A/N: Sorry for the delay, this chapter has already been rewritten 4 times from scratch yet felt incomplete to me so I had to trash my plan of updating it on time to perfect it. Hope you enjoy it.
Btw, can someone guess what is wrong here? and also, this chapter might feel unnecessary/unneeded continuation of fight, buts its for a purpose I swear, wont have to wait for more than 2 chaps to feel it
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Reva's lungs burned with anger and pain as each passing second brought her closer to death.
She did not fear death itself, but rather the prospect of dying before delivering every ounce of pain she had endured onto that traitorous hero of the Republic. She feared she would never hear his agonized screams as she burned every inch of his skin to ashes.
Yet as the saber lock shuddered, crimson against crimson, the armored figure before her refused to yield. The hilt in her hand vibrated so intensely her fingers went numb. A profound wrongness permeated the air, separate from the fight and separate from the poison spreading through her veins.
The modulated voice carried an easy drawl. "Come on, Third Sister. You swing that glowstick like a hungover dockworker. Did the Temple throw you out, or did you just skip class?"
She bared her teeth and shoved, dragging the Force into her muscles and threading power through tendon and bone until every joint screamed in protest. The blades screeched apart, and she snapped into a tight flurry of high cuts, low slices, and quick stabs aimed at the tiny gaps in his armor plating.
He moved as though he had seen the sequence before she had even thought of it.
Her danger sense sparked at the edge of her awareness, yanking her guard into place half a heartbeat before his counterstroke. She hated the helmet, with no eyes, no mouth, and no jawline to read—just a dead slab of black reflecting the alley's neon glow.
"Shut the fuck up," she spat, dragging her saber in a vicious diagonal aimed at his neck. "You have no idea who you are touching."
He tilted his head, letting the blade skim past his visor as heat from the plasma washed over the smooth surface. "Relax. If I wanted to touch you, I would have at least bought you dinner first."
Her answer was wordless. She forced more power into her legs and drove forward, boots grinding on the filthy stone. His saber met hers with an impact that rattled her shoulder and sent pain shooting up her arm.
The pain felt wrong, its icy edges crawling along her veins. Her heart pounded, and each breath scraped harder than the last.
Poison.
She felt the greasy ache radiating from where he had jabbed that needle into her side, each heartbeat dragging it further through her ribs, her gut, and to the edges of her limbs. She ignored it, having endured worse in training drills—electrical shocks, fractured bones, the Grand Inquisitor's experiments in focus under duress. She would not fold for alley poison and a masked freak.
Their sabers locked again. He stepped in, twisting his wrist so the blades ground against each other, sending sparks skittering across both hilts to sting her cheeks.
She stared at him through the haze of the lock, and then she saw it: a tiny, spasmodic twitch in his left shoulder. It happened every few seconds, perhaps a micro-failure in motor control, perhaps not.
The Force around him also, did not flow like water or wind but for some reason stuttered and rippled like a glitch in a holofeed. It did not feel intentional, but with this freak, who could know?
She struck at the next ripple, her blade aimed for his throat.
He deflected it, but the motion came a fraction of a second later than it should have.
Was he was offering her an opening? It had to be intentional. It had to be. He wanted her to think he was slipping so she would overcommit, sell the illusion that he was breaking down. She wouldn't be fooled again by this lying conniving bastard.
"That temper of yours is endearing," he said, his tone almost conversational. "It really sells the whole feral dog aesthetic."
He then out-of-blue shifted his weight and his gauntlet smashed into the side of her face.
Crack.
The world snapped sideways. A burst of white pain shot from her nose into her skull. Warm blood rushed down her lip and over her tongue. Her eyes stung as if filled with salt.
He was a blurred shape now, edged in tears and a red haze. Her balance tilted, the alley walls swaying as she fought to orient herself.
She shoved him away with a Force-assisted shoulder check, the motion clumsy and desperate.
"K-keep talking," she growled, the words thick and distorted through broken cartilage and blood. "When I p-peel that armor open… I am going to m-make you choke on every word."
"I believe you," he answered. "You definitely have the voice for angry choking."
She went for his thigh, then switched midway to a rising cut aimed at his wrist. He parried with a small, efficient motion that barely moved his elbow, and the little tug in the Force warned her of his counter. She turned her guard and caught his blade an instant before it sheared through her gauntlet.
The sense felt slower now, as if it had to travel through mud.
She dragged more power through her core, wrapping herself tighter and forcing her muscles to keep responding. Her awareness spread in reflex, flaring out around her like an invisible net. The alley, the walls, the trash, the unconscious girl slumped against the stone—all of it came through clearly. Yet the man in front of her did not.
Most people glowed in her perception; even dull civilians had a warm smudge, while Jedi and Inquisitors shone brighter. He felt like a jagged absence. Every time she tried to focus on his presence, her attention slid sideways and down into herself, as if something had carved a hole in the world where he stood.
Her heartbeat stuttered. What is he?
She tried again, harder, attempting to fix his shape in the familiar inner map that kept her alive, but the map folded back on itself. It felt like staring into a pit with no bottom, and Reva's stomach lurched.
The next warning came late.
His blade swept low toward her knee. She saw it with her eyes, not with any sense, and jerked her leg back too slowly. The plasma kissed the back of the joint, carving through armor and into flesh.
"Fuck!"
Agony howled up her thigh as her leg buckled. Pure refusal held her up as she stumbled back with her saber wobbling unsteadily. Blood dripped down her calf onto the stone, and the burn smelled of cooked meat.
She glanced toward the alley mouth. She had to run; she could not win this, not with the poison turning her blood to sludge. If she were clean, she would have gutted him by now, but as things stood, she was going to die in this dirty street.
She would leave, get reinforcements, and hunt this bastard to the ends of the galaxy. And that girl, that little bitch Leia—the cause of all this—she would drag her back and torture her on a live feed broadcast to the entire damn galaxy. She wanted to see if Obi-Wan could stay hidden while watching the girl die piece by piece.
"You're leaving yourself open on that recovery," he observed, his voice still relaxed and his blade held loosely at his side. "Might want to tighten up the spin; otherwise, the next one might really hurt you."
Her thigh screamed in protest as she shifted her weight to her other leg, breathing hard. The poison made her thoughts thick and slow.
He had not missed; he had cut her on purpose.
"Slowing down," he said. "I thought Inquisitor training involved more cardio than this."
"I will carve your heart out," she panted.
"You have to actually reach it first."
He stepped in, and she met him, her body screaming in protest. They traded three quick exchanges, her saber feeling heavier each time while his never seemed to tire. Her elbows trembled with the strain.
He came high, and she parried, the impact jolting her shoulder. She tried to riposte, but her arm moved through soup as he was no longer there. A line of fire opened across her ribs.
Shhhhk.
She hissed as her armor parted like paper and her skin followed, blood welling to soak into her undertunic. The cut was shallow and precise; a centimeter deeper, and she would be holding her intestines. He had done it intentionally, playing with her.
A choked, wet gasp clawed its way out of her throat.
Anger flared, and she lunged, but she was too slow—the poison had her now. He sidestepped, and her blade met empty air before something hard crashed into her spine. She stumbled forward, catching herself with one hand against the alley wall.
Get up. Get up.
She pushed off the wall and spun, her saber coming up in a wild arc, but he was not there. He was behind her.
A boot slammed into the back of her knee.
Crunch.
She went down hard, her kneecap hitting the stone. A low, grinding sound was ripped from her as white-hot agony shot up her leg.
"That sounded like it hurt," he remarked.
She rolled, her saber whipping around to keep him at a distance. He stood three meters away, watching with that faceless mask tilted slightly. Her vision wavered, the wall seeming to breathe as the thing inside her veins dug deeper.
She dragged more power through her core, forcing her muscles to keep responding even as they began to misfire. She spread her awareness again, desperate for any advantage. The alley came through clearly, but the man did not. Every time she reached for him with the Force, her mind slid sideways into that pit, that absence.
Fear slid cold into the spaces that anger had kept hot. She snarled and forced her legs into motion, knowing that if she stood still, she would drown.
They traded another harsh series of blows. Her breaths came high and fast as he watched her in silence before striking quickly. She blocked high, but he went low; she saw the feint, yet her body would not respond. The saber grazed her hip, burning through armor and searing her flesh.
She bit back a cry, her whole body seizing for a moment as breath locked in her chest. Blood pooled under her boots, and her thoughts began to fragment.
He stepped in again. She raised her blade, and their sabers locked. This time, he did not speak—no drawl, no quip. The temperature dropped as his stance shifted, his blade angling with precise, clinical intent.
He moved.
She saw the strike coming toward her shoulder, but her arm moved too slowly. She twisted, and the saber missed her neck by a hair's breadth, catching her across the tricep instead and burning through armor and skin into muscle.
A shattered gasp of disbelief escaped her as she staggered back, clutching her arm. Blood poured thick and hot between her fingers, the wound smoking with a smell that made her gag.
He stood there, silent and watching.
Then he spoke. "You okay there? You're looking a little pale."
"F-Fight me," she gasped. "If you're-Cough g-going to kill me, then just fucking do it!"
He tilted his head. "I do not know what you are talking about. We are just sparring, Sister."
Taking advantage of the moments he wasted talking, she tried to run, but her legs would not cooperate. She made it two steps toward the alley mouth before he was there, positioned between her and escape. Her heart hammered against her ribs.
She reached for the Force again, for the familiar hum and warmth, but it slipped away—or she slipped into that pit, that absence where he stood. She tried to fix his shape in her mind, but the map simply folded back on itself.
He came in again without warning. She saw the blade sweeping for her ribs with her eyes and jerked back, too slowly. The tip caught her across the stomach, parting armor and drawing a line of fire.
Shhhhk.
She doubled over, gasping as the pain burned a white-hot line across her stomach. Blood slicked her armor, and the acrid smell of her own cauterized flesh filled her nostrils.
For a moment, she felt that she wasn't in that valley...that smell..it reminded her of the last days she had ever spent in that Temple. The Temple filled with smoke, death and burning bodies. The smell of her friends...with their flesh burned and eyes open.
Mira, so stupidly hopeful, running toward the silhouette in the doorway the moment she saw him.
"Master Skywalker!" she had called out, smiling, thinking he was there to save them from the clones. The blue blade came alive with a snap-hiss, passing through Lyra's middle so fast she might not have even noticed before she just fell apart—two halves of a girl, her face still frozen in confusion as she collapsed. No blood, at least; the Jedi's weapon was 'merciful' like that.
They were all cut down without being told what they had done wrong—no trial, no last words, just the efficient work of the Republic's greatest hero and his pet soldiers, turning the halls into a slaughterhouse for children.
She had played dead there, dropping among the bodies and hiding beneath the still-warm corpse of a boy she had shared a meal with just hours before. She had pulled her presence in the Force down to a pinpoint, praying the patrols would not see the tiny flicker of life hiding in the abattoir.
She had lived for one reason: to find him, to put her blade through the monster who wore a black mask now. If she died here, bleeding out in some back-alley gutter, it meant nothing. Her survival, the faces of the dead she saw every time she closed her eyes—all of it would be for nothing.
She had to end this now. She saw the ripple in the Force again, the glitch and the slight shoulder jerk.
Maybe it was a trap, and maybe he wanted her to strike there so he could kill her, but she no longer had a choice. It was the only opening she would ever get, even if he was giving it to her, even if it was a lie. She had to take it.
A roar tore up from her chest as she grabbed everything she could reach in the Force and shoved it into her ruined body. Power slammed through her, and her heart lurched into the abyss of her own making.
Her muscles snapped tight, her vision narrowing to a red tunnel with that featureless helmet at the center. She moved without intent, the alley blurring under her boots as she waited for the stutter.
And when it came, she bet her whole damn life on it. She appeared at his flank, her saber arcing up toward his head with enough Force behind it to bisect a speeder. For one perfect moment, he was too slow.
Her blade crashed into the side of his helmet, erupting in a brilliant white flare that sprayed molten fragments as his head whipped sideways.
But she had paid for it. In her focus, she had overextended. His blade, moving in a reflexive arc, took three fingers from her saber hand.
My hand... The thought fractured as white-hot agony exploded up her arm. A raw, piercing sound tore from her throat, one she did not recognize as her own. Her saber did not fall; she could not let it.
She clutched the hilt with her ruined hand and drove forward, putting every ounce of remaining power into the blade pressed against his helmet.
Just...die...
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A/N: new week, new rankings. I once again, ask of stones from you. Stone me, and you shall live a life without cliffhangers. Do not, and you will see and feel the terrors of it.
btw a bit of feedback would be appreciated as I am feeling like I have lost a bit of touch on my prose to be honest.
And regarding the milestone reward we talked earlier, lets set it to 600 stones to give me a bit of time to write as the thing I want to write in future chapter is a bit harder than I expected.
Read next chapter on patreon. A bit gory I would warn you beforehand.