3951 BBY, Telos IV
Atton
It wasn't long before Atton was out of breath and looking over his shoulder, lagging behind Kreia's lead and waiting not-so-subtly for Eden to catch up with him instead.
"Has anyone ever told you that you have a familiar face?" Atton asked as he watched her approach, instantly feeling like an idiot but also too winded to worry about it. Eden paused as she approached him through the tall grasses as they made way for dense forest at the base of the mountain, eyeing him unsurely.
"Can't say they have, whoever they are," she said with a low, unmirthful laugh. "Why do you ask?"
"It's just… you were ground ops, right? I was bomber squadron. A pilot, obviously. I doubt we crossed paths but, I dunno, I just feel like I've seen your face somewhere."
It had been bothering him since the moment he'd first laid eyes on her. Part of his half-delirious brain, starved and stupid, had mistaken her for an angel. Maybe not entirely for her relatively pleasant appearance but more so because Atton was almost certain he'd died in that cell and was about to be ferried off to some afterlife where he'd pay for his crimes or something. But the more he reacquainted himself with living again, as he unfortunately often did, the more Eden felt familiar – known to him somehow as if from a memory or a dream. But he couldn't place it.
Eden shrugged.
"Maybe you have," she offered.
"You don't remember me, though, do you?"
He feared he sounded desperate, but it almost didn't matter. He would be gone the moment he had the opportunity, Eden becoming a memory regardless of her answer and his own inevitable humiliation. Maybe it was better that way.
"Can't say I do," she said with another shrug and an apologetic glance. "Sorry."
Atton waved her off as they lazily progressed in Kreia's stead, silently affirming that it was alright. The back of the old woman's robes stood silhouetted against the trees ahead, her back turned, yet Atton felt the witch could still hear them. No – he knew she did.
"Nothing to be sorry about," he said eventually to Eden, shrugging it off as well. "Just a thought. Could be nothing."
Atton expected the conversation to end there but instead he felt a hand on his arm. He froze. At first his eyes were drawn to the fingers wrapped around his forearm before he glanced at the wrist, then the arm and the elbow, and eventually the entirety of Eden herself. For a moment, he thought of her as she had been on Citadel Station, with her knee on Lopak Slusk's throat, her face covered with blood and her eyes empty. But he blinked, and within an instant that image of her dissolved, making way for how she appeared now, wide-eyed and beautiful, her eyes warm and pleading, her mouth almost pouting but downturned, imploring and earnest. Atton stilled, a chill running through him.
"No please," she pleaded quietly, "What do you mean? What's familiar?"
Now it was Eden's turn to appear as anything other than desperate and failing. She paused, as if only just noticing her grip on Atton's arm before releasing him to his internal and confusing dismay, taking a step back as she awaited his response.
"Is it weird to say it's your eyes?" he said, "They're… interesting, but I feel like I've seen them before."
If he was being honest with himself, it was the entirety of her that felt familiar – her face, her stature, the way she carried herself. Even her voice. But the familiarity of those aspects of her was more akin to a phantom feeling. It was her eyes that he was certain he'd actually seen before – her irises a deep, mossy green, the central pupil limned with gold, and the way her swath of more-prominent freckles spanned her cheekbones beneath them…
"Is that why you keep making note of them?" Eden smirked, this time brushing past him with her elbow as she resumed their pace in Kreia's ever retreating footsteps. "I thought it was cute when you noticed the color the other day, but maybe it wasn't just that."
Cute? Atton froze, but unlike before. When Eden had gripped his arm, he was some brand of startled. Now he was just confused.
If she's flirting with me, I swear to the Maker I'll-
"Wait," Atton hissed in a low whisper. His voice was low, quiet, and yet it echoed just enough for even Kreia in the distance to hear without her other faculties. The woman turned, pausing in her tracks.
He sensed it before he saw it. A low humming beneath the usual sounds of nature – birds, wind, the crunching of grass and leaves underfoot – but it was only when Atton was lost in an embarrassing thought that he heard the almost imperceptible purr of a power conduit. And not just any source, but an explosive one.
"What is it? I-" Eden began in a hushed whisper, but Atton held a hand up and she instantly clamped her mouth shut.
"Frag mines," he said, glancing around the forest floor. "They're everywhere."
"How did you-?"
"Perceptive, are we?" Kreia smiled, suddenly closer now. Atton blinked rapidly, testing his vision. He could have sworn the woman was meters away just moments ago…
"I said I was bomb squad, remember? I have a good ear for this sorta thing," he said.
If Kreia could roll her eyes, she probably would have judging by the way she tossed her head. Atton errantly wondered if the woman even had eyes or if there were simply empty sockets hiding beneath the hem of her drawn hood.
"I think I can hear it too, faintly," Eden whispered after a moment. "Like an energy field, no? But much, much quieter."
He nodded.
"Yes good, now you'll want to avoid those," Atton said. "They're likely gifts from whoever shot us out of the sky."
Eden nodded and slowly moved on ahead, though now it was Kreia's turn to lag behind. The woman didn't pick up her pace until she was in step with Atton.
"A good ear?" she repeated deadpan.
Atton turned towards her, careful to keep his mind tuned to the quiet thrum of death threatening to blow them all to bits, wincing as he spied Kreia's lips curl into a smile.
"I am curious what other talents you have in store for us, smuggler."
Smuggler.
Kreia had called him the very same thing on Peragus.
Switch the face of the +2/-2 card, the total is eight-eleven.
Where she'd gleaned the word from, he didn't know. Was it his assignment for Luxa, still fresh on his famished mind? Ferrying weapons grade whatever-it-was onto the station, surely damning that entire place to hell? Or had she somehow managed to dip deeper into his mind, reaching further back to his life before the mining outfit?
Switch the face of the +1/-1 card, the totals are nine-ten.
If Atton wanted to stay sane, he'd have to start thinking of another winning hand to keep replaying in his mind. Damn it.
Kreia walked on but not before flashing him another grin, wider and somehow more menacing, eventually catching up with Eden ahead, each of their steps careful and calculated – as if choreographed.
Fuck this.
It wasn't long before they reached midway up the mountainside where the steady slope of trees made way for sheer facing rock that shot up vertically, the façade of a military-grade bunker staring them straight in the face from out of the cliffside. Before them stood a blast door and nothing else. No access panels, no viewports, nothing.
"Not sure how we're gonna crack this one," Atton sighed. Kreia only laughed quietly at his side.
The woman extended her hand. At first nothing happened. Atton and Eden eyed each other over Kreia's still form, shrugging, just as the doors begrudgingly opened, stuttering at first before slowly obeying Kreia's silent command.
"Oh," Atton sighed, shaking his head. "Right."
"How did you do that?" Eden asked, "I was able to wrangle some doors open on the Harbinger but these doors are-" Eden paused and approached the entrance, at first glancing around for any further booby traps before admiring the dense doorway for wat it was. "Hefty."
"Practice," Kreia said calmly, something akin to amusement lacing her voice. "And utter faith."
"Faith?" Eden echoed as both Kreia and Atton unsurely approached the darkened entrance to the not-so-abandoned military facility. A single fluorescent bulb illuminated the hall a few meters down while a flickering light hung in a room at the end of the corridor, the distant space's contents indiscernible save for an old console podium gracing the entrance.
"Faith in one's abilities, yes," Kreia confirmed before waltzing into the darkness only to come out on the other side, bathed in the light at the center of the hallway sooner than she should have given her cadence. Atton shook his head, wondering if all these parlor tricks were for his benefit alone. He was convinced they were when Kreia finally turned to them - to him - and while still speaking to Eden, said "Self-doubt is a greater enemy than many understand."
He wanted to laugh. Sure, self-doubt was the reason why Atton only ever found himself in unfortunate circumstances, a side-effect of his having been born a bastard. But it was also the only reason Atton was still alive. If anything, it had been his only steadfast ally, saving him from himself as well as whatever else the galaxy threw at him. It was the only reason he'd ever left home and why he'd left Alderaan altogether. It was the reason he'd survived the killing pull of Malachor, and the reason Revan's Sith Empire hadn't been the end of him either…
"Onward?" Atton asked Eden before replacing all other brain functions with hyperspace routes, tracing the Ison Trade Corridor in his mind as he took his left blaster out of its holster, his right hand poised hovering over his other pistol just in case. Eden shook her head before nodding begrudgingly.
"Yeah," Eden muttered, engaging the Echani staff she kept clipped at her belt. "But I don't like this."
"Like it or not, it does not matter," Kreia said, one-handedly unsheathing her vibrosword. "This is simply our circumstance. All we must do is endure it."
Atton laughed. "How very insightful. Did the Force tell you that?"
Kreia was about to retort when the woman instead stilled. Each of their footsteps harbored an echo that filled the entire space as they advanced down the corridor, when a loud, wet smack broke them each out of their separate reveries.
"I'm liking this less and less," Eden whispered, now reaching for her supplementary blaster as well. "Atton, you sense anything else?"
Atton, she'd said, Eden's gold-flecked eyes glancing his way and not Kreia's.
Atton wanted to laugh, his eyes flashing from Eden to Kreia, awaiting the old woman's response to Eden's disregard for her words, choosing the advice of the smuggler over the Jedi.
Only Atton didn't laugh. The sound repeated, its echo reaching them with such a sopping, sickening thwap that Atton recoiled with a spine-chilling wince. Even Kreia frowned.
Instead of stopping, instead of turning back, Eden's eyes grew even more glassy, her gaze unblinking and fixed entirely on the far end of the hall as she fell deeper into formation and went on ahead of them. Atton and Kreia exchanged glances, much as they had back on the derelict Harbinger, and Atton was beginning to find one too many coincidences between that ship and this place. And just like their time on the Harbinger, it wasn't long before Atton sensed something else. Something unseen.
"Wait," he warned again with a sharp whisper. Both Eden and Kreia froze and turned to face him. Eden's brows furrowed, silently requesting that Atton either explain himself or lead the way. Kreia only frowned further than she already was, her lips pursing into so tight a line that her mouth nearly disappeared within the soft folds of her face.
We're not alone, he mouthed.
They were upon the room at the far end of the hall now, its contents more readily discernable from this distance. A single overhead light still flickered ominously over the large space; a space Atton now realized was a hangar bay.
But how?
The entrance they used wasn't large enough to allow any of the hulking machines shadowed in the next room entrance, or exit, their massive forms looming closer now as they approached. The console viewable from the moment they stepped foot into the place was still alit, operational, and within their grasp. It glowed an alluringly soft white-blue in the dim lighting despite the apprehension that hung heavily in the room otherwise, standing only a few steps away from where Atton stood, possibly holding an entire layout of the facility as well as maps locating anything else still hidden in these parts.
The room still felt empty as they approached, even if Atton knew otherwise. It was less of a fact and more of a feeling, a forethought that felt like a memory, something Atton often referred to as his gut or his instinct, which felt right but also wrong somehow. He sensed Kreia looking at him sidelong, as if silently questioning his methods as well.
Where are they? Eden mouthed as they approached the mouth of the next room. Eden and Atton halted in unison with Kreia taking up the rear, the old woman almost waltzing backward into them both as they stopped short. Atton sensed an unuttered tsk on Kreia's throat at the misstep.
Atton nodded rightwards, his eyes fixed on Eden instead of the room ahead, the flickering light making him slightly dizzy at the mere thought of it, reminding him more of the Harbinger than he was comfortable with. There were no assassins here, but the memory of them aboard that abandoned Republic vessel still didn't sit well with him.
Eden followed Atton's directive and peered around the corner in the way he indicated. She paused and then looked at Kreia.
Eden opened her mouth as if to say something to the woman, only she decided against it, swallowing her words and glancing briefly at Atton before she resumed looking into the space beyond. Without another word, without another gesture, Atton felt his limbs turn to stone and the air around him solidifying as if like gelatin. Kreia stilled too, yet in the congealing amber of current time, Eden moved through the world like honey, slowly yet slippery, sliding into the hangar bay as the moments dragged out. Another chill ran through him, a memory Atton still only half-remembered resurfacing as he watched Eden move almost normally while the world around him and within him slowed – a memory of him leaden and heavy, unable to move as a silver-plated droid waltzed into the med bay on Peragus, watching him for breath within an inch of his face before disappearing just as Atton slipped out of consciousness.
In that moment, Atton relived the memory within the fraction of a second, but he also sensed something else – a question, an errant thought, but one that was not his own.
How?
He'd heard nothing, and yet somehow, he knew this question belonged to Kreia.
He wanted to move his head in the old woman's direction to confirm his theory, but he couldn't. Atton was still frozen in the moment as Eden had willed it. Before long, Eden made it to the end of the hangar and back again, time resuming as she approached their position. Atton nearly gasped for breath as if he'd been held underwater while the color drained from Kreia's face.
"A trick I learned from a… a friend," Eden muttered as soon as she saw Kreia's pallor. "I'm surprised it worked, honestly."
A trick? Atton thought. What the hell kind of trick was that?
He knew Jedi could manipulate the world around them, but he'd never once seen nor heard of one literally slowing time. But the Sith, however…
"A mystery for another time," Kreia said under her breath before sighing and relaxing her vibrosword. "I take it there is no real threat."
Now it was Atton's turn to be at the receiving end of Kreia's ire, the woman looking at him with a sneer.
"We're not alone?" Kreia echoed his words from earlier as she placed a handless arm on her hip.
"Well, Atton wasn't completely wrong," Eden offered. "The hangar's empty but there's a body stuck in a service door at the far side. Hence that, well, y'know…"
Eden gestured vaguely and it didn't take long for Atton to get her drift.
"That wonderful squelching sound?" Atton finished for her. Eden turned to him and nodded, a wince crossing her face.
"Yeah, that. Looks like they were stuck there on purpose, though by who I can't tell. I imagine it was maybe a means of escape, or entrapment."
"So, we truly are not alone," Kreia said quietly, musing. "Did you glean anything else from this place?"
Eden shook her head.
"Didn't give myself a chance to, figured I'd wait until I gave myself enough distance from that door before pausing any longer."
"Smart," Kreia commended. "I can do so as well, but if you wished a bit of practice-"
"Is now really the best time to be practicing anything?" Atton interrupted though both women ignored him.
"I can manage," Eden replied to Kreia. She closed her eyes, the energy around them all stilling though not quite in the way it had before. Before felt as if they were being encased in ice, frozen in place, whereas now it simply felt like each of them shared in a long-bated breath. Eden scrunched up her face, her brows furrowing as she turned her head slightly, as if honing in on a signal. Atton found himself internally repeating sequences but listening as well, sensing some other well-placed frag-mines within the room beyond as well something just at the other end of the adjoining corridor, though what he wasn't sure.
"Wait," Eden said, her eyes shooting open as she raised a hand. "Wait here."
Eden retreated into the hangar again, not willing for time to slow in her wake. She approached one of the massive machines huddled in the dark, extending her hand as if approaching a wild animal in an attempt to gain its trust. The machine lit up at her touch, a series of sensors lighting up in a sea of green and blue as she ran a hand along the surface of the metal plating, eventually finding her way towards a command panel. Atton and Kreia exchanged glances again, their earlier disagreements melting away to make room for shared confusion as Eden keyed in an unseen sequence and nodding to herself after examining the readout before returning to them at the mouth of the hangar.
"All these battle droids are operational, but only within the last few days," Eden said, glancing back at them as if the machines might hear, or decide to charge. "They're set to security but also to stun on sight. Why none of them have attacked us, I have no idea. Whoever did that felt threatened and is likely whoever set the doors to seal immediately upon being breached."
At this, she gestured her head toward the far end of the room where the service door was still attempting to close over the torso of an unseen individual, the wet squelching sound echoing unnervingly in the space around them.
"Whoever they are, let's rid them of this torment." Kreia said, finally moving past Eden and into the hangar proper. "It's not my place to discern whether some stranger deserves peace in death, but the sound would at least no longer be an assault on my ears."
With that, Atton could agree, though the look of quiet shock that crossed Eden's face at Kreia's words rang true with him too. He kept up the rear of the search party as Eden eventually followed Kreia to the far door, glancing around at the massive war machines that lined the room, more afraid of them than he was of whoever programmed them or the door they neared. Kreia extended a hand, no doubt about to Force the body about until it no longer barred their way forward, only Eden stopped her.
"I want to see something first," Eden said, her voice barely an octave above a whisper. She approached the doorway and stooped down. Instead of moving the body from its place, Kreia instead willed the Force to stop the door instead, allowing Eden the space to examine the body between its eagerly closing panels.
"Who are they?" Atton found himself asking, the question forming in his mind just as the words crossed his lips. He hadn't meant to voice his interest, still carefully planning his eventual exit as soon as they came upon a space-worthy ship.
"Golden Company," Eden mused. "Again."
She turned to Kreia, still kneeling over the bloodied torso of their anonymous predecessor.
"Just like on Citadel Station," Kreia said, rubbing her chin. "And not a coincidence, I'm afraid."
"Golden Company?" Atton asked, shaking his head. "Again?"
The Golden Company was a high-end mercenary outfit operating primarily out of Hutt space. He'd run a few drop-offs for them in his smuggling days but had never managed to secure a permanent position with the company, not that he wanted to. The Golden Company took jobs from the richest clients, mostly, the sort that liked to haggle price only after deals were agreed upon, bringing up grievances where none were to be had, as was often the case when rich folk were forced to fork up credits. Atton wasn't surprised but as a result also wasn't heartbroken that his connections to the outfit had led nowhere despite the possibility for larger jobs and a similarly larger paycheck. He may have been set for life if things had worked out, but he knew the hassle wasn't worth the cash.
"Found a few of their mercs outside the Ithorian Compound when all hell broke loose," Eden explained, extracting an oblong gold coin from the body before finally removing it from the doorway's path. "Not sure why they were there, but-"
"I can think of a few reasons," Atton offered not-so-suggestively, hoping Eden picked up on his, though Kreia cut him short before he could elaborate.
"We should keep moving," the old woman said, "I believe that won't be the last of them."
Atton shivered, knowing she was right. He could feel it now. Atton still wasn't sure just how sprawling this particular base was, but he knew they were far from the last people to step foot in this place.
"After you," Kreia continued, nodding at Eden.
Eden glanced at Atton, as if for help, before doing as Kreia asked. Atton swallowed, running through coordinates as Kreia glanced at him briefly before following in Eden's wake.
The sooner I get out of here, the better.
"What do you sense?" Kreia asked quietly, her voice directed at Eden, her temperament almost soft. Attn wanted to writhe inside his skin.
"There's something…" Eden began, her hand outstretched, but Kreia cut her off.
"Look inward before you look outward," the woman instructed, guiding Eden's hand with her own after sheathing her vibrosword. "The answer will be easier to find."
Atton rolled his eyes. None of this made any sense to him, nor did he care. He held his blasters aloft and at the ready, waiting for either one of his ex-Jedi companions to say something or do something before he simply lost all patience.
"I'd try that service door, to the left," Atton sighed, annoyed and indignant. He waved a blaster in its general direction further down the hall. "There's a weird clicking sound coming from that way, might be worth looking into."
Kreia shot him a look, and if he could see her eyes he imagined they'd be shooting daggers. Eden looked his way as well, though her gaze was far more forgiving, her eyes going wide at the thought before redirecting her attention to the door in question. Eden approached it and closed her eyes.
"You're right, there's something stuck behind here," she said, nearing the door with caution. Eden pressed a cautious palm against the access panel and allowed the door to jitter and start, trying to close errantly before finally opening to her whim.
"What is that?" Atton asked as he neared.
"It's a… well, it was a droid."
Eden knelt over what Atton soon realized was a pile of molten metal. Kreia neared as well, her sword still sheathed but her energy clearly alert and on edge, her apprehension apparent in the air around them. Atton listed off more hyperspace routes as he approached.
"Unless someone was wielding a droid arm, this damage was done by another droid," Eden mused, her face scrunched as she examined the mound.
"You said the facility's machines were active, right?" Atton asked. "What's so weird about that?"
Eden sighed, turning her head this way and that as she considered the molten pile still smoldering before them.
"Are the Golden Company known for using droids of their own?" she asked. "Because either this was friendly fire, or this was something else entirely."
No. The Golden Company was not known for using droids, though that didn't mean the idea was entirely out of the question. Atton considered it, rolling the thought around in his head expecting to come up with a witty answer. Unfortunately, he came up with nothing. He shrugged.
"We should keep moving," Kreia urged. "The mystery will reveal itself in time."
As much as Atton wanted to sneer at the notion or the mere idea of Kreia talking, he knew the woman was right. He simply shook his head as they each carefully stepped over the ex-HK, the smell of its demise hanging in the air.
"Another body," Eden announced as she entered the adjoining room. It appeared to be a research lab, various machines lined with test tubes cluttering the space, their contents now littering the floor in a flurry of duraglass and liquified lost assets. "Shot point blank."
Atton and Kreia reached the body in question at the same time, leaning over the corpse in unison. A single bloodied hole marred the otherwise pristine face of the turquoise Duros looking blankly up at them, appearing bored if anything. Eden raised a hand and closed their eyelids, biting her lip as she glanced about the room.
"If I didn't know any better, I'd say this was the work of a-"
Eden paused. Her eyes fixed somewhere on the far end of the lab, hurrying towards her quarry with her weapons drawn.
Atton and Kreia exchanged glances again, shrugging in unison this time before following Eden once more.
"An assassin droid," Eden finished, pointing her staff at the sorry end of an HK model lying damaged, sparks flying all over the floor in a corner of the lab. Its legs had been ripped from its central core, an arm twisted beyond repair behind its back as the other reached desperately for the abandoned blaster beside it just a centimeter out of its reach. "Care to explain yourself?"
"Irritated Declaration: There you are. It has been incredibly difficult to track you down, Jedi," the droid blurbled through a crackling voice modulator, its intelligence core clearly damaged. "Quick Clarification: But now that I have found you, and I hope that we can facilitate communications."
"That's basically what she just asked you, idiot," Atton urged as he neared with both blasters aimed at the assassin droid's head. Its eyes flickered, as if registering the threat, before turning to Eden again as if it still had a leg to stand on. "Answer her question or I'll-"
"Unnecessary Addendum: Let us put an end to our hostilities," it added, still reaching for its blaster. Eden kicked it out of the way.
"Did you shoot down our shuttle?" Eden asked. "Or is there someone else here?"
"Unnecessary Clarification: We merely wished to cripple your vessel. Once we tracked your coordinates, we were able to deploy several droids to this location."
"We?" Eden hissed, shoving her staff into the throat of the droid, metal clanging against metal. "Who's we?"
"Affirmative Statement: My colleagues and I, of course. A squad of us were dispatched once our predecessor clearly failed to bring you in from Anchorhead, losing his signal after tracking him to the Peragus Mining Facility before its ultimate demise."
We? Him?
"Cute," Eden muttered, "But who sent you?"
"Mirthful Admission: Oh, I cannot disclose that information. It is classified."
"Classified, my ass," Eden staked her staff through the droid's throat, dismantling the head from the neck. Its torso sparked and twitched as Eden deftly yanked its metallic skull off clean. Before Atton could process what she'd done and before Kreia could comment, Eden kicked the intelligence module up with her foot and caught it with her hand, prying open the panels until it revealed a series of chips and wires within. Before Eden could work her magic, the entire head burst into electrical flames, igniting its innards and fizzling into dust and ash. Eden dropped the mechanical head as quickly as she'd severed it.
"I feel we may find more of these machines within," Kreia said quietly. "It mentioned we, did it not?"
"It did," Eden sighed as she kicked the assassin droid's head clear across the room with a frustrated grunt. "Let's go find them."
3960 BBY, Dxun
Agent Antares
He'd scouted plenty of places before. In his career, in his life. Even just for fun. Exploration was in his blood.
Would you like to see the galaxy? His father had asked, his first memory. He recalled road trips and hikes around their small village before then, but this was the first concrete memory he had, his father looking upon him with more hope in his eyes than he ever recalled seeing in the man after. Once the war is over, we're leaving this planet and going wherever the stars will take us.
And so they had. It had just been them, then. Once Exar Kun was brought to heel on the moon of Yavin IV, the opposing army led by his very own dark apprentice Ulic Qel-Droma, it was once again safe to traverse the spacial highways his father had traveled in his youth, first taking his son to places he'd been and remembered fondly before finally venturing to places unknown.
It was no wonder he would later enlist in the Republic Army, becoming a Cavalry Scout during a time of peace. Exploring the galaxy and getting paid for it, eh? His father had remarked from his bedside, his limbs worn out and unusable after decades of travel and the hard labor he'd endured in the years before that. His father wasn't one for medical enhancements, the medicine still primitive back then and likely to turn sour within a few years. The man was content though, happy with what he'd seen and hopeful for his son to discover more. You send me back pictures and holovids of everything you see, y'hear? Undiscovered worlds and such.
And so he did. Some of his cavalry mates joked about it, affectionately calling him their local reporter. Many of his mates even volunteered to pose for pictures, often acting as a model for scale against vast valleys or towering monuments.
Their work hadn't been vigorous in the beginning, but it had been sprawling. The central galaxy was still expanding then. Many Outer Rim worlds were looking to join the Republic, eager to be considered among their ranks and benefit from its protection in the wake of what scholars were starting to call the Great Sith War. It was his job to scout the uncharted regions of such places and deliver detailed maps that would serve as a valuable resource in the creation of new trade routes and outposts. His photographs came in handy then, too. He even picked up cartography, mapping out new regions with his holotransmitter as well as documenting what he saw in photos and videos, secretly sending copies to his father as well.
But then the Mandalorians came.
They attacked seemingly random portions of the Outer Rim first, though coincidentally right where he was stationed. His squad had been one of the first to see them, their warnings one of the first ignored. The rest of the galaxy hadn't been as concerned with it as much as he and his fellow footmen were from the beginning, but the Republic eventually saw the dangers once it began to encroach on their burgeoning enterprise, worlds about to come under their jurisdiction suddenly under attack. It was another decade before the Jedi joined the fray. Or at least some of them did.
Scouting for the sake of expansion proved to be different than scouting to spy on the enemy, to find the environmental upper hand. But even then, the job hadn't changed too much. At least not until he was stationed on the Onderon moon of Dxun.
This is where they say Exar Kun was turned to the Dark Side, some soldiers would mutter around the campfire like a ghost story. You think any of that's true?
Some would agree. Some would argue. Others would say nothing, only to jump at the slightest sound when it was their turn to keep watch that night.
Had it been any other forest on any other moon, the others would laugh and tease, blaming any jitters on lack of nerve alone. But this place was different. This place felt wrong. The trees were too thick and the earth was too damp. The jungle was too dark, and sound didn't travel here the way it did anywhere else. The wilderness swallowed it here just as it did the sun, the direction indiscernible without the aid of a compass, and even then it wasn't uncommon for equipment to simply stop working.
Even the beasts here were different – relentless, ruthless, and unlike any predatory animals he'd ever encountered on any other uncharted planet. There were hardly any prey animals either, which was notably stranger, though that only lead to proverbial allegories to the Mandalorians they hunted through the jungle brush.
"When was the last time the others checked in?" Vyn asked him through the din while on what had begun as a routine scouting mission. "A while, right?"
He shook his head, glancing at his holotransmitter as well as the time, knowing that neither his memory nor the device synced up.
"At least an hour," he answered, stopping once he did the math. "That's far too long."
"I hate this place," Vyn complained with a sigh, running a hand over her violet lekku, her fingers anxiously running the length before twirling one of the ends as she often did when she was anxious. "I really do."
"You and me both," he said. He pulled a holomap from his pocket, the screen flickering to his dismay before ultimately displaying nothing. He slapped it against his thigh and glanced at it again. An image flashed across the screen before dissolving to blackness. "I think I saw something up ahead. A structure, maybe."
"A settlement?" Vyn asked as she approached, taking large laborious steps through the underbrush until she reached his location. Beads of sweat dotted her brow, one descending towards her eyes before she flicked it away with an anxious finger. "Or a camp?"
"Neither, I think," he said. "The image is gone but it seemed… permanent."
The ghostly image he'd seen had been moderately sized and roughly square, though nothing through the underbrush in his immediate vicinity betrayed anything other than dense jungle existing nearby.
"Let me check this other thing," Vyn said, pulling a bulky device from the back of her belt. The thing was unwieldy, the sight of it almost sending him into a fit of soft laughter before he caught the severe look Vyn shot him after reading his mind. She powered on the device and after a series of odd clicking sounds, she took a few steps forward and beckoned him to follow.
"Hey, it's working now," he said, his holotransmitter powering on again. We must be leaving one of those damn pockets, he thought, thinking back to the myriad times equipment seemed to suddenly stop working for seemingly no reason at all. Lagging and lapses in equipment were commonplace in his line of work, especially in the uncharted areas of the galaxy, but this place was different. Here, things would appear and reappear. Equipment would die despite being at full battery before powering on again at odd intervals.
Just as he suspected, the map reappeared on his screen and betrayed… nothing. It picked up the vegetation around them as well as a water source nearby, but nothing else. The structure he saw earlier was gone.
"What do you see?" Vyn asked.
"Nothing," he said, surprised, shaking his head. "What about you?"
"I'm… I'm not sure."
Vyn continued on, her pace picking up as they neared a clearing. Before he knew it, the jungle opened up to a wide meadow, a stone ruin clear in the distance.
"None of this is coming up on my readings," Vyn said, her voice hardly above a whisper as her eyes scanned a straight swath of stone wall that shot up vertically from the underbrush just ahead. "This doesn't make any sense."
He shook his head.
"And whatever I saw earlier, it wasn't this big," he said. "What do you s'pose it is?"
"Only one way to find out, right?"
Vyn shrugged.
"Maybe we should wait for the others, just in case-"
Before he could finish his sentence, a rustling something fierce interrupted him, heavy footfalls fast approaching.
"Looks like we don't have a choice!" Vyn grabbed his arm and off they ran into the tall grasses.
The further they ran, the closer the wall loomed before them, its façade severe and smooth without an entrance in sight.
"Now what?" he asked, risking a glance over his shoulder. A blur of scales was close on their tail and nearer than he'd like.
"Just keep running!"
Vyn led him around the wall perimeter, the sound of their assailant crashing into the stone as they took a hard right turn once they reached the wall. He hazarded another glance back, relief flooding his adrenaline-filled stomach as he saw their pursuer lose precious ground as Vyn pulled him onward.
"In here!" Vyn yanked him sideways, nearly pulling his arm off as she darted into an alcove he hadn't noticed tucked into the perimeter wall. She clamped a hand over his mouth, urging his heaving breaths to quiet as the beast slowed ahead of them, realizing it had lost its quarry before slowly circling back around. Its wet nose sniffled loudly in their direction. He held his breath and closed his eyes, feeling Vyn do the same, an eternity passing before they eventually heard the creature wander off again. And the jungle was quiet once more.
For a moment.
As soon as he and Vyn released simultaneous sighs, a waterfall of rain poured down, falling all at once and then in perpetuity.
"That happens a lot around here," he sighed as he finally turned to Vyn and nodded. "Thanks by the way."
"What are partners for?" she smiled. They'd been with each other since the genocide on Cathar, the woman easily feeling like the little sister he never had as one of the first Jedi to join the fray. He'd met a few such practitioners in passing during his travels, but Vyn was the first to become a friend. "Looks like we may be stuck here for a while. No readings still, right?"
He glanced at his holotransmitter and shook his head.
"Do you sense anything, though?" he asked, still unsure how the Force worked.
Vyn didn't look hopeful.
"Nothing. Might as well look around. Could be something useful…"
It was their job after all – to scout the jungles, get a lay of the land and document the terrain, as well as utilize any resources they might happen to find. He knew it was only part of the job as Vyn suggested, but something didn't feel right.
"This doesn't look Mandalorian, that's for sure," he said, running his hand along the stone as they walked deeper inside. Beyond the alcove they took refuge in, the outer wall gave way to an inner courtyard. A smaller wall sat within it, and just beyond that stood a massive structure built of the same dark stone.
"No, it doesn't."
There was nothing of note in the courtyard other than an odd feeling, though they only gleaned what they could from the enclosed perimeter the alcove gave way to. The grass was overgrown within, though, covering what seemed to be an old path that cut through the yard. No one had been here for a very, very long time.
Vyn only stopped once she reached the end of the enclosed hallway, turning to face him after glancing back out at the relentless rain.
"You've heard of Exar Kun, right?" Vyn asked, her voice quiet but her eyes sharp. He nodded.
"How much do you know of Exar Kun, though?"
"Not much. Just that he was a Jedi once and went bad. Soldiers back at the camp mentioned he had a history with this place."
Vyn nodded, stroking one of her lekku again.
"That's about right," she said. "Not much else to it, but-"
"You think this might be the place?"
"Possibly."
Vyn shook her head, her shoulders slumping as she sighed.
"Could just be my nerves though. The Dark Side has an… energy to it. It's hard to explain. It feels like an absence. But also like something slightly off-putting but not quite, like alcohol. Sweet but easy to lose yourself, hence the telltale temptation. It feels dark, and somewhat –"
"Cold?"
Vyn's gaze locked on his and she nodded, eyes wide.
"You feel it too?" her voice was small, barely audible above the rain. He nodded.
And it wasn't the rain that made him feel cold as it so often did after nightfall. It was something he felt deep in his bones. A cannok bellowed in the distance, its voice ragged and angry, its rage emphasizing whatever ill feeling took hold of him now.
Vyn sighed again, deeper this time, and leaned against the wall behind her.
"Maybe we should leave, we could always come ba-"
Just as Vyn was about to make a plea for them to be rid of this place, the structure argued opposite, a hidden doorway appearing at Vyn's side as her shoulder pressed an unseen mechanism. She nearly fell in but he caught her arm and helped her back to her feet, his eyes fixed on the opening chasm before their very eyes. Vyn turned as she righted herself, her gaze unblinking into the void.
"We should see what's inside," he said, though every molecule in his body and his mind told him the very opposite. His mouth and limbs felt detached from him, as if possessed.
Without awaiting an answer, he walked into the shadow only for it to swallow him whole, the wall closing behind him.
"Vyn?" he asked, snapping out of the spell. He spun around but found nothing but solid earth. Earth? But I thought it was stone…
He reached for his glowrod but he found he didn't have hands with which to reach for it. He looked down into the darkness around him as he imagined himself turning his fists palm over wrist, but instead saw nothing. He felt nothing. He hung weightless in the void of wherever, suddenly unsure of who he was or who he might have been. The memory of the jungle and the mission and their near brush with death fast slipping from his mind as time reduced to nothing, his thoughts dissolving like salt in water, changing its contents for having been there but also no longer what it once was.
Then, he heard a voice.
Forfeit your lives to us, the true inheritors of the Universe.
It wasn't just a singular voice, but a chorus of them. Cacophonous in its disharmony, and steadfast in its message.
Revel in our glory and be reborn in the undying Empire to come.
The nothingness spread, its emptiness expanding further into naught. Only it was not empty.
It was hungry.
We feed the Force and Force feeds us.
He felt it – that clawing hunger, yearning, and wanting without end. Whatever remained of his consciousness stretched thin, a ghost of itself, but a sliver remained, knowing what it felt like to lack. The emptiness echoed within him. He wanted to feed it and be fed.
Feed our Empire and you may live on forever.
He wanted to. He ached to hand it over, whatever he had to give. Whatever remained of him began to fade away, the dream dissolving into nonbeing. It felt right at first, like falling asleep, that sweet surrender…
Until he felt it – life again, but white-hot. Like sunlight. Slow and steady.
And warm. Oh, so warm.
You send me back pictures and holovids of everything you see, y'hear? His father's voice echoed from the nothingness, giving the present weight once more. Undiscovered worlds and such.
His father's smile lit up his mind's eye, the fondness of the memory sending him further from the icy void and out of oblivion.
The galaxy's your oyster, Orex. Don't you ever forget that.
"Hey! Hey! Can you hear me? Are you alright?"
His father's voice faded into Vyn's harrowed pleas, his eyes blinking awake in a room he'd never seen.
"Wh-what happened?" he grunted.
He sat up but immediately regretted it, a splitting headache striking him the moment he did. He raised a hand to his temple and shut his eyes tight.
"Where am I?" he asked again.
He realized he was sitting now, and on a cold stone floor of all places, blinking lights surrounding him and hounding his peripheral vision. Vyn swam into view as he slowly registered his surroundings, one of her violet hands checking his forehead for a fever while the other checked his pulse.
"Thank the Maker you're alright," she said through an exhausted smile. Sweat lined her brow and the woman looked worse for wear. "We've been searching the place for days-"
"Days?" he echoed. "Days?!"
"Please relax, it's alright now."
He looked around.
Other scouts milled about, shooting him odd glances as they shoveled unseen items into boxes, others trying to use to the myriad of foreign equipment that lay around them. He sat up straighter once his vision stopped swimming, the tech around him in the small chamber unlike anything he'd ever seen before.
"Please, stay still," another voice said. He stilled as directed, though not out of any sense of obedience. It took a moment for him to place her voice, but once he did as he was told, her face came into view.
"General Valen," he uttered, attempting a salute despite his still being on the floor. "I-"
"Do you remember anything of how you got all the way down here?" Vyn asked, the worry clear on her face as she interrupted his decorum. "Or anything at all, really?"
It had all happened within the span of a moment as well as a century. There were no words to describe what he felt, or what he remembered, and the moments before timelessness swallowed him were still coming back in waves – all at once before receding from the shore again, left only with foam.
"We can ask him again later," General Valen whispered to Vyn quietly, though he could hear her full well. The Jedi tucked a short strand of jet-black hair behind her ear and glanced at him apologetically before turning to Vyn again. "We need to get this to Revan right away."
She glanced beside them and back to Vyn who nodded fervently. Both women knelt at his side as the rest of the room remained as busy as any loading dock, by the sights and sounds of it, items being hauled into boxes as if they were a warehouse preparing for a planet-wide shipment. But the item beside them was different. It lay on the floor just at the edge of his hand, as if he'd been holding it, its warmth still fresh in his palm.
It was a crystal – rough-hewn but pyramidal in shape, a sharp spire ascending from a three-sided base. It was dark but bright, somehow, its color near-black but also luminous, as if it housed an entire galaxy of shining stars within.
He did not recall ever seeing it before this moment, and yet he knew it intimately, as if it were his own still-beating heart that he'd wrenched from the depths of his ribcage. Looking at it both again and for the first time, he yearned for it, desperately wanted to hold it and clutch it close to his chest. His fingers twitched, and General Valen laid a steady hand on his arm with a concerned expression on her painfully young face.
"I was serious about staying still," she said, her green eyes flashing as she gently held him down. Vyn wrapped the crystal in a munitions cloth and placed it in a crate alongside a few other scouts, each of their faces grim. "We should take him back to camp, run some bloodwork just in case."
General Valen held his gaze, and he gazed back, unblinking.
"That sound alright to you, Agent Antares?" she asked, a certain cordiality overcoming her features as she flashed him a forced smile.
"Sure," he said, confusion flooding him as reality came crashing back. "Thanks."
His father had been dead for a few years now, but even if the man were still alive, Orex knew he wouldn't have told him about this. Not this place nor what he saw.
"Revan will know how to take care of this," General Valen assured him further, taking hold of the hand he'd reached for the crystal with just as Vyn packed it away. General Valen's fingers squeezed his. He wasn't sure if this was meant to calm him or placate him. Perhaps it was both. "You'll be fine. Trust me."
An unspoken fear laced her promise, but the girl had been right. He had been fine, at least for a time.
Revan never did get back to them about what they'd found. And that never sat well with him.
Nor what happened after.
3951 BBY, Telos IV
Eden
"You will re-familiarize yourself with it," Kreia said calmly at her side. "It is difficult, I know. But ease will come with time."
Eden's eyes were still closed, her senses attempting to get a read of the remainder of the military base but coming up empty. Or at least adjacent to empty and not in a way she liked.
"Not to mention you are likely sapped after that display back there at the entrance, slowing time and all."
There was some mirth in Kreia's voice as well as a certain sourness, a bite of criticism at the back of her throat.
"It was just something I'd… sensed," Eden admitted, telling the truth of it even if she wasn't sure what she'd done wrong exactly, only that she'd repeated it on Citadel Station with favorable results. "I never learned it. To be honest, I thought I might've gleaned it from you, considering our bond and all."
Kreia shook her head.
"We can dissect it later," Kreia said curtly though she placed a calming hand on Eden's shoulder. "You can open your eyes now. I will assist from here."
"Are you sure?" Eden asked, looking at Kreia now as she loomed over her shoulder. The woman was smiling softly though Eden sensed another unspoken sentiment hanging in the air between them. Kreia said nothing, nor did she speak inside Eden's mind. "I can try again."
"I am more in tune with my faculties, it would only be fair given our circumstances. It would be best if we get out of here sooner rather than later."
Kreia nodded at Eden once more, assuring her that the changing of the guard was indeed alright, and closed her eyes in Eden's stead. Atton hung back awkwardly, pretending to scan the room with great interest.
After accidentally dismantling the HK on the first floor, they'd traversed two more levels of the hidden base and found nothing other than more smoldering scrap metal and loitering military droids. But the place felt less than empty, a few more dead bodies littered the facility to Eden's dismay, sensing only more death whenever Kreia asked her to reach out through the Force and get a feel for where they should head next, gleaning only the dead's final moments and nothing pertaining to the remainder of the base. Some were Golden Company, some were Czerka. Some were barely discernable. But she knew they were not alone, droids withstanding. Eden just couldn't place it.
"Ah yes, I see," Kreia said eventually, a small smile overcoming her face, different from the smile she shot Eden moments ago. This smile was smug but endearingly so, indicating that Kreia had found her quarry and knew exactly where to move next. "We are getting close."
"Close?" Eden echoed, glancing back at Atton to see if he'd heard. Whether he had or was pretending not to, Eden couldn't tell.
"Yes, though I fear we should perhaps part ways for the time being."
"Part ways?" Eden repeated, Atton betraying his nonchalance and suddenly appearing interested. "What do you mean?"
"It is a matter of technicality, I am afraid," Kreia said. "Just as with the other doors in the facility, someone has rigged that far door to close immediately upon entering. Unlike the previous doors, however, I sense more traps beyond that are perhaps meant to stop our meddling should you try to leave. Yet through that very door is exactly where we need to go. Not only that, but I can sense more of those mines our resident pilot sensed earlier just beyond it. You will not only need to disable those mines, but you will need someone to allow you back out of that room should the person holing up inside decide to do something rash upon seeing you approach."
"Someone's still alive?" Atton asked as he rounded on them now, his blasters still aloft but his interest piqued. Kreia chuckled lightly and nodded.
"Indeed, and I have a feeling you will want to hear what they have to say."
Eden looked about the room, trying not to think of her time inspecting similar facilities at Alek's side so she could instead get a read on the place as Kreia had. Only Eden came up empty.
Ease will come with time, the woman had said.
The ease had been second nature once, but long ago. Eden wasn't sure she believed that would ever be true again.
Eden and Atton locked eyes, nodding once their gazes met, and side-by-side, in-step, the two of them approached the door Kreia indicated, weapons at the ready.
"It will be some time before you come upon them," Kreia called from across the room, approaching the command console nestled in the corner. "There are a few chambers separating you from the last remaining survivor of this place."
Eden nodded and swallowed hard.
Kreia took command of the computer console and after a moment urged the doors that Eden and Atton stood in front of to open and bid them entrance. Panels slid into the wall at Kreia's beckoning, a dark abyss awaiting them on the other side.
Eden and Atton stepped over the threshold and into the darkness, shadow consuming them just as the doors at their back swooshed shut with a loud metallic thud.
"Shit," Atton breathed, producing a glowrod from his pocket. Eden did the same.
"What?" Eden asked, almost immediately. Atton only laughed.
"The witch was right. This hall is littered with mines," he said, already kneeling down a mere meter away from where she stood, placing the glowrod between his teeth as he worked.
"You didn't sense it before?" Eden whispered.
Atton muttered something indecipherable before Eden offered to relieve him of his glowrod, plucking the device carefully from his canines.
"Have you seen how thick these doors are?" Atton said as he huffed a breath.
Eden was about to retort when she noticed the faint hum she'd heard earlier in the forest. The adjoining room had been silent, even when Eden reached out through the Force.
"You're right, but that still doesn't explain why-"
Eden approached the door again, the effervescent glow following her as she moved. Atton barked an annoyed "Hey! I need to see what I'm doing!" as she left him in the half-dark, but what she felt when her palm touched the metal chilled her to her very core.
"Nothing."
"What? I can't see over here, unless you're cool with being blown up, in which case-"
Eden interrupted him.
"Through the Force," Eden clarified, now touching both hands to the door, feeling every inch of it as if the feeling might increase or dissipate. But still she felt – "Nothing. I sense nothing."
"Kreia said it would take time," Atton said, motioning for Eden to return to his side again to light his workspace. "Don't sweat it, it's no big deal."
So you were listening, she thought smally, the notion squirreling itself beside her larger, more pressing thoughts, the hint of a laugh forming at the base of her throat before fear overtook it completely.
"No, you don't get it," Eden said, finally pulling away. Eden laughed anyway, a light airy laugh, but not of the caught you in the act variety as it started out as, instead dissolving into the this can't be happening sort. "When I couldn't figure out where to go next just now, it's not that I didn't sense anything. I could get a feel for the room, I could sense us and our energies. Not to mention-"
What had been tripping Eden up the most were the memories still hanging a little too ripely in this place for her liking. Through the Force she could feel the smaller aches of the more recent deaths – the sharp finality of it preceded briefly by a wave of surprise, shock overcoming everything in the end, unfortunately overshadowing any information she might have found useful – as well as the older aches, too. The deeper wounds of Telos still wept within these walls, the metal housing whatever hurt the planet itself was now working to move past from, preserved as if in a museum.
"Not to mention what?" Atton asked as he resumed his work at disabling the first of what Eden presumed were many mines.
"Never mind," she said. "The important thing being that so long as someone is – how do I say this?" Eden paused, sucking on her teeth. "So long as someone is… plugged in to the Force, you sense something similar to this, a constant undercurrent of energy, in varying levels. But when I place my hand on that door, I feel nothing. Absolutely nothing."
Eden looked at the door again through the gloom of the room, careful to keep their two glowrods fixed on Atton so he could allow them passage.
"Touching that thing makes my mind feel like it had these last nine years," she added thoughtfully, her voice quiet and faraway as she unwittingly thought of a quiet market day on Tatooine, content to mind her droids and nothing else. "Quiet."
"Is… that what it feels like?" Atton asked, pausing. If Eden didn't know any better, she would have admitted that the man sounded genuinely curious. "Quiet? Without the Force, I mean."
She nodded, verbally affirming "Yes," quietly once she realized Atton couldn't see her gesture.
"Not sure I've ever known quiet," the man mused with a quiet laugh as he finally got up, only to move a few paces forward and start the process all over again. "My brain's always buzzing."
Eden wasn't sure if Atton was purely making conversation or if he was sincerely uncomfortable. Perhaps he was both.
"It was nice while it lasted," Eden said, not surprised at the revelation but in her admission of it. "I didn't appreciate the quiet when it was all I had."
"So it goes," Atton shrugged. "What I don't get is why you don't just leave."
"Leave?"
Eden could ask the same of Atton.
"You were gone for nearly a decade, right? The Outer Rim's large, sprawling. Not hard to disappear in. Seems like you've done it before."
She had. Plenty of times. Eden had run into people from her past before, too, and it was never difficult to avoid their questing stares or questions if they managed to recognize her through her many iterations, aliases akin to disguises if not different unexplored skins of who she might have been if she were being honest with herself – which she often wasn't.
"Not this time," she said. "I don't think I can outrun this. Plus, I… don't think I want to."
She was surprised to hear it just as much as she was to say it.
Atton paused and eventually nodded, rubbing his palms together before dusting dirt off his trousers, rising again only to advance a few more steps to tackle the next mine.
"What about you?" Eden asked. "Sounds like you've had your fill of war. Why stick around for this long?"
At this, Atton truly paused. He remained kneeling, his hands poised over what Eden felt was the next explosive set to detonate should either one of them take another ill-advised step, thankful that both of them were more the wiser.
"I like feeling useful," Atton laughed a hollow laugh. "Does that make me a bad person?"
He glanced at Eden, flashing her a self-deprecating grin - though a charming one at that - before returning to his work. Whether the man wanted a genuine answer or was simply speaking hypothetically, Eden wasn't sure, so she didn't grace him with a response.
"Still, something strange about that door though," Eden said, glancing back at door. Had all the doors in this facility been like this? Did Kreia realize?
"I guess," Atton added, his work quickening before he moved onto the next. "To be honest, I didn't think this particular skillset of mine would come in handy so soon. Especially not after Peragus."
"Peragus?"
"That place was asking to be blown up," Atton said. "I only got the job without prior training because I had experience with explosive material during the war. I have a certificate, actually." He laughed. "Not much work for a bomber pilot without bombs to be dropped."
"Guess not," she added, feeling stupid for even speaking. Atton had disabled four mines now and counting, and Eden was still standing beside him dumbly, glancing back at the door Kreia had promised to open again when they needed it.
"Not unlike this place," Atton continued. "Whoever's holed up in here must be desperate. Smart, no doubt, but desperate."
Eden wondered what use there was in lining an entire hall with mines just as the memory of the facility resurfaced in her mind's eye as if she'd been there, bombs raining down on the surface outside and eating up all vegetation in sight. She didn't know why, but this hall's defenses felt like a retaliation, a response, to what had happened before.
They weren't here when it happened, she'd gleaned suddenly, as if from nothing. Eden was struck by a sense that whoever they were approaching was not a native to this facility. Unfamiliar with its history as well as its purpose, just as perplexed as she was when she placed her hand on the door at her back. Force dampening, perhaps?
"We're in the clear," Atton announced eventually, standing and stretching until his spine produced a series of pops and cracks. "We should be good to move on."
Move on.
How could she? Even if she wanted to, Eden's tenuous connection to the Force only wanted to further tether her to the past.
"Sure," she lied, knowing there was no way forward otherwise. She tossed Atton his glowrod and elongated her Echani staff, poising it ahead of them. "You ready to explore more uncharted territory?"
Atton snatched his glowrod from the air without blinking, his face illuminated as he caught the device, its glow filtering ghost-like through his closed fist.
"Do we have a choice?" Atton sighed.
Did they ever?