The Good That Men Do

[Brandon Rhea]

"The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones."
—William Shakespeare
​

Months Ago

It hadn’t been long since Jhon and Skhai were on Corellia, where he told her the truth about who Andraste and Lana were: that they were Skywalkers, one destined to be Darth Vader and the other destined to be Luke Skywalker. She took the news well; Skhai had her fair share of galactic secrets reaching back from the days before the Old Republic even existed, secrets Jhon began to learn while in the steps of Bhikkhu Bo. She would be the last person to judge him for withholding it from her, nor would she be someone who would be surprised to learn that there were great destinies in the galaxy again.

Jhon wasn’t in the right mind, not since being in the bowls of Coruscant beneath the Jedi Temple, when Kiro told him that Andraste had been crowned Empress of the Sith and married Darth Exodeus. That feeling of failure, knowing that it was his choice to flee Lehon with Lana that led to her falling further into darkness, twisted his soul like a slow-cutting knife. It took its time, as if to cut through ever cell, every fiber of skin, every bit of him one by one. It was a feeling he couldn’t shake, and probably never would.

For now, he remained here on Coruscant, in hiding in Skhai’s penthouse. The sun was setting over the city, and he watched it, just as always did when he was on this planet. Jhon was leaning forward against the railing on the balcony, out in plain view yet knowing that with all the quadrillions of beings on this world he had nothing to fear. No one could see him, even standing out on a balcony.

 

[Empress]

" Okay, shes fed and bathed...took longer to get her to sleep but a fist full of my hair seemed to help" A voice said from behind. Skhai stepped onto the balcony rubbing her head painfully with a slight winced expression as she came to stand besides her long time companion. Lazily folding one end of her robe over the other Skhai leaned forward and let her silvery gaze linger on him a moment before turning outwards to the cityscape about them. " So how exactly did you find out the adorable lil drool monster was a Skywalker? " she asked. Her tones both conveying genuine friendly curiosity though it was obvious that there was a more ' professional" curiosity behind it as well. " I mean, that even escaped Dals record keeping and shes more OCD about that sort of thing than I am."

 

[Brandon Rhea]

“I told you about her father…”

His voice trailed off. It wasn’t something he liked to talk about. The story of how he knew that Andraste and Lana had the blood of the Skywalkers stemmed from a mistake he made many years ago, yet one that didn’t seem like a mistake at the time. It was well after his exile for the incident on Ardos, well after he had chosen the path of a sage, but it was before he met Skhai. Before he became the Jedi Master he was now. He learned wisdom, but he was not truly wise. Not yet. What seemed wise at the time was anything but.

Skhai’s question brought Jhon’s memory back to when they were just recently on Corellia, at the graves of Andraste’s parents. He was sitting there before them, looking down upon the engraved stones. The names on them had faded after so many years of being subjected to the brutal chill of the northern Corellian mountains, but five words remained there. Five words that said everything: DEATH IS ONLY THE BEGINNING.

This story was Andraste’s beginning. It started before she was even born, but it was the moment that guaranteed Darth Exodeus would one day find her and she would sit at the throne of the Sith.

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Nearly thirty years ago

A shimmering blue blade thrust into the side of a terentatek. The ghastly beast howled in agony as it felt its insides burn away. Its screech grew softer as the life faded from its body, and it slumped down onto the ground and died, being cut further by the blade as it did. Yet, this was no ordinary blade. This was a lightsaber, the blade of a Jedi.

The man who wielded it shut the energy beam off but kept the hilt in his hand for protection. This was not a world traveled lightly. This was Korriban, the homeworld of the ancient Sith and the capital of Sith empires that lasted for centuries. The dark side found its greatest power here. Only the strongest of Jedi minds could stand upon its surface and not be consumed by the ravaging effects of corruption. It often took a Jedi who had seen darkness and overcome to succeed at standing here.

This was such a Jedi. This was Jhon Cordatus—young, vibrant, determined. Once clad in armor from neck to toe, bearing the symbols of the New Jedi Order like a badge of rank, he now wore the traditional robes of a sage. He had overcome his darkness and the recklessness of youth. He was forged in the fire of a war that he caused, and he grew stronger in dealing with the deaths of thousands of people who died because of his stupidity. He suffered exile, shame, loss… but he overcame it all and was stronger for it. Had he tried to go to Korriban only a few years earlier, he would have ended up no different than the Sith Lords who were entombed in the mountains all around him.

This particular one was the tomb of Darth Invidius, an ancient Lord of the Sith from the time of the Great Territorial War. Jhon had been on the trail of a pair of Dark Jedi, ones that had caused particular commotion on Imperial border worlds a few years earlier, and he believed they were here now. Normally the Empire did not allow anyone onto the surface of Korriban, keeping a close blockade around the planet with numerous Imperial Knights in charge of ensuring that darkness did not escape, but they suspected that someone had made it to the surface. That was where Jhon came in, but he wasn’t the first to be sent. Someone else had come first, and she hadn’t reported in.

Slipping through various anti-chambers, he finally came to the tomb itself. A massive statue of Darth Invidius stood behind an altar dedicated to him. The tomb itself looked damaged, as if it had been forced open. Perhaps it was by grave robbers, or perhaps the people Jhon was after. Yet that is not what caught his attention the most.

“Sara…”

Sara Umbra. His closest friend. Jhon ran to her, but it was too late. No matter how much he shook the young Jedi Knight lying on the ground, no matter how much he tried to wake her, he couldn’t. The slash across her chest told her enough—the Dark Jedi she was sent to find had killed her. His eyes welled upon. He couldn’t breathe. She was his friend, his… She was all he ever had, the only person who ever stood beside him through every moment of his life. Now she was gone.

But the people who killed her were not.

He could feel them approaching. He could feel that he had walked right into their trap, that her death was meant to lure him here. This, in fact, was not the first encounter he had with one of them. One of them was aboard the Serendipity. Whether the trap was meant for him or any other Jedi was irrelevant now.

This was where he would make his stand.

 

[Demiurge]

The dry wind and callous dust blew like the churning of swarms and the grinding of stones. The howls of the air called, faint voices on the gust like an ethereal will o' the wisp. The ghosts of times in ancient pasts, the wills of those undying even now. Perhaps no one knew, nor dared ever to say. But it drew to the arid deserts and barrens sapient beings from all corners of the galaxy. Amidst the graves and the ruins, a young boy, a mere child in every sense of the word, walked fearlessly through the scathing winds. But he never felt the harshness, never knew it. Machines encased his body, and a mask was clamped to his face. His breathing rasped, as he breathed the breaths of a mere young boy, almost as if he were sickly or ill.

"This... this is his resting place, is it not? The tomb of Invidius, a Dark Lord of the Great Territorial Wars," he said, bringing his hand to the interior of the tomb walls as he walked down them with another figure ahead of him.

Within the tomb, a brisk chill on the air struck like frigid cold, like a cold snap from the desert heat of the outside world. The whispers were louder, the chills on the spine were sharper. It was something that could only be found and felt on one world - on the "holy world". On Korriban.

 

[Sreeya]

"Correct, disciple. At times I wonder if you'd serve greater purpose as a historian."

The voice was grim, as always, devoid of any sense of emotion. The man's visage was hidden behind an ominous mask, a hood up and extending down to a cloak. He did not gaze down at the boy, his eyes trained ahead. The yellow eyes that gleamed from behind the mask shined with bloodlust. He was a predator cornering a prey, a prey that had waltzed in all too willingly. The man was little more than a shadow, his demeanor imposing, though his movements as precise and agile as a cat's. He towered over the boy, bidding him to remain silent. He spoke through the Force.

"Do you feel that presence? That...stench? It is what we seek. Are you prepared?"

The man knew the Jedi would sense their presence. He hadn't bothered to mask his aura. The man did not yet call his saber to himself, his focus on the presence up ahead. He also wanted to see his student at work. There was no doubt that this was the highest ranking Jedi the boy would have personally come across.

 

[Brandon Rhea]

He was reverting. His mind was trying to change him back into what he was, the Jhon Cordatus he cast out these last few years. The man who doomed an entire world and who faced exile, only to emerge stronger. Sara’s body on the floor of the tomb called out to him, told him to lash out in anger and destroy the men who were approaching before they had a chance to so much as feel his presence.

Yet he didn’t. He couldn’t. No matter what the sight of Sara’s body told him, her memory spoke to him in another way. She was the one who always saw the good in him. Even when Master Khoss was critical, Sara was the other side of the coin. She was the one who nurtured him back into the light, the one who saw his potential more than anyone else. He had to make a choice. Would he remember her with acts of hatred, and with anger in his heart, or would he remember the love they shared? The bond that had made them inseparable for years?

The answer came when his blade was not ignited. It came when his mind grew calm again, ripping it away from the claws of Korriban that tried to drag anything down into darkness. The ghosts of the Sith were everywhere, even here. They had lost before, and he would not let their darkness win him today.

“I can feel you lurking there,” Jhon called out. “Dark Jedi have never been good at hiding.”

 

[Demiurge]

From the shadows, all one would be able to hear was the rhythmic rasp of a rebreather. Scathing, weak, but with the small quaint breaths like that which would be taken from a child. As then, slowly but with ever increasing echoes, the patter of footsteps proceeded from there as a very young boy with a breathing mask walked out from the shadows. He looked as if he would barely be able to move, as if he were a sickly little child.

"Lurking?" he said, staring at Jhon, then down as the woman's corpse, then again at Jhon, "I don't understand... why would you say we were hiding?"

At that, the young boy looked upwards, as if looking around in wonder.

"I've never seen a place like this before. It feels.. strange, doesn't it? Like something just... calls to you, lulls you." he said, asking the question toward Jhon.

Finally, the young boy's breathing began slowing and stuttering, as if he was in pain as he breathed.

 

[Brandon Rhea]

This Dark Jedi understood what he was sensing like a spoon understood the taste of food. The man was so accustomed to darkness that he knew nothing else. Perhaps he never would know anything else. Such was the fate of many who followed the dark side, blind to the error of their ways and unaware of the very thing that kept them bound to servitude.

“That’s the power of temptation,” Jhon said, amused at the naivety of the Dark Jedi. “The beckoning of desire, calling you so it can enslave you with the promise of fleeting power. I almost succumbed to it once, before I realized that all darkness does is destroy you and the people you care about.”

 

[Demiurge]

"Temptation?" the young boy said, slightly tilting his head as he turned back to Jhon, "Is it a temptation... to breath? Isn't it just... a vital function? A part of what it means to live?"

The sickly-seeming young boy then walked to the side of the room, almost as if he sought to touch the walls along the sides of the tomb.

"Or is it we're already enslaved to living? We all breathe, after all. But, it promises me nothing. It all simply... is. And destruction..."

At that, the young boy stopped about halfway across the tomb's vicinity, until he was at the horizontal midpoint of the room.

"Is that not just nature? The natural part of evolution?"