First Steps

[Varyn Rask]

Varyn felt a momentary wave of relief wash over him as he saw the Mandalorian fall. The battle had shifted, and Varyn had every intention of taking advantage of it. There was sudden darkness that flooded the room, and the first thing that A'ro would ever feel in the Force was the harsh, cold, swirling darkness of death. It wasn't the Light, and it wasn't anything close to what the Jedi clung to.

To Varyn, it was something else: a forbidden sweet that he had always tried to keep at bay, but he just couldn't. Not now. Not when it felt so good. His right hand still held the saber, and as the Rebel - not a Jedi, Varyn sensed - gripped the lightsaber in the Force, the rebel learned something about himself. Something the Jedi hadn't wanted him to learn.

The Jedi never bothered to tell you about that, did they? Never deigned to bring an alien into their ranks, he said, letting the thought burn into the man's psyche. Varyn had nothing against other species, but the seed that the Jedi did was planted, and it would fester and grow like a weed that couldn't be uprooted. The questions in his own mind, the surrounding darkness of death, and the Dark Side bend of the blade would all make wiedling both blade and Force extraordinarily difficult for the novice Force user.

But Varyn also didn't waste time. He unleashed a stream of flame into the Rebel long before he ever made his attempted escape. With only the most rudimentary of initial understandings of the Force, swirling darkness around him, and no training at all, blocking such an attack was well outside the man's skill. As Varyn did this, he also brought himself directly into the man's path, saber at the ready. If he wanted to go out the way the Sith came in - which was precisely where he was heading - he would have to pass right by Varyn who was ready to pull a Gandalf... and would do just that. @Rom @Critas

 

[Daniel Solus (old)]

Daniel didn't register the blade that sliced him in two, not at first.

His blade caught the Sith's and the disruptor went off, striking nothing. No matter, he must have misjudged the timing. Daniel tried to turn his upper body, to bring it fully around and press his attack, but instead he experienced the most peculiar sensation. His vision slid right and he began to topple. What was happening? Daniel couldn't control it, couldn't move his arms or...his legs. That was what he was seeing. It was a strange sight, he thought to see your own legs pass before your eyes. It registered dimly that he must not have been fast enough, that his block hadn't forced the Sith's blade onto his other.

He didn't feel the pain of the wound, it was too great for him to process. Instead he simply felt sad. He had failed his brothers and sisters, his family. Just when they were starting to accept him as truly one of them he had made a mistake and proven that they were right all along. He had never had the chance to show Leandros that he had listened. He had never had the chance to show Raz that her words to him, over the body of the unconscious Sith had pushed him forward.

He felt...dirty.

Nothing had ever upset him more than letting down his friends. He had been alone in the world save for the people of his Clan. His parents dead and gone long ago, his sister...somewhere, who knew where. Over the time that Raz had taken the helm of Clan Solus, the proud people of Clan Solus had replaced his immediate family in his mind. He loved them all and he knew that they had felt the same. Raz, Leandros, Koil, Narir, Dax and Dio and his family. He saw them all as his torso hit the ground and his vision started to fade. Daniel hoped that they would forgive him for failing here. They had been so understanding, so patient--even Leandros--with him as he muddled his way through their culture, born to it but not suited to it. He hoped that they would forgive him for throwing their patience and love away so carelessly.

As he passed from this life, Daniel's profound sense of failure gave him the courage to face them all, in the next. When the time came.

 

[Artarion Sekt]

Artarion watched the blade slice through the Mandalorian, his concentration total on the series of strikes he had initiated. He was already moving for his follow-up attacks when he felt the give of flesh on the saber in his right hand. This did not slow his momentum or even allay the attack, it simply continued through the body of the Mandalorian. There was no pause of remembrance, no salute to a fallen warrior, only the thought that there was one more threat to be handled.

Artarion saw the blur as the lightsaber that was on the hip of the Mandalorian flew through the air to the rebel. “Well hello…” thought Artarion as he faced his new opponent. The Sith could sense the anger in the alien, the fury, it washed out from the alien unbidden as Varyn taunted him with it. It was like ambrosia to Artarion, he could taste the sweetness of the helplessness in the alien, stemming from the death of its Mandalorian ally.

As the snap-hiss of the ignition of the stolen lightsaber sounded, Artarion reached out and grasped the alien with the Force, holding him in place. Artarion’s will and mind were focused on holding the alien in place for the attack he knew would be coming from Varyn. Then came the stream of flame, right on cue from the Sith Lord. It streaked towards the alien where he stood, the inevitability of it’s fiery depths growing larger as it approached the alien rebel. Artarion maintained his attempted Force grip, holding the alien in place.

@Phoenix
@Rom

 

[Aro Saa]

A'ro froze, saber and blaster raised even as a pit formed in his stomach. He'd been hemmed into place and the Sith Lord was raising a hand full of swirling flame even as Daniel's killer was raising a hand toward him. He pivoted and lurched toward the man standing over the body of his comrade, but only made it a few steps when an invisible foreign hold wrapped tightly around his body. His legs felt as if they'd been dipped in duracrete, his spine in beskar. He could only glare in hateful silence forward at Artorian, body poised but unable to move on the attack even as a tongue of fire lashed out from the Sith down the hall to engulf and consume his right side.

The seal on his armor and the rebreather spared his lungs and throat from inhaling the fire, but the pain lashed over him like nothing he'd ever experienced; the durable cloth and leather of his armor burst into flame even as the metal began to grow uncomfortably hot, his thick hide helping to dull the pain but doing nothing against the intense heat that washed over him, charring his exposed flesh. The Kel Dor rebel howled in pain, the Force boiling fiercely within him, fueled by his hate and pain but with no outlet. The unnatural fire twisted and A'ro reflexively raised his saber wielding hand to desperately try and ward off the flame. The Force responded to his pain and fury and desperation, trying to cocoon him from the flame as it grew, an orb of fire pressing in tighter and closer around him. He couldn't see the Sith through the wall of flame, but he could feel him; smug satisfaction and all his focus on making sure A'ro could not run from this death.

Adjusting the grip on his stolen activated saber, he hurled it like a javelin through the flame at Artorian at the same time as he raised and fired Daniel's Renegade twice, the fire disguising his movements and his agony disguising his intent as his final desperate attacks crossed the 2 meters between them in an instant.

Dropping the smoking blaster, A'ro felt his legs shake and nearly collapse beneath him as the Force holding him vanished; whether it was because he had managed to injure or even kill Artorian, he could not say. The Force shuddered and crystallized around him, cracking as the fire of the Sith Lord ate through his meager barrier and swept in through the cracks to lick at his body. Lifting his hands, A'ro put all his focus on rising to his feet and pushing out with the Force, fighting the press of the flame even as he activated his commlink.

"Si..sixer!! Get them out of here! Tell the Commander I'm sorry..."

The fire burst threw his shields, and his message cut off in a scream of agonized pain. A'ro glowered through the flame even as he felt the fire eating away at his body, his mask cracking and exposing the Kel Dor to the toxic atmosphere even as the flame reached down his choking throat. He stood, defiant to the last as the flames surged forward one last time, and the last thing he felt was his body flying backward down the hall as he drifted into oblivion.

~~~~~

At the far side of the base, the Starsong roared to life and swept out of the hanger to reunite with the Rebel Fleet at the rendezvous point, it's captains final command played over the ship comms for the silent passengers and the war droid packed into cargo bay.

They had escaped Al'doleem, but the cost for the defenders had been far too high.


@Critas @Phoenix

 

[Artarion Sekt]

Artarion watched as the Kel Dor was caught in the flames from Varyn. He could feel the heat from the Force flame as it passed him and struck the alien, blinding him. He saw as the alien raised the lightsaber and blindly tossed it his direction. Artarion smugly sidestepped to his left, dropping the hold he had on the alien as the creature blindly fired his pistol into the area Artarion had just left. A smirk filled the face of the Rattatak as the Kel Dor burned. The smell of burning flesh filled the corridor as Artarion watched the alien die.

Artarion walked up to the smoking corpse on the ground and neatly removed the head from the corpse in one swift stroke from one of his light sabers. He reached down and picked up the head, walking back to join Varyn. They had won the battle but Artarion was not as happy as he thought he might be. The rebels had mostly still made their escape while he and Varyn had been distracted with the Mandalorian and his faux Jedi companion. The Kel Dor had been no Jedi, Artarion could feel that, but he had potential and that was what disturbed Artarion. This would not be the last they would see from the Jedi he was sure.

Raising his commlink to his lips to call the Sith Troopers under his command. “Gladiator One to stable, bring the ship to my mark. We will be leaving now.” With that done, he turned to regard Varyn, he could feel the anger still rolling within himself after the fight. He did not speak, waiting to hear the Sith Lord’s thoughts on the matter. He dropped the head of the Kel Dor to the floor, the Emperor’s prize being the head of one of these new ‘Jedi’.


@Phoenix
@Rom