“Then what do you suggest?” Scourge demanded.
“Take me to Revan now,” Meetra said. “I’ll take my chances on fighting our way out.”
“I didn’t bring you here so you could throw your life away. And I have no intention of becoming a martyr.”
Meetra was about to fire back another angry retort when the stronghold was rocked to its foundations by a very loud explosion coming from somewhere off to the east.
“The Imperial Guard,” Scourge gasped. “They’re here!”
Alarms began to ring through the corridor, mingling with the sounds of shouts and running feet as Nyriss’s people responded to the sudden attack.
Meetra reached up and yanked the slave collar from her neck, hurling it across the floor. T3 mimicked her by popping off his restraining bolt.
“The dungeon is this way,” Scourge said, quickly putting their now-pointless argument behind them. “Follow me.”
The explosions continued as he led them through the twisting passages. They were coming from all sides; obviously the Imperial Guard had the entire stronghold surrounded. Based on the frequency and size of the distant explosions, Meetra guessed they were using an artillery assault to try to breach the walls at multiple locations. Males and females ran past them in both directions, some rushing to join the fray and others scrambling to safety. The unexpected attack had caught Nyriss’s people completely off guard. They were in disarray, their efforts to defend the stronghold uncoordinated and disorganized.
“I would have expected someone on the Dark Council to put up better resistance,” Meetra said as they turned a corner and raced down another hall.
“The security chief and three of his top lieutenants aren’t here to rally them, thanks to you,” he reminded her.
They rounded another corner and confronted the first real sign of any kind of counterattack. Eight soldiers led by a lightsaber-wielding Sith acolyte had taken up positions in the corridor roughly ten meters away from a large, smoking hole in the wall.
As the smoke cleared, dozens of red-uniformed soldiers poured through the breach, armed with blaster pistols and electrostaffs.
Nyriss’s people opened fire, mowing down the first wave. Those in the ranks behind never even slowed. Driven forward by their furious devotion to the Emperor, they charged the enemy line with a reckless disregard for their own safety.
Had the defenders held their ground and continued to fire, they might have survived several more waves. But their morale was shaken by the berserker mentality of their attackers, so instead they broke ranks and tried to flee. None of them succeeded.
Three were taken down by blasterfire, shot in the back as they turned to run. The other five, including the acolyte with the lightsaber, were swallowed up by a sea of red-uniformed guards and smashed down with electrostaffs.
The entire incident took less than ten seconds; plenty of time for Scourge to lead Meetra and T3 in another direction. But instead of trying to avoid the melee, the Sith had simply held his ground and watched.
As the last defender fell, the invaders broke into two teams and set off in opposite directions down the hall. The chance to hide until they passed was lost; as the red-robed butchers approached, Meetra started to reach for the lightsaber hidden inside her black, knee-high leather boot.
Scourge grabbed her wrist and shook his head. He stepped back against the wall, dragging her with him. Recognizing Scourge as a friendly target, the Imperial Guards ran past without even a second glance.
“The dungeons are close,” Scourge told her once they were alone again.
They were fortunate enough not to encounter any more battles for the rest of the journey, though they came across the aftermath of several violent skirmishes. Some of the bodies wore the red uniforms of the invaders, but for every one of them there were at least five of Nyriss’s people.
Security guards, acolytes, and even civilian staff lay strewn about the halls and corridors; the Emperor’s Guard had spared no one. Meetra understood there had been no other way to free Revan, but she still felt revulsion at the wholesale slaughter. When she noticed the body of a young Twi’lek slave lying on the floor with her throat cut, she forced herself to look away.
“Nyriss’s personal attendant,” Scourge noted. “But I don’t see Nyriss among the dead.”
T3 beeped and Meetra shook her head.
“I don’t think she escaped,” she said, remembering the ruthless efficiency and organization of the attacking troops.
“Her fate is irrelevant,” Scourge declared.
“Right. Take us to Revan.”
They rounded a final corner, bringing them face-to-face with a massive durasteel door. Scourge stepped up and punched in a security code, but the door didn’t open. He tried again, and the pad responded with a sharp buzz.
“The whole place is in emergency lockdown,” he said. “My security codes won’t work.”
“Don’t worry,” Meetra said confidently. “Tee-Three can slice through any security system.”
“He’d better hurry,” Scourge said. “I don’t sense guards on the other side of the door.”
“You think they fled?”
He shook his head. “I think when the alarms went off Nyriss told them to execute the prisoner.”
AT FIRST REVAN THOUGHT the distant explosions were an unusual side effect of some new drug combination his captors were trying on him. But when the alarms started blaring, his addled mind realized the facility was under attack.
“Meetra,” he mumbled.
He struggled to his feet, battling the mind-numbing effects of the chemicals coursing through his veins. Had his mind been able to focus, he could have purged them from his system. But of course, the entire point of the drugs was to keep him from drawing on the Force.
A few seconds later he heard someone outside the door of his cell. When the door opened he expected to see Scourge, but instead he found himself faced with an unfamiliar guard.
The young man was a dark-skinned human. He was holding a blaster out at arm’s length, pointing it at Revan. His hand was visibly trembling.
From outside another voice shouted, “Hurry. Do it!”
Even in Revan’s clouded state, the situation was obvious. In the wake of the attack, someone had ordered them to kill the prisoner.
“Squeeze the trigger and it will be the last action you ever take,” Revan warned.
“Come on,” the other voice said. “Just do it! What’s the problem?”
“Shut up!” the young man shouted to his hidden companion. “You were too scared to even open the cell!”
Their fear was completely understandable. Since his incarceration, Revan had been held under strict quarantine. Nobody had been given access to his cell without Scourge being present, and even then the Sith had mostly come to see him alone. No doubt it had been drilled into the guards’ heads over and over how powerful and dangerous the prisoner was. They’d been warned against having any dealings with him whatsoever; his mysterious reputation built up over years of speculation and rumors among his jailers.
“Set the weapon down if you want to live,” Revan told the young man. Through the veil of drugs, he strained to reach out with the Force, amplifying the other’s fear and confusion.
“No!” his friend shouted above the piercing alarms, still staying hidden around the corner. “He’ll kill us!”
“I promise to spare you,” Revan said. “I give you my word as a Jedi.”
“See? See?” the man with the gun squealed. “I told you he was a Jedi!”
“Nyriss has sent you on a suicide mission,” Revan told them.
“How do you know who we work for?” the man barked, the pitch of his voice rising.
“The Force shows me many things.”
Another explosion from above, this one much closer, caused the guard to nearly drop his weapon. He fumbled it briefly before seizing it with both hands and quickly bringing it up again to point at Revan.
Revan briefl
y contemplated making a grab for the blaster, but the drugs slowed him physically as much as mentally. Instead he remained still and calm.
“This is bad,” the young man said, squeezing the blaster’s handle so hard that his knuckles were becoming discolored. “This is bad.”
“Just walk away from all this,” Revan told them. “It’s your only real chance of survival.”
“We can’t walk away,” the guard moaned. “The door upstairs won’t open. We’re locked in!”
“Just shoot him!” his friend shouted. “He can’t hurt you. If he was going to stop you, he would’ve done it by now.”
There were several seconds of silence, punctuated by the alarms and another series of explosions in rapid succession.
“Nyriss will kill us if she finds us down here with you still alive,” the man with the blaster said, his voice almost apologetic.
“Nyriss is already dead,” Revan said, trying a different tactic as he tried to apply even more pressure through the Force. “Do you hear the explosions? The alarms? My friends are coming to liberate me.
“You say you’re trapped in here. What do you think my friends will do if they find you standing over my corpse?”
“He’s got a point,” the unseen speaker said reluctantly. “Listen to all those bombs going off. This isn’t just some quick hit-and-run attack.”
“Surrender to me and I will guarantee your safety,” Revan said. “I give you my word as a Jedi.”
The young man’s head turned quickly back and forth, from Revan to his friend outside the cell and then back to Revan again. Then he dropped the blaster as if it were on fire.
Revan calmly stepped out of the cell and got his first look at the other guard: another human male, perhaps a few years older than the first. Both guards were frozen with fear, watching his every move intently. Each time the alarm whooped overhead, they flinched.
“I will not harm you,” Revan assured them.
Both men seemed to relax a little, and Revan tried to project calm, soothing waves through the Force to further ease their minds.
“Sit down over there against the wall until my friends arrive,” he suggested. “You don’t want them to mistake you for a threat.”
Seeing the wisdom of his words, both men scrambled to follow his instructions.
Several minutes later they heard a loud crash from above, followed by the sound of footsteps racing down the steep stairs.
And then Meetra descended into view, dressed in some type of dancer’s outfit. Seeing Revan, her face broke into a wide grin.
“I knew I’d find you,” she said, rushing over to embrace him fiercely.
“It’s been a long time,” Revan whispered, wrapping his arms around her.
After a moment she broke the embrace, and Revan noticed her nose had crinkled up against the powerful odor wafting off him.
“A real long time,” he said with an apologetic shrug, eliciting a soft laugh from Meetra.
“A touching reunion,” a familiar voice said.
“Lord Scourge!” one of the guards shrieked in terror.
Revan spun Meetra to the side and stepped in front of her, an instinctive but foolish move. Meetra was a Jedi; she knew how to handle herself. And unarmed he was no match for the Sith.
“It’s okay,” Meetra said, placing a hand on Revan’s shoulder. “Scourge is here to help us.”
It took Revan’s foggy mind a moment to process what she was saying. Once he figured it out, he couldn’t help but laugh out loud.
“So I finally get to learn your name,” he said. “Scourge. No wonder you didn’t want to tell me.”
“Make jokes once we’re safely away from here,” Scourge said.
“He’s right,” Meetra told him. “Tee-Three’s keeping watch at the top of the stairs. Come on.”
“Go ahead,” the Sith told them, drawing his lightsaber and approaching the guards cowering on the floor. “I’ll take care of the witnesses.”
“No,” Revan said. “I promised to protect them.”
Scourge gave him a look of utter disbelief. “It’s going to be hard enough to get out of here without escorting these pathetic excuses for soldiers.”
“I gave them my word,” Revan said. A rush of dizziness swept over him, and he reeled.
“What’s wrong?” Meetra asked, reaching out to catch him before he fell.
“They keep me drugged,” Revan said. “I just need a minute.”
With Meetra’s help he lowered himself to the floor. His heart was pounding and his head was spinning. During the confrontation with the guard, he must have instinctively used the Force to keep the worst of the drug’s effects at bay. But he wasn’t strong enough to keep it up any longer, and now his body was responding with an acute over-reaction.
Scourge stepped over to a medkit on the wall and yanked it open. He grabbed a hypodermic filled with a green luminescent fluid.
“This will help,” he said, injecting it into Revan’s arm. “But it will take a few minutes.”
“I have something else,” Meetra told him. “Bastila asked me to give it to you.”
She nodded at Scourge, who pulled a package from the large pouch on his hip. He tossed it to Revan, who didn’t even try to catch it, but just picked it up off the floor.
The object was wrapped in cloth. It was clearly metal, and there was something oddly familiar about it.
“You spoke with Bastila?” he asked. “You saw her?”
Meetra nodded. “And your son. They’re both well.”
Revan smiled. His mind felt like it was floating blissfully away, but he wasn’t sure if the euphoria was triggered by thoughts of his family or the drugs still working their way out of his system.
He unwrapped the cloth to reveal the masked helmet he had worn during his campaigns against the Mandalorians and the Republic. In an instant, all his lost memories came flooding back to him.
A million images—years upon years of forgotten people, places, and events—flooded his consciousness simultaneously. In his weakened state it was too much to take. As his brain went into sensory overload, his body went limp.
——
“WHAT’S HAPPENING?” Scourge demanded as Revan collapsed on the floor.
“I—I don’t know,” Meetra said, her hands fumbling to check Revan’s pulse as he lay motionless on the ground.
His eyes were closed, but the lids were fluttering madly. Otherwise he was completely still.
From the stairs, T3 let out a piercing wail, several octaves higher than the incessant alarms.
“Someone’s coming!” Meetra said.
Scourge turned to the guards still sitting on the floor.
“Ready your blasters, you fools!” he shouted.
As they scrambled to their feet, T3 let out what could only be described as a shriek of terror. An instant later, the little astromech came tumbling down the stairs and bounced across the floor as if he’d been shot from a cannon. He landed in the corner on his back, his wheels still spinning.
“Get Revan out of the way,” Scourge said to Meetra.
As she dragged the Jedi’s unconscious body into the nearby cell, one of the guards drew his weapon, while the other rushed over and picked his discarded blaster up from where Revan had kicked it aside.
Scourge nodded at the guards. In response to his silent command they crept to the foot of the stairs and peered up toward the door above.
A burst of purple lightning arced down the steps, catching both men in the chest. They barely had time to scream before they were turned into charred and smoking husks.
Scourge took a step back, knowing exactly who had been responsible for unleashing the fury of the dark side against the hapless guards.
Nyriss made her way slowly down the stairs, the outspread fingers of her left hand still crackling with electricity. In her right hand she held her lightsaber, the blade humming softly. By the time she reached the bottom, Meetra had emerged from the nearby cell.
She ign
ited her lightsaber and came to stand beside Scourge.
“What’s this?” Nyriss asked, her voice mocking. “Another Jedi?”
When neither of them answered, she turned her head to the side and laughed bitterly. “The Imperial Guard will make sure I never leave my stronghold alive,” she told them. “But neither will any of you.”
She raised her free hand above her head and fired off another burst of lightning. Both Scourge and Meetra threw themselves clear of the deadly electrical bolt, but in doing so they gave Nyriss the early advantage.
Before they could recover, she leapt at them. Despite her withered appearance, she moved with the all the speed and ferocity of a dark side warrior in her prime. She landed right between her two adversaries, her blade flashing back and forth in a series of slashes and cuts that immediately threw her two opponents on the defensive.
Scourge barely managed to parry the first wave of her assault, unable to even think about countering with an attack of his own. Another quick thrust forced him off balance and he staggered backward.
Nyriss seized on the opportunity to focus all her efforts on breaking through Meetra’s defenses. The Jedi was clearly overmatched; though she managed to hold her ground, she was forced down to one knee.
In the awkward position her right flank was exposed, and Nyriss brought her blade in to deliver a crippling cut. At the same time, Scourge lashed out with the Force, catching Nyriss flush in the center of her chest.
An ordinary foe would have been thrown clear across the room, but Nyriss instinctively threw up a Force barrier to protect herself, absorbing and redirecting the brunt of the impact. Even so, Scourge’s attack knocked her off balance just enough to send her lightsaber wide of the mark, giving Meetra the opportunity she needed to scramble away to safety.
Scourge rushed forward, hoping to drive Nyriss back into a corner, but she met his charge with an invisible wave of rippling energy. It picked Scourge up and tossed him head-over-heels, sending him crashing to the wall.
Dazed, he looked up just in time to see another bolt of violet lightning catch Meetra in the chest. Like Nyriss, she threw up a barrier to save herself from the worst of it, but she was still knocked from her feet.