A/N: RIP James Earl Jones. Your voice gave us the villain of a generation and so much more. You will be missed.

Chapter 101

Watching Asajj Ventress striding through the assembled males and evaluating them was interesting and disturbing in equal manner.

It was like a farmer looking over her cattle, deciding which should breed, go back to pasture or go off to the slaughterhouse. She stood in front of each male, grabbed his arm by the bicep, the leg, then moved on. On occasion she even punched a male hard in the stomach; the guy folded in half, groaning in pain but managed to right himself after a few moments. Asajj nodded with approval but moved on.

"Pretty," she commented to another male, then grabbed him by the neck with a single hand. Most species had vital veins there, so naturally he seized up and struggled to breathe. "Looks aren't everything though." She let go and allowed the dathomiri to wheeze on the floor.

She stopped at another male who stood half-a-head shorter than her own height. "Too small," she said before abruptly push-kicking him out of the formation.

Her next punch also left another brother wheezing on his knees, unable to get up after a few seconds, "Too weak. Tano, your turn."

I walked to each remaining brother, put my hand on their shoulders and evaluated their internal health. The dathomiri were a very robust species and anyone who made it to adulthood was by nature not prone to having any health issues, simply because those with problems had already died. There were lingering annoyances though; I fixed an internal parasite problem with one, another had an overstrained back from all the training he did.

Five of the nine remaining were naturally Force Sensitive. It wasn't necessarily a condition, since Talzin could use ichor imbuement to bump them up to a neophyte level at least, but if we wanted a true spy who could also be trained under Dooku…

"You," I pointed to the four non-sensitives in turn. "Stand aside."

I sensed their immediate disappointment, outrage and anger, but they obeyed.

"Not leaving much to work with Tano," Asajj commented idly.

"It's from these five we will find our candidate."

"So, these are to your liking, sister?" Rizos asked in an almost simpering fashion, which was definitely weird coming from someone so visually intimidating.

"Yes," she said dismissively and stood in front of the five. "Listen carefully, there will be trials. Some will be held here and some at the Nightsister mountain. If you pass and survive, you will be given a great task of honor and renown. The one who succeeds may become the greatest nightwarrior to walk the mountains of Dathomir. You will obey me and my guest in all things. Is that understood?"

The five chorused, "Yes, sister!"

"Then let the trials begin."

We used the last vestiges of sunlight to conduct Asajj's first trial.

The chief escorted us to a flat combat arena that had been painstakingly carved out of a neighboring mountain to the settlement.

It was a circular arena, roughly larger than a football field in diameter, bordered by high stairs, before nature took over, crowning the place with jagged natural rock. The mountain it was carved out of loomed high to the north-west. In the center, a slanted jagged plinth nearly twenty-four meters tall speared up. Halfway up, a pulpit was carved, a place where Rizos and I could stand and observe proceedings from above.

The plinth was in clear violation of natural conditions and I could practically feel the stone beneath my feet screaming with the history of tens of thousands who had poured their labor into it. I was also getting the distinct impression that ichor had also played a hand in its formation. The Force also spoke of this place witnessing countless battles, some for practice and others to the death.

Asajj stood just thirteen meters from the plinth and surrounding her were the five candidates, who were now armed with bladed maces, spears, swords and single handed scythes.

My eyes turned to a specific nightbrother and the lines of probability shrunk down, before bursting with a kaleidoscope of possibility. It was easy to see who this was and between the five, everything was in his favor. There was also a minor set of probabilities that favored another.

"What are those two's names?" I pointed.

"They are Savage and Feral, dear guest."

"You can call me Vizsla."

"As you wish, Vizsla. We know of the Mandalorians," The chief bowed.

I nodded, not surprised at all. The names had jogged my memories enough.

Of course, Savage and Feral would pass muster. They were both the brothers of Maul, raised in the unforgiving conditions of Dathomir. All three were sons of Talzin. In any other society, they would've been elevated and revered, either for martial accomplishment or birth, but not in a matriarchal society where the leader had conquered through strength in the Force and cunning.

Rizos raised his arms and abruptly clapped his hands high above his head.

Below, the combatants sprang into motion, charging down Asajj.

Some screamed in challenge, others were silent.

The first brother came in with a mace and Asajj easily side-stepped the attack.

He was completely overbalanced and a single flat palm attack to the back of his head left him reeling and tumbling away.

Asajj lifted her leg high to deliver a kick under the chin of another charging brother.

So quickly did it hit, that he was caught completely by surprise and stunned.

Asajj smoothly turned into him and jumped to deliver a right kick to his face that sent him tumbling back.

Then a third brother attacked but she was again too quick for him, flowing into a nice one-two kick punch combination.

Such was the strength that it practically sent the brother flying backward and tumbling head over heels.

Savage was next, trying to cut Asajj's head off with that scythe of his.

She ducked and twirled under his guard, a single punch to a vital point underneath his ribs, robbing him completely of air. Then her hands pushed outward and a Force Push followed.

Savage was sent flying backward and carried so far that he impacted the stairs around the arena.

I had to admit, that was impressive strength. Savage was easily 80 kilos of muscled dathomirian and Asajj had sent him more than twenty meters. He would've gone further if the arena stairs hadn't been in the way.

Feral screamed in anger at watching his brother so easily being tossed aside. He was fighting with a dual arrangement of sword and mace. It was a rather awkward combination of weapons; one being heavy, the other light.

His flurry of attacks missed Asajj completely, as she ducked very low to the ground. Her hands had to brace on the floor to maintain balance, but she immediately flung herself forward into Feral as he was caught in the recovery momentum of his attacks.

Braced with hands on floor, she delivered a punishing double kick to his side that also had a minor Force Push radiating outward. Feral grunted in pain as he was sent tumbling to the ground and skidded painfully on the hard unyielding arena floor.

I couldn't help but smile as I perceived that. Good, she was learning. She hadn't come close to touching the Dark Side so far either.

She immediately twirled in mid-air, a move straight out Ataru, to intercept the attack of another brother that had since recovered.

Her right foot slammed into his chest at an angle that immediately had him kissing dirt.

In the same fluid economy of motion, she was on her feet and ready to greet the fourth brother. Dodging his attack then grabbing him by the tunic, with leverage and the Force, she flipped him over her head.

The brother slammed hard into the stone floor, scoring bruises and broken ribs at least.

Asajj pilfered the bladed mace of the downed brother and lifted it in time to intercept Feral's sword.

Her newly acquired mace whipped back and forth in a blur that knocked his weapons aside, leaving him wide open for her to deliver rapid kicks to his chest that I swore came straight out of Chun-Li's attacks.

The fifth brother had fallen back to using two short scythes and he tried to double team Asajj, attacking just as Feral was falling backward.

In a feat of crazy dexterity and the Force aiding her movements, her own attack with the mace intercepted the scythes, whilst she drove the blunt end into the stomach of the brother with such strength, that he was sent flying back.

His two scythes were dropped in the process and Asajj smoothly discarded the mace, catching the falling weapons.

She sent them flying with the aid of the Force, straight towards a charging Savage.

It was here that I saw the first bits of subconscious usage of the Force from the brother. In pure reflex that could only come from neophyte battle precog, he dodged one blade and actually jumped over the other. Smoothly coming into a roll and still running forward, brandishing his long scythe.

Asajj quickly delivered a kick-punch combination that once again sent Feral crashing to the ground.

Just in time to whirl around, as in a rather prudent display, one of the brothers had kept his distance and was readying to throw a spear at her.

In a move worthy of any Olympic javelin thrower, he sent the spear with multiple serrated barbs flying towards Asajj.

She dodged and caught the spear, using its own momentum to flow into a movement that sent the spear right back at the brother.

He wouldn't be able to dodge and it would hit his left leg, which would leave him permanently disabled. It wouldn't kill him immediately, but on Dathomir such a disability was a death sentence anyway.

For appearances' sake, I gestured with my left hand.

The spear was knocked off course, sent spinning and the blunt end slammed home in just the right spot to ensure it was lights out for the unfortunate brother.

Feral was still recovering his wits a few feet away from Asajj, but he ran out of time and she gave him a rather vicious knee to the face, then followed that with a push-kick that sent him tumbling away from her.

"Feral!"

Savage ignored Asajj completely to see if his actual blood brother was all right. It was touching, but was completely out of place in the circumstances.

"Get up, brother," he encouraged.

Asajj slipped into their blindspots, using the Force to remove herself from their perceptions.

Feral sat up with help from his brother and shook his head, looking confused and suspicious. How interesting, he could tell his mind was being messed with.

"The witch, where is she?"

Savage whirled around in sudden alarm, scanning his darkening surroundings but he still completely missed seeing Asajj.

Then she had enough and to his perceptions, suddenly appeared out of his moving blind spot and delivered a nasty flat palm strike to his jaw that sent him to the ground and groaning in pain.

"Where are the warriors here?!" Asajj scoffed at all the wincing and unconscious males on the floor around her. "Is this the best that you have?"

I could feel Rizos' rage and anger spike at Asajj's presumption. Of course, she was going to steamroll them. They might be the best conventional warriors in the nightbrother settlement and I could see the raw skill and experience they had. It just wasn't enough to go against any trained Force Sensitive. Jedi adepts and even some initiates could twist these brothers around their little fingers.

It was all just another part of the trial, to test the character of the five nightbrothers.

The sun's last rays vanished over the horizon, marking the arrival of dusk.

I stepped forward and with a few Force Jumps I was among the brothers, healing, alleviating injuries and waking up those unconscious. Then I gathered them into a line to face us.

"Ventress, some light please," I requested.

She simply gestured with a hand, the ichor writhed around it briefly before vanishing. The tall torches stippled on the arena floor flashed with green ichor derived flame before turning orange, settling to burn with the natural fuel in them.

"If anything about this trial felt objectionable or unfair to you, I invite you to leave now and not waste our time or yours," I said, walking up and down the line of brothers.

My senses were carefully probing and evaluating each for their emotional response to that request. None of them wanted to give up, even seeing how outclassed they were. This was not really surprising given the harsh conditions they grew up in and had survived. It distinctly reminded me of a culture in another universe that had thrived on a world that made Tatooine seem like a walk in the park. Dathomir was just short of what I would consider a Death World, but it came very close.

I nodded at Asajj.

"We will wait until night has fallen completely for the next trial."

The glorious tapestry of the galaxy was revealed above us with only scattered clouds covering the view. The air was bitterly cold and the breaths of each brother was visible as their hot exhalations produced tiny puffs of condensation. They didn't shiver at all, despite only wearing clothes that would be best described as threadbare for a cold evening.

"If you wish to fight against any who wield the Force, you must see what cannot be seen."

Asajj was holding a Dathomiri kusarigama, which was called a nonset in their native tongue. She gave a flick of her fingers, which flared with ichor.

The torches all around the arena began smothering themselves.

It was very theatrical and quite intimidating.

Soon the entire arena was plunged in darkness.

Before Asajj could run off and begin I grabbed her by the arm. "Don't make too much work for me."

She grunted in acknowledgement, ripping herself free from my grip and burst away with Force Speed in complete silence.

The five brothers were instantly wary, raising their weapons into guard positions. They also had enough teamwork to immediately stand back to back, staring into the darkness of the surroundings. Then Asajj began a rather intimidating laugh, a cackling in the distance that was thrown using the Force, disguising it's true origin point, giving the brothers no reference to judge her position.

This was literally a more brutal version of a Jedi youngling beginner lightsaber class. The nostalgia from those times washed over me strongly.

Asajj was difficult to follow in the darkness, but not to any trained Jedi. She was not going so far as to mask her own impact on the Force, to give the brothers a chance 'to let go' as Obi-Wan would've said to any youngling he was teaching.

She made her first attack run on the five from the north-west. Lancing in with the nonset, wrapping the leg of a hapless brother with its chain, pulling him away in an instant, disappearing into the darkness.

She motivated the brother to give a blood curdling scream, by literally grabbing him between the legs and squeezing.

Then silenced him into unconsciousness with a perfect strike to the head.

Her intimidating laugh cackled in the night.

She Force Jumped to my position and dumped the brother at my feet, before disappearing again into the darkness.

My hands were on the brother to begin healing his torn ligament and nasty bruising of his gentleman's area.

"Not that one! Four left! Ha ha ha," she cackled.

Fear began rising like small fires among the brothers, as their presence in the Force began finally leaving a mark.

Asajj attacked from the east this time, using the nonset's chain to grab one of the brothers around the neck.

He vanished from sight to the survivors, letting out a gurgled scream that was abruptly silenced.

I was soon left treating that brother for severe whiplash and concussion. If Asajj had pulled any harder she'd have internally decapitated the guy.

Soon, as expected, it was only Savage and Feral left.

The witch charged in for another attack, going for Feral, but abruptly Savage made a breakthrough, using the Force instinctively, anticipating the attack and pulling his blood brother out of danger.

He raised his scythe and brandished it perfectly in line with Asajj's position, keeping it there even as she steadily walked to his right.

"Show yourself!" Savage barked.

She stepped forward, flicking a finger to light the nearby torches.

"Good… and then there were two."

I jumped forward and into the island of light nearby Feral. Savage whirled, also successfully anticipating my approach. He slashed at thin air as I easily dodged.

"Good instincts, Savage," I praised. "You are to be commended for trying to protect your brother. He is the younger?"

Savage wearily stared me down, his eyes twitching between myself and Ventress. "Yes," he finally answered when he saw no attack was coming.

"You have accessed the Force for the first time, remember the feeling well. You will need to call on its aid consciously and always be listening. Yet, we cannot continue the trials until Feral also achieves the same thing."

"If he didn't touch the Force under threat of death, why would he now? Stop with the coddling, Tano," Asajj snapped.

"Not everyone responds in the same way to that sort of threat, Ventress. And Savage protected Feral, so he did not have the opportunity. Now it's my turn. Savage, on the plinth you will find your brothers alive and waiting, join them."

"Yes… sister."

Feral got to his feet, watching me wearily and glancing at his brother as he left with Asajj.

"You are close to your brother," I observed, walking slowly around Feral.

"Yes, sister."

I realized both men were just defaulting to calling me that out of habit and ingrained cultural fear and respect for females, no matter what species they were. His caution, especially considering the clearly intimidating armor I wore, was foremost in his mind.

"He cannot protect you forever."

It was an obvious and predictable button to push, his fear springing forth, conjuring images of Savage dead by the various many dangers of Dathomir. He also feared that it would be his mistake that would cause it.

"Sooner or later, he will leave and only you will remain. Who will protect you then, hm?"

I pushed hard on his spirit, stoking that fear.

"Answer me, Feral," I demanded. "Who will protect you?!"

"I- I don't know-"

"Stop lying and answer with the truth. Ignore your brother. He is not up there to you now. You are here, alone with me." I poked further into his fears, using Dun Möch to amp it up. "Who will protect you?"

"I- ," his breathing was hard and I saw his eyes dilate as fear pushed his heart rate further.

"Your brother is dead!" I shouted into the Force. "You hesitated, fumbled, your grip slipped, your brother fell to his death on the climb."

His mind flashed to their favorite climbing spot as children, especially on one occasion when their rope snapped and Feral was left holding Savage's life in his hands. It was easy to reach into his mind and spin an illusion into this vision. Showing him Savage falling to his death.

"No!" he gasped. "That didn't happen. I stayed strong. I saved my brother."

"And there we have it. I ask again, who will save you?"

"I'll save myself!" he snapped in anger.

"Good," I smirked. My palm snapped outward, striking him directly from behind as I walked with no warning, no ability to see it coming even in his peripheral vision.

He ducked and immediately tried to retaliate with two punches towards the gaps in my armor near the groin area.

It was easy to step back and deflect the strikes with speed and an indirect quick Force Push had him stumbling away.

"Enough," I held up a hand to stop him. "Do you feel it?"

Feral glared at me warily, but his wits returned to him as I eased up on the Dun Möch. "Yes, sister. It's… amazing."

"That it is," I nodded. My hand pointed to Savage and made a beckoning gesture to the dathomiri. He clambered down the plinth, sliding down it before rejoining his blood brother. "Your next trial will be administered by me."

I held up my hand and the two lightsaber hilts mounted in the legs of the holodroid floated up into view. I inspected the second briefly with technometry, making sure it was at least functional and wouldn't explode. It had been built by Mother Talzin, the knowledge passed down from the rogue Jedi exile Allya, who had 600 years ago laid the foundation for the Nightsister clans to exist.

Satisfied I grabbed both weapons and ignited them.

Two blades emerged, bathing the dimly lit area in blood red light. "You know what these are?"

Feral looked at the blades with some awe, before nodding, "Yes, sister. Lightsabers, the weapon of the Founder."

"Yes, these are also the weapons of the Jedi and Sith. There is a great deal of context and knowledge that you will need before you can understand the purpose of these trials, why they are happening, why they are important to the future of the planet. For now, know that you must at least demonstrate that you can learn to wield this weapon, without killing yourself and killing each other." I deactivated the weapons and levitated them to the brothers. "Take them, but do not activate them."

Savage glanced wearily at the hilt before plucking it out of the air, his brother followed suit a moment later.

"Feel the weight, the balance," I instructed. "These are generic weapons, a true blade is one you eventually build yourself with guidance from the Force using your own hands. Point the emitter end into the air, away from your body and activate." They did so and the snap-hiss of the blades echoed through the arena. "What is the first thing that strikes you about this weapon?"

"No weight," Savage answered, his gray-green eyes looking at the red blade with fascination.

"Correct, you don't have to fight the momentum of a physical blade, the lightsaber is supremely nimble and that is why it's especially dangerous to you both. All your life, you've fought with melee weapons of various types. Now you must unlearn what you have learned and cast aside all those instincts."

I took a few steps back and pretended to limber my body. "Now, your trial is this. You must attack me with those lightsabers and not kill yourself in the process."

Savage immediately put more distance between Feral and myself, and adopted a rudimentary stance with the blade kept horizontal and in view of his eyes.

Feral stepped back and pointed the tip of his blade straight at me.

Savage attacked first, coming in fairly fast with an overhead diagonal cross cut to my left shoulder.

For their sake, I simply gestured with a single hand, held like a spade, throwing a wall of telekinesis that halted the blade in its tracks and grabbed it, to stop it from bouncing off and potentially cutting into Feral, who was also charging in.

Another gesture, sent Savage tumbling out of the way and I stopped Feral by bodily grabbing him as a whole with TK and pushed him backward.

Savage had already almost sliced his own torso as he tried to get back to his feet, barely remembering what weapon he was dealing with now.

"Again!" I snapped.

They tried and tried.

It made me wish that I could always be this strong against any potential opponent I would face in the future.

"Stop using your eyes to keep track of your own blade!" I snapped as I sent both dathomirians flying backward. "Know where your blade is."

It took me slapping them away three more times with precise Force Pushes and Stasis, before first Savage and then Feral began attacking with a clear fluidity and knowledge of the position of their lightsaber blade.

Their forms were still hopeless and they were adapting some attacks and sequences from a conventional sword style that felt like it was a distant mutation of the basic Shii-Cho Jedi form.

Both of them weren't confident enough to attack me both at the same time, fearing that I would use their fumbling inexperience against the other.

"Enough," I called an end.

I gestured with my hand, lifting both of them into the air and ripped the lightsabers from their grasp.

"Right now I am holding you in the air easily because you have no control over the Force within and around your bodies." My hand's fingers began curling inward and in so doing I began squeezing their bodies from all directions. "You have no hope to stop me from simply crushing you both, but I want you both to at least demonstrate the beginning of some resistance. Feel the Force, it is within and without. Right now I am in command of that which should belong to you, take it back or suffer…"

I curled my fingers inward a few more millimeters.

Both brothers visibly flinched and gritted their teeth, their arms and muscles beginning to strain and fight back.

"If flexing your muscles would help you visualize the truth, then go ahead, but know that conventional resistance is futile."

My thumb curled inward.

"Argh!" Feral cried as my constriction started to push painfully on his ribs. Savage trembled and twitched, his teeth glinting white in the night as he strained against my very slow Force Crush.

"If my hand closes into a fist, you'll both be no larger than a shoe box. Resist or die!"

Naturally, I wasn't going to actually do that, but my words hammered into their minds and they believed it.

When my hand resembled an eagle's claw, both brothers were looking quite contorted and Feral was close to breaking multiple ribs and both legs. Savage's knee was in deep trouble and his left arm already had fractures.

Finally, Savage screamed with effort and I felt him regain some control over his own legs.

I immediately let him go, letting him crash to the floor.

Feral was still not out of the woods yet and I heard a rib crack nastily before he rather impressively released a rudimentary, instinctual Force Push outward that wouldn't have knocked over a toddler, but it was enough.

I let him go too and he managed to land somewhat on his feet, but his broken rib had him screaming in pain.

"Well done." I stepped forward and touched Feral's ribcage, resetting it back into place and starting the healing process. "You've both taken steps into a much larger world, but it will only get larger from here on out. Ventress, you're up." I jumped back up to the plinth and Asajj was staring at me with the oddest expression I had ever seen on that severe face. "Stop that," I said, folding my arms.

Her eyes were shining with astonishment and even respect, but she quickly returned to her default scowl, "Whatever."

The former Sith turned Nightsister jumped off the plinth and returned to the brothers.

"Your next trial is that of movement. If you can't be in the correct place at the right time, no amount of power you have will matter."

She flung out her hands, ichor briefly flared and writhed from her fingers.

All over the arena floor, squares of green fire sprang to life, before the very earth underneath our feet began to tremble.

Asajj sprinted forward, just in time to catch a square pillar of carved stone that rose into the air over eight meters. Each pillar was writhed in bands of ichor, further twisted into the ancient written language of Dathomir. A written system that interestingly enough clearly had basis on the first people who had called this planet a home - a colony of Zeffo. Dozens of similar pillars began rumbling out of the arena floor, before starting to randomly move up and down. It formed both a dynamic maze at ground level and a traversal test if you fought on the pillars themselves.

A Dathomiri 'danger' arena.

It was fascinating to see what the Nightsisters had managed with ichor, how they had reshaped the world around them with it. Now if only I could manage to somehow replicate it with just the Force…

Bendu had already given me the first steps along that path, but it would be the work of decades before he would even give me the next steps of knowledge along that journey.

"Stick together, Feral, we must work as a team," I heard Savage mutter to his brother.

They watched and faced off against Asajj for a few moments before they burst into action.

Running as fast as they could to the left and putting pillars between them and their adversary.

Asajj took the high road, hopping and Force Jumping, following their path from above, before she blurred with Speed, grabbed a hold of an edge and fell in front of the brothers, cutting off their path.

They immediately backtracked and rushed into another part of the dynamic maze.

Savage led the way onto a pillar that was just rising up again from the ground, giving them a boost as they began to rush over them in a reasonable display of jumping from pillar to pillar. He even began timing his jumps with the beginnings of a battle precog instinct. Even Feral did well, but he mistimed a jump, landing right on the edge of a pillar.

He barely stopped a nasty fall by hanging on with his arms, but the harsh movement of the pillar saw him fall anyway a moment later.

The height wasn't fatal and he managed to keep a vertical base and even roll with the landing.

Now separated from his brother, Asajj immediately changed targets and jumped to land right next to Feral.

She gave him a quick moment to appreciate how screwed he was, before launching into swift punches, followed with a kick and finally a Force Push that slammed Feral right into the shifting surface of a pillar.

Asajj gave a twist of her hand and grabbed him with the Force around his shoulders, lifting him off the floor and finally began a Force Choke.

It was a rather gentle one, considering that you can be instantly lethal with that move if you wanted to.

"It is one thing to be in command of the Force when you are calm and prepared, but if you can't do it now, Feral, when the life is being choked out of you, then it will be a mercy for me to kill you now."

Savage charged right into her blindspot.

She could've stopped him in many ways, but let him tackle her and interrupt the Force Choke.

He hip checked her, knocking her off balance and pivoted, throwing her with leverage and strength.

Asajj slammed into the side of a rising pillar and grunted in pain, before she managed to control herself into a cat-like landing on her hands and feet.

"As long as I live, you will not harm him," snapped Savage, standing protectively in front of his brother as Asajj rose to her feet.

"Let's test that resolve," she smirked and charged forward.

The battle that followed was a blur of strikes and kicks.

She went for his collar bone, he blocked and elbowed her chest in retaliation.

She deflected and redirected punches, swerving out of their way, until Savage managed to sneak in one punch that got under her guard to slam in just below her ribs.

Asajj went with the impetus of the hit, letting it carry her back. Her Fortification was not troubled at all by the hit, but she let him have his minor victory.

"Please, spare him," Savage said with great courage. "Take me instead."

She clearly considered it for a moment and then said, "Leave us."

Feral was clearly reluctant to do so, but nodded after a last look at his elder brother and hurried out of the maze.

With that, it was over, we had our candidate. Yet Asajj had one more thing to achieve.

The fight resumed, with her unleashing a flurry of punches and strikes at Savage that he could barely keep up with.

He retaliated with a kick, but she aggressively countered, stepping inside the range of his leg and slammed both hands onto his inner thigh.

He managed to retain his balance, delivering two strikes towards her head in retaliation, which she blocked as well, then punished the resulting opening by hammering him on his collar bone. Followed by a low punch to the stomach then reverse handed back fist to the face.

I had to give Savage credit here, he took those hits, which would've left the majority of sentients in the galaxy flat on their back and kept going. He was taking the punishment and powering through it with sheer resilience. Asajj was holding back, there were any number of openings he had presented that would've ended the fight, but she wasn't aiming to kill. She was still testing him, seeing how much punishment he could endure.

Savage's next series of attacks tried to go directly for her face, but he was stymied every time by her flawless blocks and deflections.

He tried to kick her legs out from under her, but she simply lifted her leg and deflected that too.

They traded another series of punches and strikes, most of which hit Savage, but he showed some actual cunning here.

When Asajj tried to kick again, he let himself get hit only to grab her leg and push forward, trying to get the fight down to the ground, hoping to leverage his larger weight and submission moves.

Instead of resisting she went with the movement, allowing her just enough space to bring her other leg up and deliver a kick straight to Savage's chin. The blow naturally relaxed his grip and she used him as a platform to somersault backwards.

Her feet had barely touched the ground when she blurred forward, to deliver low kicks and strikes that Savage only managed to partially defend against.

It drove him backward and he got another blow to the chin as he was punished for opening his guard.

He rallied and managed to return three rapid strikes, only one managed to get through, hitting Asajj in her side.

It had barely any effect as she retaliated, but again Savage lured her in, managing to briefly grab hold of her arm and throw her towards a rising pillar which became an effective wall at that moment, boxing her in.

Good, he's trying to mitigate her natural advantages. He was far from some dumb brute. There was some natural cunning and intelligence here. In the harsh environment of Dathomir, there was no opportunity for it to truly blossom or grow.

He screamed and actually managed to summon a small fraction of the Force, poorly and merely applied to his fists.

Asajj easily dodged the strikes, which hammered home into the plinth behind her, shattering small portions of it.

Savage paid for it though, as he had no conception of restoring the equilibrium of Force within his own body after using it like that. What followed was a brief spell of dizziness, which Asajj took advantage of by hammering strikes home into his torso.

Funnily enough, it also did the job of clearing his head enough to retaliate, but she dodged left and right, then delivered a double palm strike with a slight Force Push that sent Savage flying backward.

He landed right on the top surface of a pillar as it began to rise up into the air.

He had barely gotten onto his feet again when Asajj easily jumped the eight meters, a flick of her hand stopped the pillar's movement as she landed in front of him.

Savage was clearly feeling the sheer length of the fight now, as his stamina was flagging.

Asajj didn't care and started raining strikes onto his torso, before delivering a vicious uppercut that sent Savage crashing onto his back at the edge of the pillar.

She stepped forward and jammed her foot right onto his neck, ready to break it with just a single twist.

He futilely tried to grab onto her foot, but found it immovable.

Finally, his arms relaxed and he looked up at Asajj with resignation. "My life is yours, sister."

"Yes, it is," she affirmed, taking a step back. A gesture with her hand had Savage lifted into the air and placed on his feet. Another sweeping gesture and the many pillars around the arena stopped where they were, before lowering down and forming a generally smooth floor again. "You have this entire evening to put your affairs in order and say your goodbyes. We leave at first light. Know this, it is highly unlikely that you'll ever see this village or even this planet again."

Savage's eyes widened, "I'm… going offworld?"

"Yes, explanations will come at Nightsister mountain, Savage. Go."

As much as I would wish events would follow different paths, sometimes, despite my presence and nudging events, there are certain inevitabilities. The fact that at this point in time and place, Savage was the strongest among the males of the settlement, made him inevitable. He would enter the greater stage of the galaxy, fighting in the open war and the war in the shadows.

Now I had neatly usurped his fate.

Instead of just becoming a blunt tool of revenge for Asajj, now Savage was becoming a double agent for Mother Talzin and by extension, for me. He would be an agent of Fulcrum, though he wouldn't know it.

The journey back to the Nightsisters was rather awkward, since we both had to share the passenger pod on the speeder and naturally it brought about the revelation that I was only here through the holodroid proxy.

"I did not think such things were possible!" he shouted against the rushing air passing the speeder.

"There is much you're going to learn, Savage," I thought, pushing my voice directly into his vulnerable mind. That was the first thing going to be fixed. Talzin assured me it was possible, but I couldn't help but be skeptical.

Savage needed mental defenses that would rival those of a Jedi Master, before Dooku arrived, which was just a few days away at this point.

It was a few hours past midday when Asajj stopped the speeder in front of the main entrance to the mountain that the sisters used.

Waiting for us beyond the ancient doors was Talzin.

Savage knew immediately who it was and knelt. "Mother."

Talzin smirked and stepped forward, putting a long finger under his chin and gently lifted him back up to stand. "It is no surprise to see that you passed the trials, son. You are of my blood. Your rudimentary senses picked up on it immediately, even though you were just an infant when you last saw me." She placed her hand against his chest, then started walking around him. Not merely feeling his musculature, but I also sensed her probing his spirit and emotions. "Yes, Dathomir has forged you into the perfect male specimen."

She laughed in that eerie multi-voice. "I will have to declare an edict that you are off limits to the sisters. Many would kill to bed you."

Savage was naturally intrigued, but the better part of him knew it was a supremely bad idea. Since a nightsister would surely kill him afterwards to keep the bloodline for herself.

"Such strength and hate against your competitors in the male village, hate against the beasts who threaten and kill. We can make good use of that," Talzin turned to me pointedly.

Before I could say anything, she tapped Savage on his forehead, rendering him instantly unconscious.

He collapsed like a puppet with strings cut.

She gestured negligently with her hand and Savage's body rearranged itself and began floating behind her.

"Come, children," she looked at me and Asajj. "We don't have time to waste."

I opened my eyes to regard my own inner world.

It was its usual infinite landscape of solid black floor with white radiance, but to my immediate left there was a distinct boundary now. It ran up against the inner world like a harsh edge that bled into darkened red rock that further turned into an infinite mountain range.

My ethereal feet carried me to that edge and I played my finger along the boundary, poking it.

Appearing out of thin air, as if he was summoned, Savage stepped forward. His face bounced against the invisible barrier that flared into radiance. The representation of my own mind's defenses and integrity.

"Ouch," he grumbled, holding his nose.

"Sorry about that, Savage. But for all our safety, you must stay within the confines of your own mind at the moment."

He blinked and sudden awareness of his own situation came upon him.

"What? What… what is this? I know, yet I don't know."

"You are currently undergoing the Nightsister ritual. It's empowering you with ichor and alongside that is flowing knowledge from Mother Talzin and a number of other nightsisters that we think you'll need."

He suddenly groaned and winced, clawing at his head. "It's like… I am there. Living it…"

"Yes, the pain you are feeling is the price that must be paid for this shortcut. Once that process is complete, we are going to stretch our perception of time here to extreme levels. Eight hours, this ritual is going to take, but from our point of view, we're going to have roughly three years in this place."

"Three years?" Savage looked around at the inner worlds. "I hope there's more than just this."

I chuckled, "These are our minds, Savage." I held out my hand in demonstration and a cup of steaming hot tea appeared. Then I took a careful sip, experiencing a distilled combined feeling of the sweetest teas I'd ever drank over my two lives. I chucked away the cup and it vanished. "Decide what you want, determine how it should look and just bring it forth. It's there inside you."

He frowned for a moment, looked right and then started gritting his teeth.

"Again, don't think you can, know you can."

It took another subjective few minutes before a vague outline of a rather comfortable wooden chair, covered in leathers from various dathomiri fauna started to fade into existence. It stabilized into full existence after he wrestled with his own preconceptions, casting them off. He stepped forward wearily, as if afraid that it was going to vanish on him again, but then put his hand on the hard wood of the chair.

"Well done, why this chair?"

Savage glided his hand over the leathers, "It's the first chair I made with my own hands, for myself."

"You feel pride over it," I observed.

"Of course, it was the first that actually held together properly. For months I worked with the brother-artisan, I wanted to be more than just Feral's protector or the tribes. I was the strongest, but everyone thought I was nothing more than that."

He stepped in front of the chair and sat down. His feelings of satisfied comfort bled outward, suffusing the area and even reaching me.

I flicked my fingers, willing my control chair from the Resolute into being opposite Savage. Then sat down in it and tented my fingers. "It's time I explain why we are here. So far, you know that you're being made into a nightwarrior, but there's more to it than that, Savage."

He frowned, his gray-green eyes growing distant, "Dathomir has an enemy, the Mother has an enemy… a Sith… who took Maul?"

I smiled, feeling impressed, "You're responding well to the memory integration. Yes, an enemy that I share with Mother Talzin."

"You're a Jedi? An actual Jedi?"

"Yes, do you find something objectionable about that, Savage?"

He frowned at me, "You are legends, you cast out the Founder. We are all taught to dislike you."

"I can't speak for the Jedi of six hundred years ago, Savage. All I can tell you, was that Allya fell to the Dark Side, but because the Jedi hold all life as sacred, the Council refused to execute her. Instead she was banished to Dathomir and through that action, the very society you live in was born. From your childhood the Book of Law has been hammered into your head…"

I held out my hand and a nydak leatherbound book with pages made from the local mushling plant appeared. Savage's eyes widened in recognition as he saw the Dathomiri writing on its cover. "A rather fascinating read, I especially like the foreword… 'Learn these words and learn them well, for they are the foundations that will increase your strength and keep you safe from harm. Those who suffer emotion will never enjoy peace. Those who choose ignorance will never know their own greatness. Those who yield to passion will fail to dominate. Those who fear death will never achieve pure power. Never forget that your magic must always be used wisely. Never concede to evil, lest you be consumed by it.'"

I snapped the book shut and it vanished back into my own memories of reading it. "Well, as a male, you never had to worry about the Force before, but now you do. I have to train you in the mental component of the Force, how it interacts with the minds of sentients and by the time we finish, we will both be better at it."

"Why? What is so important that I need this so quickly?"

"The enemy's apprentice, Count Dooku, is coming to Dathomir and we need you, Savage, to become his acolyte."

"A spy," his eyes gained a thousand yard stare.

"Yes, and if Dooku or Sidious even suspects what we are attempting, it could mean the death of everyone on Dathomir." I sighed wearily, feeling the mental strain. This extensive mental merging, despite my only being on the planet by telepresence was only sustainable thanks to Talzin using ichor directly to empower the connection into the Force itself.

The stuff felt… icky. It was the Force, manifested into a physical form in the universe that could be seen, touched and manipulated by the Nightsisters, yet it came with more 'baggage' attached to it. It carried the subconscious gestalt of the sisters both currently alive and those who had died in the past.

"Then why do it all? Why put this on my shoulders?!" he asked, starting to get angry.

"You will see, Savage, you will see. Now we don't have time to waste. Let's begin."

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