The sun rose on the Halcyon Academy. From above, no one would ever assume that anything was out of the ordinary. The Dawnbreakers filed about in formation along their patrols. Professors and staff went about their daily routines, occasionally stopping in the halls to chat about the day. No distress call had been put out on any public channel, and so there was no reason for anyone to assume that the Academy had been overtaken by a malevolent force.

Nearly the entire Halcyon clan now served under Zahavi's mental manipulation, their eyes glowing faintly with a golden energy. To keep up appearances, Zahavi had silently commanded them to keep the Academy under the appearance of business as usual. To this end, people hurried and scattered about, without any true destination.

In the meantime, Zahavi had teams searching for the missing students, as well as the last remaining members of the clan. He walked the campus, taking mental notes on all that the Halcyons had done here. In his timeline, the Halcyon Clan had grown into tyrannical warlords, crushing the galaxy under their heels. Their battleships and reapers were forces to be feared, and had brought the galaxy to the brink of destruction on more than one occasion. It was this future that Zahavi worked to save. He had been sent here, to when the Halcyons were only just beginning to consolidate their strength. He had no malice in his heart, he sought only to eliminate the evil before it could germinate into a force that could not be stopped. It was his responsibility to bear the sins of these deaths. His soul was a small price to pay to save the lives of billions more.

After all, isn't that exactly what a Guardian is meant to do?

Asmodeus was crawling around the far side of the terrace, brushing aside piles of leaves and underbrush. He sniffed twice, hoping to catch a familiar scent. Zahavi, walking up behind him, gave him a quizzical look.

Picking up on the unasked question, Asmodeus grumbled. "Bersk. I felt him break in my hands, and I threw him here. But he is missing. No body." He turned to face his master. "Loose ends."

Zahavi raised an eyebrow to him, and Asmodeus nodded. "I'll take care of it."

The large Sith turned and with a mighty leap descended into the jungles below.

A shuttle floated in orbit above Yavin 4, taking special care to avoid sensor range of any passing ships or nearby settlements. Inside, Oryon and Nila-Om were coming up with their plan. Oryon had set up at a makeshift workbench, where he was carefully measuring and mixing various chemicals and formulas, straining them and loading them into his wrist gauntlets as weaponized injections. Nila-Om sat behind him, reading through the stack of notebooks that Oryon had been filling over the past several weeks during his time with Zahavi.

She looked up at him. This man was her biological father, and there was an uncanny resemblance between them. Not only were they physically similar, but in reading his words, she found a certain familiarity in his reasoning, in his cadence. It was unsettling to see words put down on paper that appeared to be written in her own hand. And yet, there was a fundamental difference between them. Oryon saw the universe with a singular state of mind. There was what was right, and what was wrong, and there was very little crossover between them. Logic and reason dictated all, the ends justified the means, and one's greatest accomplishment could only be setting up the future to be better prepared for adversity than the present was.

Nila frowned, and looked down at the mask that had kept her identity a secret for the past year. They were so very different, after all. On Voss, Nila had learned of the sanctity of life, the sacred intrinsic worth of all living beings. Duty and responsibility she understood, but also generosity, compassion. Things that she could see little of in the man before her.

And yet...

Here he was, preparing for an assault against a being whom Oryon fully believed to be capable of killing them all. A man whose cause he had pledged himself to, up to and including his own death. Zahavi had shown him some kind of future which had convinced him that turning on his family was the only way to save lives. And now, he had been confronted by a remnant of the only part of his life where he had ever known love, known peace. And that had been enough to force him to turn his beliefs inside out for the sake of his only daughter. There was a note of compassion in there, somewhere. There was a kinship between them. If they survived, she was determined to find it.

She approached him from behind. "What is it you are doing?"

He did not look at her, but continued to prepare the micro-darts that would load into his wrist gauntlets. "I did extensive testing on Zahavi's mind control abilities. I helped him develop a tool that would aerolize a chemical compound that allowed him to take control of large groups at once, without having to place hands on each of them individually. However, as a standard practice of mine, I also developed a counter serum to that compound. It should be enough to counteract the effects of the formula if it was inhaled."

Nila felt a glimmer of hope at this good news. "That's excellent! You can cure them if he has them controlled."

"Not exactly." He loaded another dart. "This compound only works to counteract the previous formula I created. If the subject breathed in the first formula, allowing Zahavi to take control of them remotely, then yes, this should 'cure' them. However..." He wiped his brow. "If he took control of them through physical contact, then this particular compound will do them no good."

He set down the darts and picked up a datapad. Pulling an extending cable from the side, he plugged it directly into a side port on his bionic eye patch. The datapad beeped as it downloaded the information. "I was able to create a concoction that prevents the subject from being able to be controlled by Zahavi's physical touch, based on the readings I recorded during my own experiments under his control. However, based on the way signals are interpreted in a sentient mind's neuron flow, it will not break the connection if the subject is already under Zahavi's influence."

He turned to face Nila, who was nodding as though she understood, but was obviously having some trouble keeping up. He took her hand, and carefully injected the formula into her arm. "Basically, we can stop people from being infected. But if they are already infected through physical contact, we have to find a way to snap them out of it before my serum will do any good."

Nila nodded. "Alright, so we have a plan, then. How do we snap them out of his control?"

Oryon frowned and turned back to his workbench. "So far, I've only seen his control relinquished in two ways. He can sever the tie willingly, any time he likes. The only other way is if the subject completes the kill-command that Zahavi gives them."

Nila held her arm where the injection was administered. "They have to kill someone to snap out of it?"

Oryon narrowed his one good eye. "Do not worry. No one else will die because of my mistake. I give you my word."

On the surface of Yavin 4, the students of the Academy were making their way through the jungle. The past several days had taken their toll on them. They were hungry, they were tired, and they were afraid.

It was Khalon who was the first to come to a very unpleasant realization. He kneeled down in the grass and mud, and took a look around at the trees surrounding them. "Oh hell..."

"What is it?" asked Kaikorero.

"We're going in circles." He pointed to an outcropping which gave way to a small trench. "Over there, that's where Sesna and I uh...failed our test." At this, Sesna blushed and Zhejari grunted and turned away. "We aren't far from the testing ground where Haran had us recover the idol. Not far from the Academy either, for that matter." He sat back and sighed. "We've been out here for days, and we are right back where we started." He folded his arms and buried his face in them. "It's hopeless."

At this, the students felt a collective wave of depression sweep over them. Someone had finally said it. The situation was hopeless.

"What if we just went back?" Fiachra asked. "Maybe they've got it all sorted now. They might even be looking for us!"

Kai shook her head. "If that were the case, they wouldn't be jamming all transmissions from the jungle. We'd be able to call for help, or set up a beacon. As it is, they want us cut off. And that message that zombie-Asmo put out? No way. I know a trap when I smell one."

Zhejari slumped to the ground, unsure of how to proceed. He was full of rage, full of power, but it did him no good here. Any outburst would signal the enemy to their position, and he was strong, but not strong enough to take them alone. Sesna crouched down next to him and put her head on his shoulder. His face flushed for a moment, and then he put his arm around her. They sat there, with each other, quietly wondering about their fate.

Fiachra was at a loss. She was out of her element, unsure of how to contribute. She had come in dead last in almost every test that the Academy had given her. She held back tears, wondering if she was only dead weight to this troop. Perhaps they would be better off if she snuck off on her own...

She was deep in these worrisome thoughts when she sat down absent-mindedly on a mossy stone. To her great surprise, it grunted under her weight.

Fiachra leapt to her feet in shock, pulling the dagger from her belt. The rest of the students leapt to their feet as well, drawing their weapons. However, it was Fiachra who first realized what was happened. She turned to her fellow students and threw up her hands. "Wait!"

She turned back and brushed aside the moss and growth that was hanging from the nearby tree branch, exposing a face beneath. Bersk. His face was bruised and puffy, and his eyes were red. Dark splotches along his cheek indicated broken bones in his face, and the majority of his body was concealed beneath a bed of moist soil and grass. He did not speak, but opened his mouth, his lips dry and cracked.

Without hesitation, she reached into his robe and pulled out his flask, spilling a few drops onto his tongue. Bersk gasped and swallowed, some color returning to his face. "Thanks kid. You can stab me now, if you still want to."

Fiacha choked back a laugh, a tear running down her own cheek. She kissed him on the forehead. "What happened, Bersk?"

With great effort, he turned and looked back at the students, then back up at the sky. "Asmo's a big fella. I should have packed a lunch." He shifted his weight, trying to prop himself up on his elbows. Dirt and mud fell away, exposing his torso, which was encased in a series of very rigid roots and branches. "Did a number on me. Broke most of my ribs, probably messed up my spine real good. Was only barely able to crawl away to rest down here, with my good friends." He took the flask from Fiachra and lifted it in the air, toasting the jungle, before taking a swig himself. "It's no kolto tank, but I'm alive."

Fiachra helped him to his feet, brushing the rest of the soil away. Bersk was supported by frame of branches and roots, tied to his limbs with vine. In this state, he looked more like a sentient tree from the chest down. He leaned against a stone and laughed softly to himself. "Not the first time I woke up feeling like something stomped me to death though."

Fiachra helped him sit down. "We don't know what to do, Bersk. The Academy isn't safe anymore, and they are jamming all signals. We can't even call for help."

Bersk pulled a comlink from his robe. "Don't worry about that, kiddo. There's one signal they can't block no matter how hard they try. We set this up special a very long time ago, in case one of us was ever in trouble and needed help. I figure this situation qualifies." He pressed a red button, and the comm flared to life, transmitting on an encoded frequency. Bersk smiled weakly. "It what brothers do for each other."

Several kilometers away, Lothärius, Otso, and Haran'buir were riding their swoops through the jungle towards the Academy when Loth and Otso received an emergency transmission on their comms. Hellfather private comm channel.

"It's Bersk!" Otso called to the others. "Emergency frequency."

Loth kicked his swoop into gear. "Well let's go get him."

A few moments later, the Hellfathers were reunited with their fourth member, and the younger and elder generations were breathing in sighs of relief to have found each other safe and sound. Haran'buir sat down with Bersk and revealed his true identity as Kuno to him, and the two embraced in a long hug. Otso shared his pack of rations with the students, who had not eaten a real meal in days. Lothärius was sitting with Khalon and Sesna, trying to come up with a plan to get them off-world.

"No way, we're not leaving." Sesna said. "This is our home, and we aren't going to abandon it."

"She's right, Loth. We've been through too much already. We aren't going to slink away."

Otso smiled at Loth. "Can't argue with them, chief. You would have made the same argument when we were their age."

Loth covered his face with his hands. "You exhaust me, and we don't have time to argue about it. Fine, you can help, but I want you guys out of firing range."

"Screw that." Kaikorero piped in, recharging the blaster packs in her pistols. "If there's going to be a fight, we're going to be in the middle of it, old timer. Count on it."

"We still don't know how we are even going to get close enough to the Academy to recon. We don't even know really what is going on." Loth said.

"Perhaps I can help with that."

Through the jungle emerged Oryon Halcyon, closely flanked by a younger, female Chiss. It took Fiachra a moment to recognize the robes she wore. "Nila?"

Nila smiled awkwardly and waved. "Hi guys. Uh...I'd like you to meet my dad?"