Trilla jumped to the left, another sniper round burying itself into the ground next to her. Three teams so far were how many she had counted. The snare was being closed faster than she anticipated. A probe droid whirred over her head. Thinking quick, she wrapped the Force around a loose vanity stone and knocked the annoyance from the sky. An action which made her swoon, finding her knees shaking. Using the Force offensively was taking its toll, but she needed the advantage it offered to keep her head. It was fall apart or fall in battle. Those were her choices.

"Collot! The troopers are going to have anti-aircraft equipment! Be careful on your approach!" Trilla yelled in her communicator. Collot shouted back unintelligible, and she heard his wrench banging before the line went dead.

A third sniper bolt found its mark, connecting with her exposed hip as she ran for cover. Trilla jerked, grabbing at the smoldering wound. There was no time to assess it.

Cal! She focused on rising above the pain, if only temporarily. Reaching out for him. Get those snipers!

She was out of patience and out of options. If their connection was going to be any use, now was the time. A landing platform was ahead. Just a straight run through an employee park of sorts. Two parallel paths intersected with cordons of carefully selected flora which glowed in the environment. Hurried footsteps behind her dashed any hopes of a quick escape.

"We've got a ship approaching the target, switching to warhead launcher," Spotter One said into his radio, as he tracked the TZ-86 with his binocs.

Next to him, his comrade rolled off the sniper rifle and popped open the heavy weapons crate they had deployed with. "Fifteen seconds." The RPS-6, his baby from the Clone Wars. She had served him well and was still scarred from knocking out twelve Separatist tanks over the course of his service. He loaded a missile, checking the targeting aid.

"Altitude is …" Spotter One found his instruments were displaying all sorts of junk data. "Let's say low."

"Calibrating. Ten seconds." The Sniper leaned into his knee, keeping the reticle on the transport. "Five seconds until lock on." An emerald orb formed in the barrel of the rocket launcher, creating a solid mass. "Firing."

An explosion followed as the rocket collided with the orb, vaporizing both the weapon and the Sniper's hands. Who in shock fell over unconscious.

"What!?" Spotter One rushed to his comrade, checking his pulse. Finding a faint one, he said, "You'll be fine, ya big baby. I'll make sure they get you some of those fancy cybernetic hands."

Cal limped into view. He did not know how Trilla put up with it. His knee felt like it had been dipped in molten carbonite, despite Merrin's intervention.

Spotter One switched on his baton. "Jedi!"

Merrin materialized behind him, putting both hands on his helmet. She jerked his head. A snap and Spotter One fell next to his comrade.

"That's a team," she said, kneeling over to get the trooper's communicator. "Are they always this organized?"

"You kidding? From my experience, they mostly were just standing around." Cal limped over to her, grabbing the binocs. "Guessing this is why he's considered the 'Grand' Inquisitor, compared to his lackeys."

"So Trilla was incompetent?"

"Hey, you said it, not me." He scanned the horizon. "Although she almost got me a few times."

"So did I. Not helping her case, Cal." Merrin sniggered, pushing the rifle over with her foot. It was nearly as big as she was. "So uncivilized."

The communicator crackled to life. "Team One, check in." When there was no response from her, the voice said, "Team One has been compromised. Switch to back up communication channel."

She threw it down. Cal pointed at the adjacent ridgeline. "They are over there. Let's go."

The Seventh Sister leapt over Trilla, their blades connecting sliding against each other. You're starting to annoy me," Trilla snarled.

"They want me to bring you in alive," the Seventh Sister said, placing both hands around her weapon's ring hilt. "Tell me why."

"It's eating you up inside, isn't it?" Trilla snorted, slipping behind the protrusions of florescent tentacles. "You've always been smart, sister and I often admired your creative solutions to challenges. "So why don't you tell me, what you think makes me so special?"

Compliments were a rarity in the Inquisitorius. Her sincerity made the Seventh Sister nervous as she caught sight of Trilla's eyes, peering back at her through a translucent leaf. "… I reviewed the security footage of the raid."

"And?"

"Fifteen minutes are missing. Whatever happened in the interrogation room is classed for the Grand Inquisitor's eyes only." The Seventh Sister mimicked Trilla's movements, the two of them locked in sync. "Yet according to logged death reports. A woman's body was discarded only an hour after the Jedi made his escape."

"Sounds like Lord Vader's ego is more fragile than I thought," Trilla said. Secrecy was not uncommon, but to go to such a length to suppress her revival suggested an insecurity she never considered.

"Right…." The Seventh Sister pursed her lips, her brow furrowed. "That leaves only one option." She uncurled a finger. "You are supposed to be dead."

"I'm touched you lost sleep over me." Trilla offered the sarcasm of a one-handed clap.

"Don't give me that!" The Seventh Sister stomped her foot. "You once trusted me enough to let me apply bactagel to your burns!"

An old memory reaching into their first year in as hunters. Trilla raised an eyebrow. "A moment of weakness on my part…" She shrugged. "You were the least likely to slit my throat."

"Our enemy is the Jedi. This infighting gets us nowhere." The Seventh Sister retracted her blade. "Come quietly, Sister. I'll speak on your behalf."

"Fool. Have you already forgotten I've killed our brother?" Trilla was surprised to find her sister, of all people, trying a diplomatic track.

"I'm won't fight you. The Jedi only benefit from our infighting."

"Then I'll kill you instead."

"You won't. Just as you couldn't kill our Ninth Sister," The Seventh Sister remained adamant, glaring back. "Did you never stop to think why I supported your move against the Grand Inquisitor?" She lowered her lightsaber. "Because you were the strongest of us! I wanted to learn from you!"

Trilla hesitated for the second time. Their shared wounds bound them together as sisters in a way that went unspoken. They dealt with the torture in their own ways. Some suffered in silence. Some buried themselves in their new work. And some, as they did, formed alliances of hatred, taking aim at those who inflicted the wounds. To hold a knife against a comrade's throat brought with it an intimacy a Jedi never could enjoy.

Trilla let herself smile. "Sister, you tongue is that of venom. Had I succeeded, it would have been your knife buried in my back."

"I had it all planned out," the Seventh Sister said, a wistful glimmer in her eye.

"I would have enjoyed putting you in your place." Trilla licked her lips. The thrill of the hunt was matched only by the shadowy avenues of factional politics.

"Sedition…" The Grand Inquisitor rasped. He stood at the top of the stairs leading down toward them. His arrival was marked by the air growing stagnant and with a dismissive wave, he tossed the Seventh Sister aside. "I'll consider this a lapse in judgment and not a dereliction of duty."

Trilla turned, taking a shaky step back. While she remained ever the egotist, it was hard to face down the face down the Pau'an who for five years held her life in his hands. "She was delaying me. You should be proud."

"I have little to be prideful for in any of you. You simply do not listen." He took the steps three at a time as he walked. "Now, sister." He placed his fingertips together. "It seems your persistence has attracted the attention of his majesty."

"Well, I've always been a people person."

"And I've never been one to share." He spoke through his teeth. "Is this how you've decided to repay my absolution? Impotently destroying buildings and killing the rabble?"

Defensively, Trilla felt compelled to justify her actions. "The Empire got five years of my life, its only fair I take those five years out of the next employee census."

"Ah, so that is what you seek? Mere vengeance?" The Grand Inquisitor mused, a blank expression on his withered face. "How banal." A low rumble rose from his belly as he chortled. "Stupid girl. I trained you to be better."

"Stop talking." Trilla found her hatred welling up as her rational senses receded.

She charged him, and the Grand Inquisitor unsheathed his vibrosword. Intending a single decapitation strike, she jumped into the air. He simply moved out the way; her lightsaber inflectionally stabbing the ground. The Grand Inquisitor placed the point of his hooked blade against her throat. "Lord Vader wants your swift reclamation… You are fortunate I intend to do no such thing."

"And you accuse others of sedition." She felt the sword tug on her skin.

"Don't misunderstand." He calmly removed the vibrosword and, as if bored with it, tossed the weapon away. It clinked off the stone. "This is no act of charity."The Grand Inquisitor said; "Lord Vader overstepped his authority by executing you. His shortsightedness never ceases to be a source of frustration."

Trilla got up, facing him. "As if your judgment would have been different." She readied herself for another attack.

"Death?" The Grand Inquisitor reached for his lightsaber. "Snuff out my legacy over something as trivial as… wanting to forgive your old master?" He clicked his tongue, annoyed. "Death was too merciful of a sentence. Too fleeting." He ignited his lightsaber. The maroon light dancing off his cavernous eyes. "I could have corrected your error."

Trilla was cowed at the suggestion, finding no words would form on her tongue. She recognized the weapon he held. A unique sword rarely seen outside the fortress on Nur. It was ceremonial, bestowed by the Emperor to the Grand Inquisitor for his devotion. Which had separated many a head from the shoulders of those inquisitors who failed him. A single swing, then a dull thump. It brought the only freedom an inquisitor could hope for.

"Looks like you've reconsidered," she said, running her lightsaber across the ground between them.

"To think…" He shut his eyes briefly. "Only a short time ago, I would have traded all the lives of those Force-sensitives on that holocron for…" The Grand Inquisitor spun around with catlike agility as he wielded his long limbs with an alien grace. His blade met hers, and he pressed her strength. "You."

Trilla's knees wobbled, but she held firm. She squeezed her lightsaber's hilt until her knuckles were white. "I'm flattered." She pushed off him, a well-placed butterfly kick creating distance between them. "It seems disappointing, my masters, is what I do best."

"I'm not disappointed. You've earned my attention."

She did not get to ask what he meant. They were soon locked in the struggle the Grand Inquisitor so romanticized. A struggle for life itself. The right to exist. The right to a future. While their relationship was not comparable to that of a master and apprentice, he had taught her the dark. But more importantly, through his cruelty, he taught her how to survive the darkness. Where others had fled from her, the Grand Inquisitor made sure she learned to stand alone against all the galaxy threw at her. And now it was him. She needed to survive.

Their skill was equal as a result of his teachings. He never feared betrayal like adherents of the rule of two and since his motives remained shrouded in lies, he would take his reasons to the grave. As they fought, Trilla found her knowledge of him grew through the movements of their bodies. Namely, she discovered his age. The Grand Inquisitor was an old Pau'an. Ravages of hard living melded into self-inflicted scars and tattoos that covered his gray skin. How many had perished at his hand? How many more would? Was Trilla to be another notch on his chest? But as she found, it was his lack that remained his most disturbing quality. A lack of drive, of ambition, or of interest.

She wondered, how did he fall? Was he tortured until the darkness took him like it did her? That could not be. He was too restrained. Too measured. Maybe, just maybe, he never knew a world without the dark. Trilla stopped speculating any further. There was no point. She was prey. Another animal in that universal dark forest which he intended to pursue relentlessly. A kick knocked her through the centermost display. She crashed through the tentacled plants. Insanity overtaking her as he drove sharpened stakes of the Force through her brain. Painful memories were wrenched back to the top and wide-eyed Trilla found herself a padawan cowering the cave again. Alone. Powerless. Weak. Afraid. Then came the shadowy whispers. The promises of the power she needed to survive.

Avenge us.

Her own words roared, joining the call of the dead like a chorus. Trilla's eyes peeled open, the hallucination clearing as he brought his lightsaber shrieking down.

"Never again!" She kicked him in the leg, a blackened howl climbing out her sternum as Trilla heard the dead and dying all around her. The ones who massacred during Order 66. The Jedi who met their deserved end at the edge of her lightsaber. Their fear and terrified eyes as they realized the Second Sister was the last person they would ever see. Now she was one with and beyond them. .

She loosed the dreadful, ear-splitting howl of a wounded beast. Shockwaves expelled through the Force crushed against the Grand Inquisitor, sending him careening into the steps, as windows across the buildings circling them exploded into a hail of glass. Standing, Trilla touched her neck, a trail of brackish blood dribbled from the corner of her lips.

"Never… again," she repeated. Her words emerged craggy through shredded vocal chords. "Will another dictate my fate. So you can do me a favor and die quickly."

"Ehehe." The Grand Inquisitor cackled. Blood streaming down his face from behind his blinking ear protection. "At last… your eyes have opened." He was on his feet in the blink of an eye. Deftly, his lightsaber moved to his left hand, his dominate one. "The dark side disfigures all it flows through. But as it does, it frees us from all other obligations and allows us to stand alone as who we always were."

On the defensive, he was forced into a reactive state as she set the pace of their duel. Her motions were fluid, beautiful in their expression of the Makashi form. Aggressive, she did not let him relax. His detachment was met with newfound wrath. His arrogance greeted by disdain. As their clamor reached a pitch, the Grand Inquisitor created an opening for himself. He closed a fist; the Force clamping around her throat, dragging her toward him. "Let's speculate on your revival, shall we?"

"There is nothing to speculate…" she hissed, finding her sword arm pinned as well.

"As you say, but aren't you at all curious? What if I were to take off your arms and legs?" He leaned in close, their faces inches apart. "Would you persist?"

"An irrelevant question." Trilla stomped down on his boot, but he did not react.

"How about your head? Just a little snip, and I'll allow you to look upon your own mutilated body."

"It hasn't been my body for a long time. I doubt I'd recognize her." She opened her hand; her lightsaber released, curling the Force around the hilt as an extension of her physical being. The blade was rotated counterclockwise and before he reacted, Trilla stabbed it down through her foot and into his.

The Grand Inquisitor opened his mouth in surprise. No sound emerged for a haunting second, where everything became still as he took a deep breath. "There it is again." He released her, allowing the lightsaber to slice cleanly down the middle of his foot. The pain did not phase him. "Your spirit. I thought it had been lost to me." The Grand Inquisitor retracted his lightsaber. "I've decided."

"What?"

"You have become something worth killing," he said with sincere smile. The Grand Inquisitor raised his long arms above his head. Transforming the Force into claws which he jammed into the metal walkways lining the roofs of the circular building. A screech of metal buckling under his commanding hand echoed through the air.

Realizing his intention was to bury them both, Trilla did the only logical thing. She turned and hobbled toward the landing pad. "Collot! Where are you!?"

A series of angered squeaks filled her communicator, and the TZ-86 appeared from blow the ridge. It swung around, the cargo bay door already open. Metal crashing down around her was all Trilla needed. She found a cloud of pain bubbling in the hole in her foot and through its sting she threw herself off the platform. She slammed into the side of the loading ramp. Trilla dragged herself safely onto it and rolled over. In the center of warped metal and rubble, she saw the tall figure of the Grand Inquisitor. And he started to run. At a full gait, his elongated legs blurred as he ran. In a fearful moment, reminiscent of her hunt for Cal on Bracca, her pursuer flung himself at the transport.

She flinched, hearing him smack the side. His sharp nails allowed him to scurry over the top onto the roof. From where he dropped onto the loading ramp behind her. "There is nowhere you can run. Nowhere you will hide." The Grand Inquisitor wrapped his fingers around one the piston supporting the ramp. "Where I won't find you."

"I know," Trilla said, punching the ringed portion of her lightsaber into his mangled foot. "I'm counting on it."

The Grand Inquisitor lost his balance, the first visible reaction to any kind of pain she had seen. He fell upon her, the two grappling against each other. "Then we shall fall together." His toe clicked down on a switch in his boot, and a small knife flicked out.

Feeling his intentions, Trilla rolled from under him, wrapping herself around the nearest piston as the wind ripped against them. The Grand Inquisitor grabbed hold of her, digging his bootknife into the ramp to stabilize himself. She stomped on his face. "Let go!" Again and again, she smashed against his skull. Knowing he was going to lose his hold, he made one last play for control. He drove his fangs into her calf, locking his jaw. The strain was enough for Trilla to feel her torso separating, and as fear took hold, she did the only thing she could do. Through sharp breaths, she retracted her lightsaber. Trilla emotionally braced for what was to come, and pushed the emitter matrix diagonally against her thigh.

But just as she reignited the blade, the Grand Inquisitor released her. He fell from the ship, tumbling beyond the dark clouds below. She gave an agonized gasp. "Collot…" Her voice was barely a whisper. "Collot! H-help!"

From the cockpit, Collot felt her distress, and flipped on the autopilot. "Ra'ti!" He cried, tying himself to a handle in the cargo hold. A necessary precaution for one of his diminished stature. He waddled onto the ramp, grabbing hold of her by the shoulders.

Trilla did her best to help, pushing herself up as he dragged her into the hold. He punched the panel on the wall, and the door slammed shut behind them. Collot left her to guide the ship into hyperspace.

Writhing on the floor, a brand new morass of sensations chewed at her entire body. Somehow, both new and old, Trilla fought to stay conscious under their relentless assault. The ship jerked, confirming they had made the jump safely.

Collot returned. "M'nuta! M'nuta! M'nuta!" His panic was followed by him ripping open a medical kit, spilling out the supplies next to her. Trilla kept her mouth shut, unable to speak, as she trembled in rage. Her hand shot out, grabbing hold of his collar. Dragging him closer. As she stared into his golden eyes, Trilla realized his concern was genuine. So, despite her desire to throw him across the room, Trilla released Collot. Choosing to shut herself up in the darkness of her mind, as she wallowed in the pain.

The Force might have broken the Grand Inquisitor's plummet straight into solid rock, but the sudden stop was still enough to splinter the bones in his right arm and twist his left arm backward at a unnatural angle. He welcomed an alternative source of torment. Unfortunately, it was a fleeting source of amusement, and when his wobbly arm lost its novelty, the Grand Inquisitor sat up. He pushed his left shoulder into place with a soft pop. Footsteps behind him and the hum of a lightsaber confirmed the presence of another.

"Sister. If you intend to strike me down. Now would be the time." he said.

The Seventh Sister considered her options. "You're right, and it would be so easy."

He waited patiently, but when she did not make a move, he sighed. "Since you lack the conviction. Might I make a proposal?" The Grand Inquisitor looked at her. "We will tell none of this to Lord Vader. Neither your treasonous plotting nor my failure."

She had not expected him, of all people, to offer such a deal. The Seventh Sister retracted her weapon. "Ninth Sister too."

"Agreed. She handled herself well enough."

The Miralan went to his side, helping him stand. She found a long, mangled arm hanging off her shoulder as they walked. There was also a slight odor around him. "Grand Inquisitor. Why did you allow Trilla to escape?"

"Why does our Inquisitorius exist?"

A question answered with a question. The Seventh Sister said, "To hunt down the Jedi traitors."

"That would indeed be Emperor Palpatine and Lord Vader's dictum," the Grand Inquisitor said, leaning onto her. "I am of the opinion this is an irresponsible action."

"Then what is our purpose?"

"Same as our Empire."

"Which is?"

"We are an act of galactic triage. An emergency measure required to stabilize an ailing galaxy." He paused, stuttering up black bile. "We must think ahead to a time when the hemorrhaging has stopped. What have we given the people?"

"Peace and security," the Seventh Sister regurgitated as she helped him sit on the rubble.

"Of course, but what does that look like?" He asked, removing his ear covering and snapping his fingers to check the extent of his hearing loss. "I am of the opinion we must control the Jedi population. Not exterminate it." His shuttle approached them. "A severely wounded Jedi, or in this case, our sister. Is more useful than a dead one." He saw her uncertainty. "We must establish terror as the order of the day. Those who survive us tell others and that terror spreads through the Force, creating a rupture. From that rupture, a new order descends."

The Seventh Sister sat across from him. "What does this have to do with the Second Sister?"

"She is a daughter of the Clone Wars and, like so many others, she has lived her whole life confined to a galaxy at war. Her rage is limitless and only has just been unlocked." He coughed, clearing his throat. "The terror she plans to inflict will reveal many more of those primed to join us in darkness…" The Grand Inquisitor smiled faintly. "And that is why I love her."

"Using her even after death... Cruel, Grand Inquisitor. " The Seventh Sister's eyes flicked feeling as though she understood his thesis. "But she is exceptional. It is why I cannot fight her."

"I realize this now, and I forgive you as I forgive myself for this weakness. We are all guilty of private treasons. To condemn them is to deny sentient nature." The Grand Inquisitor placed a hand on his knee. "When we report in, I'll tell Lord Vader if he finds our performance unacceptable, he can free me from my duty at any time. You need not say anything."

The Grand Inquisitor pushed himself off his rough seating. "Oh, and we are going to Onderon." He walked past her, stopping. "Our sister never did master shielding her thoughts."