When Darkness Falls Starwars Jisu/Ko

Vitani smirked as she watched a few gungans pass her by in the street. The people here were so happy, and this planet was the birthplace of the Empire. The inhabitants didn't know it but this was where everything began. From Palpitine's birth to Amidala taking off for a fateful meeting on Tatooine, Naboo was the nexus of starting points.

"And soon, Jesha-alenien, this shall be your starting point as well....from here, you will try your hardest to pursue and unmask me..."

With a swirl of her heavy black cloak, the Sith Apprentice turned away from the bright windows outside of her chosen domicile on Naboo. Soon she would arrive, and soon, Vitani would be known to the rest of the Galaxy. She only hoped that it was not too soon for Jesha and Master Skywalker.

As Jesha's shuttle touched down on the beautiful planet of Naboo, she could already feel the adrenaline rushing through her body. She had been keeping it in check the whole trip over by recalling historical factoids about the planet and it's involvement in the Clone Wars, but now that she was here, her mind was less occupied by the past and increasingly anxious about the future.

This was the first time the apprentice had actually sought her out and all but invited her to join her on a specific planet. It smelled more like a trap than ever, but Jesha had come too far, been beaten too badly, lost /too much/ to let /any/ chance of catching the Sith slip away from her. So, against her better judgement, she reached out via the Force, through the link she felt when the Sith contacted her. The link that felt oddly familiar in a way the Jedi couldn't nail down. But she brushed the feeling aside and instead sought out the apprentice's precise location. /Where is the trap you would have me walk into /sith/?/

Sneering down at the Jedi from her chosen perch up in the upper levels of the building, the Apprentice growled, mentally and out loud. You dare approach me at anything less than your best?? Do you hate living so much? I should kill you where you stand for your impudence, she snarled at the Jedi, being sure to give her mind a harsh shove.

"Foolish child," she whispered to the still air, turning away from the one she had once called sister, "others would have gladly fought you, and you would have died for your rash decision to face me before you were fully healed from our last encounter.... I shall not waste time with you here..."

Before Jesha could get a lock on her location, Vitani disappeared, by the time she would drop the protective dampening field around her, the Sith Apprentice would be deep in space, far from the Jedi, far from her foolish sister. "I grow tired of these games.... if she wants to know the truth, she shall have to work for it. I wonder how long it will taker her before she can corner me."

Four and a half months. That's how long it had taken for Jesha to finally get inside the Sith's head enough to be able to predict her movements. Where and when she would surface. And even then, she was still glaringly wrong from time to time, and more often than she'd like, she found herself arriving just in time to see the Sith's recognizable starship slip past her own and into hyperspace. The two had had a handful of skirmishes. Nothing to match the intensity of the fight on Kamino. But enough to keep both parties on their toes. Of all the far off planets that Jesha had tracked the Sith to, it all came to one fate-filled encounter in the undercity of Coruscant itself.

Jesha had a fairly good idea of just where in the undercity the apprentice would be. So, without a word to anyone in the temple, she snuck out and made her way down through the layers of politics, poverty, corruption, gang wars, black market dealings, illegal racing, and other less appealing aspects of the center of the New Republic, down to the worst parts of the city, where a Sith could walk the grime covered streets freely.

Then, she focused her mind, and waited.

The low yet staccato tone of soft boot falls and the soft drips of the condensed water falling from the heating pipes that provided hot gasses and liquids to the parts of the City planet that couldn't afford fancy piping within the duracrete walls, mostly because the duracrete slugs would have gotten to the pipes down here, and that would have been a whole different load of krayt shit. Her steps were purposeful, she had been followed, and there was a presence up ahead.

"I do not have time for this," she spoke softly, and turned to address the would be bounty hunters behind her. "I do not know whom you work for, but if you think you are a match for a Sith, you are sorely mistaken...This is your only warning, leave or forfeit your lives to me." Holding up her hand, blue lightning crackled ominously at the tips of her fingers as she spoke, and one of the group stepped back in fear, having heard stories of the pain that lightning could inflict before finally causing an agonizing death. But before he could run, and have a choice as to weather he lived beyond that night, one of his companions spoke up arrogantly, bringing his gun up to bear.

"Big words for a little girl, but I bet you scream really pretty once we put a few rou-" the Trandoshan looked like he was going to say more but he was cut off by his own screaming, as the lightning flew from claw-like nails and through him to take down the rest of the group. She held the flow of electricity for thirty seconds before cutting it off, and by that time, the bodies were almost nothing more than heavily burnt lumps of metal and flesh.

"I warned you," she spoke to the corpses before turning to the presence ahead, scowling beneath her hood, though her voice was soft and deceptively gentle when she asked her question. "And you, what business do you have with a Sith?"

Before long, Jesha sensed the sign she had been waiting for. A disturbance in the Force. The darkness being pulled into form, and used to attack, to kill. Jesha raced forward, shoving through bystanders and criminals alike. She paused just behind the line of onlookers that stood and stared as lightning crackled from the Sith's fingertips, frying the would-be bounty hunters in mere seconds. Then the Sith pivoted to face Jesha and spoke.

The crowd, fearful that the dark lady was speaking to any of them, scattered rapidly, leaving Jesha face to face with the apprentice, or as close to face to face as they could be considered. The apprentice's face was, as always, obscured by her hood and the few features that were visible were skewed by the flashing of assorted neon signs pointing to clubs, adult stores, and brothels.

"My business is what it has been for the last /year/. Ever since you /killed/ her." Jesha took a breath, pushing down the seething anger that threatened to control her. "I will stop you. Here and now." She drew her lightsabers - one her own, and one her sisters - from their places on her belt, but did not activate them. Instead, she waited. Overhead, the pipes dripped steady condensation down onto the Jedi and the Sith, as well as the small group of onlookers who hadn't gotten it through their heads that this might not be the safest fight to spectate.

The sith giggled, her voice lilting and again completely off balance. "Her? What ever are you talking about? Do you mean that weak Jedi my Master rid the galaxy of on Bespin?...Hmm, such a petty thing for a Jedi to hold a grudge over..."

The way she spoke the word Jedi was like she was hinting at something, black lips pulled into a wide smile, it was rather disconcerting to watch, as her sharpened finger tips traced whimsical patterns in the air with a crackling fingertip. An arch of lightning jumped out and struck one of the cool water pipes, creating a hole in it sufficiently big enough to imitate rain. "After all, she was useless, not even able to use that amazing power that she had been forced to hide away, since she was a Jedi."

Again, the inflection was there. And again she smirked.

All this time, she was finally ready to know. "But like I said before, Master was kind, and her potential lives on...and you are ready for the truth...Je-di."

For a moment, Jesha flinched away from the falling water before ignoring it as it began to soak her cloak. "The truth?!" Jesha spat. "I know the truth. I don't need to be told by the likes of you. Nor do I need to hear you insult her. She was my partner, my best friend, my /sister/. I loved her, and now she's dead because of you! So stop playing your games, stop toying with me like you have been these last few /months/, and face me. Now!" With that, both sabers hummed to life, each vibrating at a different frequency, hissing as water rained down on them, steam coming off the blades where each drop landed.

"Face you? Why, sister mine, that is exactly what I intended to do," the Sith drawled.

"The last nine months have been dedicated to preparing you, sister mine. All for you, so that you can know the truth of that day a year ago. That day you saw the Jedi known as Vitani fall into that endless shaft, to her apparent death. You were lied to in a way. Yes, the Jedi known as Vitani died, but that is not the entire truth... I had wanted to tell you earlier, but I knew that too soon would break you too far..."

As she spoke, her hands slowly came up to the deep hood that obscured majority of her face. Firmly, she grasped the edges of the hood, and drew it back, her head looking down, exposing red, gold, and orange hair, curling about with wild abandon. She deliberately moved slowly, so that Jesha had time to see exactly just who she really was. "But I knew that I could not hide it for too long either... You were always so very intuitive and quick to solve the riddles put to us by that little green troll..."

Poisonous red and yellow eyes gazed out from a face that should have died a year ago, the red tear markings trailed down her face, just as they always had. Her brow was marked with the silver and gold crest of the Delma Reane, as it had been since she was a small girl, her skin was slightly paler, but that was bound to happen when one spent most of their time either in deep space or only venturing out in the night.

"Hello again, sister mine....Jesha-alenien."

And for a brief moment in time, with that warm smile on her lips, and the color of dried blood taking over in her eyes and brightening to a brilliant ruby, you could see the Vitani of memories, if only for a brief moment.

Jesha's heart all but stopped. Whatever words she may have had suddenly became lodged in her throat and and it took conscious effort to continue breathing. Blackness threatened to take her but she fought to cling to consciousness if for no other reason than to know...

"What...w-why?" she asked, in a voice so broken it was barely her own. She resisted the every urge of her body hug the woman she thought long dead. She knew that, just as Vitani had said, /Jedi/ Vitani, had indeed perished on Bespin. The woman before her, was the Sith apprentice. And even as her heart broke, she clung to that one truth. The truth that should have simplified her feelings into a simple desire to kill the apprentice, but a truth that instead stirred even more pain and conflict in her heart. Water ran down her face, whether it was from the pipes or her eyes, even Jesha couldn't tell. She just felt numb. "Why," she whispered again

The yellow was quick to reassert itself in her eyes as they narrowed in rage. The snarl that bubbled in her throat quickly grew to become scathing words. "Why? Why?! WHY?!?!"

None too gently pulling aside her own muffler like collar she exposed the now altered sealing mark. "THIS IS WHY! I WAS DOOMED TO FAIL AS SOON AS THIS DAMN SEAL WAS PUT ON ME!! AND YET EVERYONE STILL THOUGHT I COULD WIN AGAINST THE DARKNESS! Do you KNOW what it's like to HAVE that sort of expectation on your shoulders?!? DO you!?"

Suddenly Vitani drew back, visibly calming herself with a deep breath before shaking her head, when she spoke again, it was quietly, calmly, but the anger was still very much tangible in her words. "Everyone, even Skywalker, expected me, as single Knight, barely out of my padawan apprenticeship, to prevail against something as big and as powerful as the Dark Side. Even you, Jesha-alenien....I was never allowed to relax, to show how much pain it brought me, to let anyone know how much it cost me to barely even function....And then Master Chi'kai came to me, and told me that I shouldn't have to fight alone...and yet everyone at the temple expected me to. You Jedi ALL expected me to fight my 'inner fears' and 'dark desires'....I'll let you in on a little secret Jesha, I wasn't fighting MY fears...I was fighting the fears of everyone around me. I was fighting with Skywalker's need to prove that he was really cut out to be a Jedi Master, I was fighting with Kovu's grief over Meren's death, I was fighting with your utter Loathing of Storm Troopers, and on tatooine, Sand People, which by the way, I lost that fight to, and slaughtered an entire village...I was fighting with my mother's wish that both her baby girls never grow up, I was fighting with my sister's jelousy over my being both a Jedi and the Heir Apparent to my Aunt...So ask me again...Why....When you, and Skywalker, and Everyone else in that blasted Temple of yours always expected me to fight alone!"

Jesha turned her sabers off. Now she knew that the tracks on her cheeks belonged more to tears than water. She shook her head. The sadness and pain that were etched into her every feature were now joined by pity.

"Vitani," she whispered, taking an involuntary step closer to her sister. "Why. Why didn't you just tell me. Talk to me. I would have...I - I don't know," she said, fear cracking her voice. "But I would have done what I could. More than what I could - Vitani you /know/ I would have done /anything/ to help you. You were my sister!" she cried, her own use of the past tense paining her more than anything Vitani had said. "How could you do this..." she added softly. "I don't...I don't understand. Make me understand," she sobbed.

Vitani sneered, she had planned this out to be a little less...teary, and more...actiony, but she supposed beggars couldn't be choosers. "You couldn't possibly understand, Jedi. Kovu did not understand, and you will not understand."

Turning away from her weeping sister, Vitani scoffed. "For all the Light you profess about, it wasn't there to aid me when I needed it. It turned it's back on me, and you can't possibly understand the pain of knowing that you are condemned by the Force to fall to the Darkness. That is why I spent so long preparing you. So that you wouldn't break when I had to show myself to the rest of the Galaxy.... You can't possibly understand, and I'm not wasting my time with trying to make you see past the black and white of your perfect little Galaxy the Temple has you seeing."

The Sith Apprentice snorted before starting to walk away. "Tomorrow morning I shall make my public appearance in the form of eliminating the Hutts that try to stand in the way of my plans here... You should keep an eye out for their obituaries....I'll see you around...Sister mine."

The way Vitani refereed to her as "Jedi" instead of her name stung. But it was the repeated use "Sister Mine" that finally made something snap inside the Knight.

"Vitani!" She yelled as the Sith made to walk away. She snapped both her sabers back on, taking a moment to look at the purple blade in her hand before replacing her gaze on her sister. She faltered for a moment before her resolve set. "Sith apprentice! I will not let you leave here." There was anger clear in her voice. An anger so deeply rooted in betrayal that it verged on hatred. "FACE. ME."

Jesha was rewarded with a lilting laugh as Vitani halted her progress. Turning her gaze over her shoulder, she smirked. "You would raise your blades against me, even after you've experienced first hand my prowess? After you've witnessed my mastery over the powers that were so forcefully thrust on me? ...Hmph, very well."

She threw back her mantle, bringing up her arms here her sabers, one hers, and one stolen from her sister, flew to her hands from their holsters upon her hips. "Show me what you've learned since the last we met, Jedi," and those were all the warning given before she was an almost literal blur of action.

She could not afford to loose this fight either, but neither could Jesha, and she knew that. With what little she could feel from the Future in the Force, this confrontation would most likely end in a stalemate, and Vitani would be forced to make a quick get a way to keep her early morning appointment with the Hutts, and Jesha would be forced to go back to the Temple to break the news.

Jesha launched herself into the fight with much the same rage-fulled strength as when she first fought the apprentice so long ago. However, the bitter sadness that had hindered her fighting in that fight, was bitter hatred now. Hatred that she channeled into each swipe of her blade, each parry, each block, each outward lash of the Force, each movement contained a small piece of what she felt inside.

All around the two blue and purple and steam and water danced, and between the two sparks flew. Sparks containing words unsaid. Words that now found their deliverance through the swing of a blade or the use of the Force.

The crowd, although staying close enough to watch the clash of sabers, had moved back as soon as the fight began, providing what they assumed was a wide enough area for a fight. However, it was clear through their whispered confusion over the color of the blades that no one there knew as much about Jedi as they thought they did. A fact that continually brought Jesha's and Vitani's blades closer and closer to the unobservant onlooker. And Jesha, despite her wrath, found herself going out of her way to protect these idiots from Vitani's uncaring swings.

She found herself more and more at risk as she put herself in danger to protect others. Finally, her patients reaching it's current limit, she shoved Vitani back with a short burst of the Force before briefly closing her eyes, drawing energy into one central point near her stomach, and then expelling it out in all direction, momentarily creating a dome of water as the shock wave expanded outward, knocking back all the onlookers. She really didn't care if they got a few bruises or scrapes, so long as all their limbs stayed attached.

With the pedestrians now /well/ out of the way, Jesha returned her seething gaze to Vitani.

Vitani had of course flipped back to her feet as she was Pushed, knowing that is was just a distraction, but she could not fight the kinetic energy, that was what caused most of the damage from a Force Push, often far more than the impact. Of course, it was instinctual to fight, for most, but when your Master requires (or at least she thought He did) nothing less than perfection, not fighting against it became instinctual instead. Any weapon, according to her Master, could be used against it's wielder, even those drawn from the Force itself. But right now, she needed Time more than she needed cunning. And Time was exactly what Jesha had given her.

"Tch, how foolish you are Jedi," she said as she was allowed time to gather her power about her. It brightened in her eyes, glowing that poisonous yellow and red, and crackled at her fingertips in the form of lightning. "You spared a few pathetic life forms, but for what? Your urge to protect something so worthless has cost you your fight, I cannot afford to waste my time here much longer, though I would love to linger and 'chat' with you dear sister, like I said, I have an appointment to keep, and I cannot miss it."

With her piece said, she released the power, and it manifested as a blinding ball of blue lightning that lingered in the air for almost an entire fifteen seconds, ample time for Vitani to slip away through the shadows.

--- In the Temple ----

Waking from a deep Healing Trance was never pleasant, at least not to Kovu. Waking from a deep Healing Trance in a Bacta Tank was fifty times worse. And unlike most other Jedi, he was slow to come to full consciousness, slipping in and out of awareness as his body readjusted and his mind caught up with him.

Jesha knew as soon as the flare went up, that Vitani was gone. She closed her eyes to the light, kneeling and using the force to cling to the feeling of her sister for as long as she could before it disappeared again into the darkness.

Once the light faded, she stood. The crowd was still gathered around her, murmuring and pointing, whispering to each other. She turned off her blades, her own first, then, reluctantly, Vitani's, then pushed her way through the crowd, dragging her unwilling body back to her craft.

She felt nothing during the walk to her shuttle. She didn't allow herself to think, but just to feel. To feel the nothing that filled her empty chest and enveloped her heart. But as soon as she entered the shuttle, she began to cry. Softly at first. She fought off the tears, blinking to clear her eyes as she took off and set a course back to the upper levels of the planet wide metropolis. But as the ship climbed higher, the crying turned to angry, bitter sobs. Hatred washed over her time and time again and each time Jesha forced it away. She didn't want to hate Vitani. Her heart wanted to; but her mind forbade it. As did the code. And so she shoved the anger away again and again until it turned into a dull, unbelieving ache. And thus it remained until she reached the Temple.

The small intra-planet trip seemed longer than even most hyperspace jumps. She dared not meditate for fear of where her thoughts would venture, and of what she would feel through the Force. And so it was with mixed feelings that she began docking at the Temple. She was grateful to be out of thought-provoking shuttle, yet she was loath of the thought of having to tell Master Luke that Vitani still lived as the apprentice.

So, with a heavy sigh, she exited her craft and began making her way through the halls. As she trudged, knights and padawan ran past her. Finally, she caught one.

"What's going on?"

"It's Kovu!" the padawan panted. "He's awake! And he knows who attacked him!"

A light bulb went off in Jesha's head at the same time as a pit the size of the Death Star sank into her stomach. Kovu knew. It had been Vitani that had attacked him, and probably Vitani that had saved him. Jesha took off for the medical wing at a full-blown, force-enhanced, sprint.

Kovu blinked away at the sleepy feeling still in his eyes, his vision swimming for a few seconds before it finally came into focus. The world around him was muffled, but that too became sharper. Soon the indistinct noise became voices and questions.

"I..know who..the sith is..." He had managed to croak out, his unused vocal chords protesting greatly at the sudden strain.

"-call Master Luke." He could make out the soft voice of the Mon Calimari Jedi Master that served as the Temple's Head of Healing. Turning his head to the side, though the muscles pulled in an almost annoyingly 'you've been too still for too long' fashion he could see just the tip of her light blue trailing head ornament and the back of her tan robes.

It was a few more minutes, and two glasses of water with some much recovered senses later, that Master Skywalker appeared through the door way.

"Kovu," came the soft voice of the Jedi Master. "Kovu who did this to you? You said you remember?"

Kovu closed his amber eyes. ((THEY'RE AMBER NOW SINCE I CAN'T REMEMBER WHAT COLOR THEY WERE BEFORE)) The memories of those days with her...it was like being with family again, and to know that it could never be...it was painful. To know that one of your own had betrayed you. To know that someone you considered an elder sister had the power to murder him. 'But why didn't she,' he wondered.

"The Sith..." He began, pausing only slightly when Jesha burst into the room, but continued on, if anyone need know, it was Vitani's partner, the one she had proclaimed Alenien, a high honor and show of trust. Jesha was Vitani's Sister Twin. She had the right to know. "The Sith Apprentice was...IS Vitani...I... I met her while I was supposed to be scouting for the Sith... She.. she spoke to me as she normally would have...but you could see it every now and then, it would bubble up and she would change...but she'd always go back to being Vitani... And then she got a communications from a man she refered to as 'My Master,'" you could hear the resentment in his voice as he spoke those two words, that man was the reason she had turned, he had seduced her with a sympathetic shoulder, with lies that accepting the Dark Side in her was the way to escape the pain... He hated that man, slag the Code, he hated that man. "It was then that I insisted she come back to the Temple, and she refused. So I....I attacked her with a training saber... I cannot willingly raise a weapon against my future Delma Reane, I am sorry. But she defeated me so easily.... and then I distracted her, and she reacted instinctually.... it wasn't so much painful as it was... disconcerting. She then did a strange thing, she froze, seemingly having a battle with herself before she helped me into a Healing Trance and placed me within the Bacta Tank. That's all I remember..."

Jesha listened numbly as Kovu told his story. She lingered in the doorway to the infirmary, hoping beyond hope that no one would turn to her after Kovu's proclamation but also knowing she would have to coaberate the young jedi's story.

And then, as if reading her thoughts, the whispers began. Disbelieving, upset, questioning, scared whispers. Jesha took a deep breath and stepped forward. She pushed past Master Luke, ignoring his frightened, shocked expression, and taking a place beside Kovu's bed, in the center of attention. She slipped a gentle, supporting hand on the knight's shoulder, knowing Kovu was one of the few people in the universe that understood what Jesha was feeling now.

"It's true," she finally spoke, the words caught in her throat, but she forced them out. "Vitani lives. But not the Jedi we knew." More quietly, she added, "not my sister." She took a deep breath as her eyes scanned the crowd, skipping over Master Luke. "She is now the Sith Apprentice that has been working from the shadows. She is ready to reveal herself to the galaxy. She and her new master," she spat the words with the same contempt as Kovu had, "are about to make their move.

"I tried...I tried to stop her. Many times. Even...this last time...when I knew. I tried - but I couldn't. She's strong. So much stronger." And now she looked up to Master Luke, knowing only he would fully understand what she was about to reveal. She placed her hand around her neck, mimicking Vitani's tattoo. "It no longer holds. She's embraced it," she said quietly and with sadness in her voice. The expression on her face revealing the nagging feeling Jesha had that this was all her fault. That she had failed Vitani so horridly and so numerously that she now carried the weight of the apprentice on her shoulders.

Seeing Jesha's face, Kovu decided that he had to speak up. "She's...not completely lost. My elder is there, you can see it when her eyes loose their insanity...but that's the problem. The insanity is almost all encompassing..."

Amber eyes gazed down at hands clenched into fists on his lap. "She blames us.....we didn't...we weren't there for her." And that was all he said as he fell into silence, refusing to cry, because he knew that she was right in a twisted sense. He /did/ encourage her to fight the darkness, and never once did he ask her if she was okay. Always encouraging her along, telling her she was strong enough to fight the darkness. Foolish.

~*~*~*~*~*~*

Vitani smirked as she watched the light leave the eyes of her target. "Mission completed, master," she spoke softly into her communicator, idly flicking blood off of her hand. It was so interesting to see how much pressure she could apply to the the skull of a twi'lek could using the Force before it ended up caving in or imploding. Of course, she had gotten a little overzealous for the last one and it had ended up with blood and brain matter flying across the room in a gory fountain. There were no weapons used, save for her occasionally deflecting a blaster bolt with her saber, she did not lay a physical finger on any of the corpses. They would only be able to track this incident back to her, but no further. Her master's identity was safe, he was secure. That was what really mattered.

"Very good my dear, come back home and we will speak more of what further actions we should take."

The Sith apprentice made a sound of agreement in the back of her throat, distractedly wiping blood from her face with the back of her palm because it was getting itchy, smearing it across her cheek and only further enhancing her insane appearance. "Of course, I'll be home in a standard hour or so, I think I shall make use of our friend's fresher and launder my clothes before then, I would so hate to get blood in the new couches."

"Haha, always so considerate of me, my dear. Take as much time as you need, there is no haste, he was the last of the competition I must worry about for now," Chi'kai chuckled fondly before ending transmissions.

Vitani smiled, a soft and warm smile, as she thought about her master. He was the father she had needed, always supportive, firm but not restrictive, caring but not overly smothering. He was everything that Skywalker wasn't. "Foolish Jedi," she grumbled before stepping into the fresher, enjoying the almost scalding water and watching the red water disappear down the drain and slowly run clear. "I have what I need. What I want. I don't need to go back."

Jesha stood outside Kovu's door. Hesitantly she raised her arm, lowered it, then raised it again. As she was finally mustering her courage, the door slid open of its own accord, and Jesha found herself face to face with Kovu.

"Jesha," the knight said, a surprised tone to his voice.

"Hi," was all Jesha could lamely conjure.

"Hi," Kovu offered back. When she showed no signs of moving he continued, "I...was just on my way to the library. Is there...something you needed?"

"I...uh...I" Jesha fumbled. Pausing and taking a breath she calmed herself. "I was hoping to talk to you. About Vitani. About the /old/ Vitani."

"Oh. It's been...about half a year, hasn't it?" Now it was Kovu who was at a loss for anything meaningful to say.

"Today is the two year anniversary of our graduation to knighthood."

"Oh," he repeated more somberly. ((This is the deja vu line, btw.))

"I uh...I dunno I was just hoping we could talk," Jesha concluded, growing more and more convinced that this had been a bad idea with each passing second.

"Sure," Kovu tried to offer a smile. "Do you want to come in?" He gestured back into his room.

"Yeah, that'd be great."

But just as they both turned, Luke appeared from around the corner. "Kovu," he began, then his eye caught Jesha. "Ah, Jesha. I guess it's good you're both here." He paused and the two knights exchanged worried looks.

"What?" Kovu asked, not sure he wanted to know the answer.

Luke's expression grew grave, as if trying to rival those of the knights. "It's your Delma Reane," he said to Kovu, adding "Delphine" in Jesha's direction. "She's...dead."

Horror washed over both faces. Kovu's quickly turned to grief, while Jesha's turned slowly into disbelieving anger.

"Vitani..." she could only whisper, rage and betrayal audible in every syllable.

Luke gave her an admonishing look, but let the emotional display slide without a verbal reprimand. Instead he just shook his head. "No. A sudden illness. They say she passed in her sleep."

"What illness?" Kovu asked in a hallow voice.

"I don't know," was all Luke could say. "I'm sorry. If you want to go home, Kovu, you're certainly welcome to. You too, Jesha. To Altheair, that is." Kovu nodded in response.

"I can't," Jesha mumbled. "I didn't keep my promise. The promise I made to Delphine. I can't go back." She didn't mention that even the thought of returning to the planet where Vitani was first tainted brought pain to Jesha. She could never go back. "I need to meditate. Excuse me." She placed her hand on Kovu's shoulder for a moment, then turned and began walking to her room.

When Vitani had received the alert from her contacts back on her home planet, she had answered it immediately. They were only to send her any messages if any of the people she wanted to be watched were either leaving the planet, or something had happened.

The next hour saw her in hyperspace, pressing as much speed as she could from her White Starling.

She arrived two hours before the Delma Reane breathed her last. She watched from a far as the funeral pyre was lit and the lanterns of mourning sent skyward to accompany her Alne on her journey back to the Great Mother. She witnessed her sister declare Delphine's last act was to start on her death Reane se Shiav, the Daughter's Trials, and it was then she turned away from watching her family, her eyes flashing ruby briefly. "It is with a heavy heart," her sister had said, "that I ask all females to go through the Trials." Vitani knew the truth. She had been Chosen. Marked by Altheaire, as proven by the golden crest upon her brow and the ruby color that graced her eyes. There would be no other, there could be no other, and her home would go without a leader. But she couldn't leave her Master. She couldn't. She wouldn't. None could make her!

A soft voice, identical to that of her now late aunt, floated on the wind. 'Your will has always been your own, daughter.'

Ashamed, she fled her home and alone she cried piteously in the cabin of her small starship, refusing any messages, from her Master and from her contacts. She had loved her aunt, but she also loved her Master. She would not just leave him. Her home world was comprised of strong warriors and people. They would be fine without her. Or at least she kept trying to convince herself of this.

It only took her eight standard hours before she gave into her despair and searched for a way to forget. It was Vitani's first experience with being completely inebriated. The next morning she swore to never do so again after contacting her very disappointed master, the throbbing in her head was simply not worth it. And then she /remembered/ and once again the despair had her seeking out the alcohol to numb the pain.

Jesha had spent the better part of the last day meditating. Slowly she was coming to terms with the loss.

Logic told her that Delphine was now one with the Force, in fact, she had even heard what she could only describe as a kind caress of a whisper that had helped her in her healing. However, all the logic in the galaxy couldn't keep her heart from aching. Then something occurred to her. If Vitani hadn't killed her - did she even know? Jesha sprung up from her kneeling position and ran through the temple, heading to Master Skywalker to ask him that very question.