupor and struggled to rise. She managed to rise, and it warmed Anakin's heart to know she wasn't considering Varus an enemy at this crucial moment, but it did little against the sight of so many things coming at him.

Until time seemed to stop. The flying spears stayed a few inches away from Varus's back and sides, the hovering tank-soldier was locked in position, and Ahsoka stopped her efforts to come to his aid. The only signs that time did not truly stop was the small sparks moving across the ground and Varus' skin, and the leaves moving in the gentle breeze.

A wave of pure energy and electricity pulsed from the Sith teenager and knocked the tank-soldier away. The various spears flew away and imbedded themselves in trees and soil around them. The tank-soldier struggled to hands and knees while electricity rippled across his metal armor. His little lights were off and the technology giving him his additional mobility sparked dead. The spears flew to him and hovered around him like protective chicks.

Varus put his hand out and the energy around him focused around his hand. A visible ball of darkness and electricity appeared in his palm and blasted into his opponent with all the force of a cannon. It exploded against a shield the spears joined together to form in front of their owner, but the residual impact was still enough to send the couple-ton, ten foot man skidding back several feet.

The soldier-tank desperately jumped up and charged, his swords at the ready, but Varus released a second ball. It hit the man directly in the chest. The explosion released a sonic wave that made Anakin's ears tingle and all sound muffled. The tank-soldier flew back and was imbedded into a tree snuggly. The impact bent the entire tree backwards a bit before returning to its normal position. His armor was black and scored, a hole cleanly cut open in his chest revealing third-degree burns across his entire front. If he hadn't been wearing armor several inches in thickness, he would have been killed.

He struggled to get out, but he was firmly implanted into the side of the tree.

Varus moved for the first time in what felt like an eternity. His movements were slow and struggled. His feet dragged across the ground and his dead arm swung. He looked practically like a zombie. Slowly, but surely, he dragged his drugged body to the tree. He levitated off the ground, reached out, and took the man's helmet off with the Force. The helmet refused to give, and with a second attempt he ripped the upper half of his armor clean off. As soon as the helmet came off, the man was growling and grunting in his efforts to move. He was a stubborn one.

Varus took no notice of it, but stopped levitating and stood with difficulty on the man's waist. He extended his hand to the man's head, and a dark mist poured out of his arm. The mist enveloped him entirely and the grunting turned to screaming. The man's scream suddenly took on a gurgling tone before stopping entirely.

Varus stepped down and… his limp was gone. He flexed his arm slightly and the hole in his chest was gone. He was still only half-conscious but for all extents and purposes he was healed. But how-

The man inside the armor was reduced to a skeleton.

Oh Force, Anakin felt sick. He glanced at Ahsoka and noticed she had taken a shade of purple at the sight.

Varus had used some Sith technique to strip the flesh right off the man to heal himself.

"I thought you were a monster before." Maris yelled from the side. "But this goes beyond that. You're a FREAK!" Varus turned his drugged head slightly toward her. "YOU ARE AN ABOMINATION AND LIFE-SIPHONING VAMPIRE! HOW MANY MORE WILL IT TAKE?! How many… How many more have to DIE!" Varus visibly stiffened. "If only your parents could see you right no-"

Varus snapped. He roared angrily and extended his hands. All energy in the air held silence and the entirety of his power focused itself. He reached out, ripped the tree Maris was pinned to clean out of the ground, and slammed it down onto her the next moment like a hammer. Being a tree miles high and forty feet wide at its smallest radius, it shook the ground with all the power of an earthquake and sound like thunder.

The impact and shaking ground tripped Varus and he fell to his knees.

When Varus rose, he looked around. "Tree-Hugger? Mother Hen? You guys there?"

Anakin's heart nearly burst at the nickname. This was it. His right foot was broken and his right arm was injured, but he could speak. He glanced at Ahsoka and recognized her blank expression. He had no idea what was going through her mind. In the darkness he couldn't see Varus's expression, but he was standing a bit straighter.

Anakin cleared his throat, but the first one to talk was Ahsoka. "Yeah, Varu-?"

"What have I done!?" Varus screamed.

Review! The secret is out! We have to catch it before everyting ends!