Find The River - Part 1: The Infernal Machine

[Garrett Blade]

Milennia ago, before the times of the ancient race known as the Sith, there lived a race of people known as the Lithalia. They lived in tribes and their entire society revolved around crafts and arcane mechanisms. Their leader was known as Xeus. He was the chief mechanist, and wielded extraordinary power. Some religious texts depict him as one of the first force users, others say he was a deranged lunatic with unstable energy. But one thing is certain - an enormous force potential coursed through his veins. Amongst the very few accounts of his life, one can find a brief summary of the events leading up to his death. Xeus was somehow able to forsee his own death eight years in advance. Before his murder could take place, Xeus constructed a mysterious device. Comprising of 4 segments, each one took 2 years to assemble. In it's entirety, it was covered in magical runes, dozens of enchantments protecting the pieces from destruction. But before he could cast the final spell, Xeus' stronghold came under attack. So, before the enemy breached his inner sanctum, Xeus bonded his soul and life energies to the machines pieces. With their remaining spirit energies, the last remnants of the Lithalia channeled together all their power into a force powerful enough to shatter their planet into a billion fragments that were sent soaring into the depths of space. Along with those fragments went the four pieces of Xeus' machine. That was eight thousand years ago. And three things have survived those eight thousand years. Hatred. Greed. The lust for power. The descendants of Xeus' enemies are still out there. And it is only a matter of time before they learn of the four lost pieces of his machine. The Infernal Machine.

Present Day

A thick mist hung in the air about the Valley of the Dark Lords. You could not see more than ten metres in front of you thanks to the crowded ethereal presences all around, gliding in between crypts and altars and tablatures and tombs. Several pairs of glowing yellow eyes seemed to dart about under the ghostly concealment of the blanketing fog. Several furies flew overhead, barely visible above the canopy of mist. They circled overhead, like scavengers on the prowl. The sandy soil was hard and cracked. Even in the moist air of the evening, the ground was ever arid and dry. Garrett walked slowly. His feet did not scrape on the ground for he was not lazy or idle. His gaze inclined to stop on the furies. They seemed to notice his observations of them, and so dispersed and flew over to perch high upon one of the many acropolis' throughout the Valley. His lightsaber was attached to his utility belt, hidden beneath his black robe. It jingled slightly against his comlink and holocron that he had compiled himself. He brushed his hand against the part of his robe that they lay beneath, subconsiously checking they were still there. After a few more minutes of walking in complete slience, the Maosoleum came into view.

It towered above Garrett. The tallest trees were dwarfed by it's sheer size. It would have shown up on radar had there been one present. And that was only the doors! Inscribed all over the surface of the stone gates, ancient runes of mystical relevance and untold secret scriptures, that Garrett could only begin to decipher, could be seen, albeit with difficulty due to their size. On either side of the gates, two twenty-five metre-high Tuk'ata statues stood guard. A flaming torch on either side of them. Fenix held his head high and proud at this sight. Garrett looked down at him and smiled as he stepped forward and held out his hand to the gates. He began to recite words in a tongue very new to him, and alien to all. As he did, the inscribings began to glow white. Then, they stopped. Garrett took a step forward and pressed against the gates. Nothing. They did not budge. Then, Garrett took a few steps back, and then, unexpectedly, leapt through the water-like doors, and disappeared inside. Fenix imitated the action, and disappeared inside also.

[DarthHERA]

"Dont.......Dont do this to me now!!"

Bringing her fist down to slam the console, Hera cursed outloud.

The indicator lights were blinking in a maddeningly random fashion and she could not find the reason for it. All her data readings were going nuts and she had to apply all her skill to keep on course. But it was all to no end. The Wolfsschanze was shuddering violently under what seemed some kind of ionic barrage or storm.

Frantically she tried her options of course adjustment and evasive maneuvers, but her craft was sluggish and unresponsive.

Lets just try this...when all else fails, give it more speed..

click

click, click

She sat stunned.....the jolt of being thrown into the stars with enhanced speed did not happen. She looked over her consol in dismay and was at a loss. Time seemed suspended. Then a loud whirr began and unexpectedly, the craft shot upwards and was sent into a spiralling headspin.

Desperately trying to bring her ship under controll she flipped on the Auto Nav-sat and allowed the Wolfsshcanze to locate the nearest planet and automatically lock into the co-ordinates.

*****

She was coming in too fast......way too fast. Hera tried to pull it up and given a little more distance would have been able to. But seemed everything was hell bent on going against her today.

Plowing between the sparce tree tops, shreding limbs from them as if they were cobwebs only, the craft careened wildly. Hera flicked on her outside sheilds to help minimise the damage as the crash was imminent. She watched on her screen the green digitilised terrain outline - atleast there were no mountains to hit -and prepared for impact.

Any minute now......

The bottom of the craft clipped the ground and bounced violently, spraying a huge wall of sand in its wake. Skimming along as if it was a rock on a lake. Airborne again briefly, the ship clipped again, this time bouncing less and then plowed into a large sandy rise in the ground.

BWOOOFFF

With a massive thud the craft hit. The nose of the hull was completely covered with sand which slowly then drained off to reveal the Wolfsshanze had been carried by the forward momentum and, like a disk, hit a type of embankment or rise.

*********

Powering down enough to just be able to do a systems check, Hera ran a diagnostic of her craft. There was still no real accounting yet of why the systems failure had occured. She would need to do a more thorough check. But for now, she wanted to assess the outter hull and see its state.

Stepping into the dry hot air was a contrast to the level atmosphere of the inside of her ship. Hera felt an overwhelming sense of activity going on within the force. Once she had checked her ship, this activity would bear investigating.

Pulling at her shirt, the heat was already making her clamy, the Sith checked over her ship. Both her and her craft had gotten off lightly. She had only bruises and a light cut on her forehead. Her ship, though faring a fair bit worse, had sustained no hull breach. Everything else was fixable to varrying degrees of "patchup". Returning inside, Hera did a scan of the surrounding landscape, to see exactly where she was and seek signs of life before beginning her technical repairs.

[Garrett Blade]

Inside, the air was moist and clamy. A good inch or two of dust lay on the stone slabs that made up the floor. Garrett and Fenix were standing in a roughly square room, with two small doors on the left and right walls, and a larger door on the wall in front of them, opposite the outer entrance. Judging from the inscriptions on the walls, and the layout of the room, Garrett summised that it was nothing more than a mere ante-room. He walked over to one of the side doors inquisitively. On either side of it, a sword and shield were embedded in the wall. As was the case on the opposite door. The sword was maybe three of four feet long, quite sharp-looking at the tip, with sharp barbs along the shaft. The hilt was rather thick, with decorative, maybe even ritualistic, inscriptions on it. The shield was much more bland, with a simple diamond boss in the centre of the circular shield.

He turned away from the doorway, to find Fenix sniffing around the opposite door. He called him over, and returned to the centre of the room, turning their attention to the much larger, central door. Like the main entrance, this one was littered with inscriptions of an ancient, almost lost, language. Only this one seems much more erratic in its layout. As he began to read and translate the writing, Garrett immediately realised that none of it made any sense whatsoever. A sentence would start, only to merge with a completely unrelated one. And it was not straightforward to read either. There were words going from left to right, right to left, vertically, diagonally, even in swirls and zig-zags. A migrane began to form even as he glanced over it. Another thing which Garrett found odd, was that there were symbols added in here and there that Garrett did not recognise at all.

This was going to take a great deal of concentration. And what better way to do so than with a simple concentration spell. Garrett took a vial from his utility belt. It was glass with a simple screw-on lid. Inside resided a thick, crimson liquid. Reaching out with the force, Garrett restored the floor, returning the blanket of dust to it's previously undisturbed state. He then took hold of his staff and drew a circle in the dust with it The circlie was moderate in size, no more than 6 foot in diameter. Then withing the circle, he drew a pentagram, with each point barely touching the circular trench around it. Garrett then opened the vial and poured it into the circle. The liquid quickly filled the entire trough just below its brim. Garrett removed a second vial from his utility belt. This time though, it contained a dark blue liquid. Instead of pouring it into he pentagram, Garrett flicked it up into the air slightly. It spun vertically several times before Garrett struck it with the blunt end of his staff. It soared towards the door and shattered upon impact. The blue liquid miraculously splashed up into the air and evaporated. The room was quickly filled with a thick, almost purple smoke. Garrett held out his staff and began to recite something in an ancient tongue. The smoke rapidly gathered around the heart that was located inside the blunt end of the staff. Garrett then moved the staff above the pentagram, tracing the shape only a few centimetres above it. The smoke condensed and ran into the star-like shape. As it settled, Garrett sat in the centre of the pentagram, legs crossed and eyes closed. Fenix stood in one corner of the room as Garrett relaxed, still reciting the unknown words.

Five minutes later, Garretts eyes snapped open abruptly. The liquids had vanished, leaving a smouldering circle and pentagram made of solid metal on the floor. Garrett stood up and picked his staff from amidst the dust next to him. He stepped towards the door opnce again, and began to work out just what the hell the inscriptions actually said. Fenix sat upright, covered from head to toe in dust. He shook his body violently, sending dust particles into a dogfight all around the ante room, much to Garrett's annoyance. The dark beast then plodded over to one of the side doors, and plonked itself down on it's chest, lazily. Garrett shook his head in amusement, a slight smile on his face - something that had been absent from his face in recent times.

[DarthHERA]

She had been wrestling with one bolt that seemed rusted or melded on and given its awkward positioning, Hera couldnt get a decent grip on it with the hydro-spanner. She needed that panel opened, but to use more force which was fast becoming her only option-searing a hole through it with her lightsaber for example, it could do more damage than was already there to the wiring within.

She had been at these repairs for hours. She had made some progress, but this last task of checking the wiring looking for her initial problem that caused the crash was taking much longer than she had patience for.

"aaaaaargggh"

Hera bashed the spanner repeatedly against the bolt in angry frustration and finally flung the tool across the cabin, missing by a mere inch her droid that had been blowtorching over in the far corner.


Pulling herself out from under the low console, her back screaming out as she straightend up. "See what you can do with the wiring panel. I'll be back in an hour - gonna take a look around this 'sand dune'". The droid nodded obediently and finished what he was doing, then tackled the panel as ordered.

Meanwhile Hera had taken a speeder, and having earlier seen some buildings on her terrain-viewer on ship, she accellerated in that general direction, sending a small seeker-droid on ahead to relay data back to her as it came across it.

The landscape was changing gradually. The sandy hills were giving way to more trees here and there and the ground itself was becoming harder and more compacted. As if at one time it was fertile, but drought and arid temperatures had drained the natural moisture and left it cracked and ragged.

Pictures that were being relayed back by the droid reveald the stuctures Hera had thought were buildings, to be more of sepulchers and tombs. Closer shots revealed statues and great columns of temples. Hera had no idea what this place was.

Her feelings of alertness increased as she could sense beings here, though they didnt seem tangible for some reason. Their essence was here, but no physical form.

Closing the distance, Hera could now see with her own eyes and not just rely on the pictures from the view screen from the seeker-droid. Etheral mists swirled and dipped and drifted all around this place. The Sith stopped her transport on the outskirts of what she took to be some ancient buriel site. And walked silently into the grounds.

The droid returned to hover beside her as she moved forward, the swirling spirits with their yellow eyes making her skin crawl.

Up ahead, were two forms were standing outside a huge gateway. Hera stopped behind a statue to watch them secretly, the droid recording the mens actions on its long-range receptors.

As the two vanished into the water-like gates, Hera moved forward. Seized by curiosty, she replayed the footage from the droid, and after two attempts repeated the incantation that Garret had said, and then, she too stepped into the region beyond.

What greeted her was an astounding site. A conjury of some form was taking place with purple smoke and a smouldering circle on the ground and a dark beast - all these sites confronted her as she tried to adjust her eyes to the inner darkness. But despite all these strange things, her gaze settled on the two individuals in the ante-room with her. The one continuing to try to advance further through a larger door.

[Garrett Blade]

The silence in the room was deafening. Garrett was concentrating too hard on translating the texts to notice Hera's arrival. His eyes were tightly closed, but he ran his fingers over the inscriptions rapidly. Once again, he came to one of the parculiar symbols at the end of one of the sentences. He searched frantically for an identical symbol. Finding one, his eyes opened suddenly with..

"Sneaky buggers!"

Garrett took a step back to view the door in its entirety. he closed his eyes and clenched his fists, holding them out towards the doors. A purple ray burst from his hands and bathed the doors. The writing glowed white hot as he translated it - much faster than doing it all manually. Without warning, the ancient shattered instead of opening, revealing darkness once again. Also, the doors on either side of the ante room slowly began to open. The shieds and swords on either side seemed to change, becoming metallic and life-like. When the door fully opened, a skeletalised warrior stepped forward, taking up his weapons in the process. One turned to Garrett, and the other to Hera, with their weapons at the ready. Garrett eyed each one, still not knowing of hera's presence directly behind him...

"Sneaky buggers!!!"

[DarthHERA]

It took a fraction of a second for Hera to unclip her lightsaber and activate it.

The chaos of the incantation made it difficult to see all that had taken place in the breath of a moment as Garrett opened the Pandora's box of this "sepulchre." But the Sith's instinct to recognise threat zeroed in immediately on the room's freakish gatekeepers.

With one fluid swipe the luminescent blue blade of her lightsaber "Atropos" cut through one Skeletal warrior as it advanced into the room. Its vacant diaphragm separating and its brittle body crumpling in two parts to the dust.

Garrett seemed surprised at first, by the appearance of another in the room, though he didnt have time to think on it. The second warrior was upon him and the unsheathed sword swinging forcefully toward his head.

Hera reached out through the force and stayed the Skeleton's hand in mid air - preferring to let Garrett deal with it, and see what he was capable of other than chanting and waking the dead.

Calling out in greeting, Hera taunted..."For a Sorcerer...you arent very smart..." And then shadows moved as more of the lifeless soldiers marched from the darkness of the room beyond toward the 3 intruders.

[Garrett Blade]

Garrett held his hand out towards the skeleton warrior, and clasped his hand around it's boney neck. He crushed the spinal link between the body and the skull. In an instand, the entire skeleton shattered into dust, and the sword and shield fell to the floor with a clang. His hand glowed a deep purple, almost black. A strange white aura surrounded the dark glow. With the utterance of a single word, Garrett hurled the bolt towards the advancing guardians of death. The resultant explosion all but collapsed the corridor. Several warriors were sent flying towards Garrett and Hera...

"Everybody has to start somewhere!"

Fenix leapt into the air. His jaws contracted around the throat of one of the advancing warriors. With a jerk of his head, the skeleton crumbled in the Tuk'ata's mouth. He then turned to the others, snarling at them, revealing razor sharp, pearl-white teeth. Garrett stepped in front of his animal kin wielding his staff. He drew a rectangle equal in length to the width of the corridor, and three metres wide. Then, he took a step back, telepathically urging Fenix to do the same.

[DarthHERA]

Hera watched what the sorcerer was doing and, as wisdom dictated, she too stepped back out of the way of what most likely would be another of the strangers explosive conjurings.

She kept her saber activated, unsure of what was next to come - not to mention the snarling beast mere feet from where she stood.

Keeping her eye on Fenix, Hera called to the man infront of her.

"So...Sorcerer....you got a name?"

Keeping his concentration, the man waved his staff before him and after speaking a low spell in more of the strange language, he replied "Garrett Blade. And you would be.....?"

A sense of "impending" hung on the air as they waited a breif moment for Garretts work to take effect. Hera called back in an automatic and subdued tone, half expecting any moment the floor to open up and swallow them all. "I am Hera DrenKast."

And she watched on, dividing her sight between Garrett and the beast behind him.

[Garrett Blade]

The undead guardians shuffled forwards gradually. Garrett could see that Fenix was growing impatient, ready to pounce in an instant. A second or two later, the warriors were all standing in the rectangle created by Garrett. He spun his staff several times, channeling the darkside energies of the temple through it, and struck the ground beneath him. At first nothing happened. But a second or two later, a shockwave was sent from where Garrett hit the ground towards the skeletons. The ground encompassed by the rectangle shattered to reveal darkness. The warriors fell from sight, giving way to a clear path further into the Mausoleum. Garrett stepped forward, then stopped at the sound of stone rumbling. He turned around to see the wall through which he had entered. He stepped up to it and pressed his hand against it. It was solid.

"What the hell?"

Garrett uttered the ancient words once again, then pressed forward. he door remained solid. There was no way anybody was leaving through this entrance any time soon.

It seems we're trapped in here. I'm not sure about you, but I planned on venturing deeper inside anyway. You're welcome to accompany me by all means - unless you'd like to stay here and try to get through that..."

[DarthHERA]

She didnt need a second invitation. Hera was intrigued every bit as much by the man, as by his reason for being here in this strange place.

Garrett Blade was already moving ahead, not bothering to wait for her response, and so Hera moved to follow him, remaining wary of the man's snarling pet.

Catching up to walk beside him, Hera began with her questions. She was curious by nature, though she didnt bother with trivialites such as where he was from or how he got to this place. Neither of those things really mattered right at this moment. Instead, she got to the main of the matter.

"What is it you are seeking here, Sorcerer? And can I expect more of those undead soldiers, or worse, from your spells?"

[Garrett Blade]

Garrett picked a skull up from the sandy stone floor and ignited it. he hurled it across the corridor, obliterating yet another skeleton...

"I'd expect plenty more of them. The dead do not rest easily in this place."

Garrett ignored her other question for now, to give her the benefit of the doubt that he was keeping secrets from her. Garrett was never one to give the game away too early - just in case there were other prying eyes about. They walked down the dank halls, their path lit by Hera's lightsaber. After fifteen minutes of walking in relative silence, except for the occasional idle chatter, they reached a t-junction with a small fountain that was not flowing. The water was still and old - full of dust, not to mention all manner of dead insects that inhabited the dead hallways.

"Mind if we have a little rest here before continuing?"

He spoke whilst simultaneously sliding down against one of the walls lazily. He plonked himself down on the dusty floor and lay his staff beside him. Fenix plodded up to his other side and dropped to the floor, letting out a sleepy yawn as he did so. Garrett looked around the dim room curiously, before settling his gaze on Hera...

"I'm not entirely sure what it is I'm looking for down here. I don't know where it is, but I'll know when I've found it. All I'm certain of is that the prize in this deep of dangers is one of four fragments of an ancient machine, devised by a great sorcerer many thousands of years ago. Each piece of the machine is powerful in itself - but once combined, the machine that is created is capable of unimaginable power. At least that's what the legends and texts say. But you can't believe everything you read. Fortunately there is some viability in the inscriptions throughout this place that tell of the machine."

[DarthHERA]

While Garrett made himself semi-comfortable on the ground, Hera strolled around the perimeter of the old fountain base, listening to his explanation of his presence here.

She looked into the fountains well - nothing but dust and the empty husks of long dead beetles and bugs littered its surface.

Interesting that Garrett would seek a machine, when he seemed to understand that power can and did come from much less physically obvious realms. The sorcerer commanded the mysteries of witchcraft as one familiar and at ease with such knowledge. She was curious as to what agenda such a one as he would have for a weapon of much destruction. She herself was fond of such appliances..But she had not heard of anything like what Garrett had described, which really meant nothing. The Galaxy was full of many strange and amazing things, most of which one would have to live many lifetimes to even have a vague understanding of.

Leaning forward and blowing aside a heavy layer of dust, the Sith sat herself on the edge of the fountain and looked over to Garrett seated on the ground across from her.

"How did you learn to read such inscriptions as these? I am not a scholor of the dark arts by any means, but these markings are certainly nothing I have seen before."

As Garrett replied to her, the dust she had blown aside still had not settled. It filtered through the air in what appeared a harmless unsettling of dust, so sublte in its movement, that at first neither of the two in conversation noticed it.

But Fenix noticed. His wild eyes flicking to the motion and watching as the particles began to form a distinct shape and then descend to fall lightly onto the beasts body.

[Garrett Blade]

"I learned the majority from my old master before he was killed. Then my last master filled in the gaps, and I developed it from there by myself."

Fenix was fidgeting beside him, but Garrett payed it no mind for now.

"They're not Sith in origin, as most achaeologists would tend to believe if they saw them. The language is far older, and the magics of the people are older than our understanding of the Force. Hence, not many people are versed in the language - unlike me."

Fenix's fidgeting was starting to annoy Garrett...

"What's wrong with you?"

[DarthHERA]

Fenix began to snarl and got agitatedly to his feet, walking forward in an unsteady gait. His back bristled and he twisted his great head around as if to try to pluck something from off his back.

Hera looked at the huge creature and stated blandly to Garrett, "Something's wrong with your dog."

She looked on, not yet making a move, but beginning to ready herself for a fight. What was going to be their opponent, she didnt know, but a fight was coming - she could feel it.

Garrett Blade was on his feet and striding towards the Tuk'ata' - its bizare behaviour accelerating. The beasts snarls had turned from low growls to an almost painful roar. It had bared its sharp teeth and was trying to bite its own flesh.

Garrett called out a command, which Hera assumed meant something along the lines for the animal to be still or settle down, but it made no effect.

Suddenly Fenix's eyes flew open wide and had a very unnatural wildness to them. The creature lunged at his master, its powerful body a black blur. But Blade saw it coming and moved out of its reach. Hera had no such luck. Her view was blocked by the position of Garretts body, and she had been looking elsewhere for other signs of assault.

The beast landed squarely on her, toppling both itself and her backwards into the Fountain well. The impact from the force of their combined weight crashed through the stone bottom. The two disappeared into the emptiness below, Garrett glimpsing a tangle of arms legs paws and the flailing hemline of a Sith Robe.

[Garrett Blade]

Garrett jumped up and dived forwards to try and catch Hera before she disappeared, but he was too late. The pair of them were gone. Garrett did not doubt that the water system led to another part of the catacombs. It was just a case of finding them again. He sat down before the fountain, with his legs crossed and his staff impaled in the sand. His eyes were closed as he began to chant yet another sith incantation. He began to feel drowzy as he did so. The spell was actually one that would allow his consciousness to leave his body, so he could find them easier...

[DarthHERA]

She thought she glimsped Garrett leaning over the rim of the hole that she and Fenix had plunged into as they tumbled down into the darkness, but she couldnt be sure.

And she had no time to dwell on it either.

With a brutal jolt, the trip to oblivion was halted as Hera and the beast landed on the dirt floor. Fortunately for the Sith, she got the lighter of the solid greeting than did Fenix, as they had tumbled in the air and their positions had reverse, with Hera landing on top of him.

That benefit wasnt to last though. She didnt have time to focus her eyes in the dark or orient herself to any degree, before the animal thrust his great head at her in an attempt to tear hers off in its jaws.

Hera threw herself backwards, but Fenix only following, righting himself and finding his feet, he pounced on her with lightening speed.

Defending herself as best she could with the animal pinning her body flat on the ground, Hera grabbed either side of Fenix's yawing mouth in her hands and held them wide apart and away from her as much as she could. His tongue was flickering about in his slathering mouth and his teeth were protruding as far as he could manage in a continued effort to tear her apart.

She had engaged the force and using its strength to hold the Tuk'ata off her. But she was fighting more than just this animal. There was something driving it. Some other force or thing that had made it attack in the first place and it was not yeilding.

Her arms were straining and her muscles were tight with fighting for her life and it was all she could do to make the effort required to scream for Garretts help.

"Blaaaaaaaaaaaaaaade!!!"

[Garrett Blade]

he glided effortlessly around corners and through cracks in walls, down flights of stairs and under archways. The sound of running water was all around him, so he figured that the water system running throughout the catacombs would guide him to Hera. As a corner was turned, he was greeted with the sight of Hera pinned down by Fenix's black body, as she screamed Garrett's name. In mere seconds the ethereal journey was undone and Blade's eyes snapped open. He leapt to his feet and grabbed his staff, impaling himself in the chest with it. His body illuminated a faint crimson colour for several seconds as he pulled the object from his body, leaving no wound. He then sprinted off down the corridor at an inhuman speed. After a few moments, he came to what looked like a solid-enough-looking wall with a single, hard-to-see crack in it. He formed a fist with his hand, pulled back his arm, and struck the wall. It exploded with a single hit of red and black, as dust and rock and earth and blood sprayed out to the other side. Garrett wasted no time in stepping through the rubble and carrying on down the flights of stairs until he skidded around the corner to find Fenix seemingly out of his mind.

Garrett stood several feet away, with his staff held out in front of him. He straightened his hand out, with fingers together pointing upwards, and the staff resting vertically against his palm, which faced the beast. Then, his staff began to rotate, slowly at first but quickly speeding up into a full-blown spin. It moved a couple of inches towards Fenix and hera, whereupon it emitted a red beam of incandescent light that gave off very little glow. The beam struck Fenix in his chest as he raised up off Hera and onto his hind legs. Upon impact, Fenix was thrown back against the far wall of the dimly lit room, some twelve or so metres away and in passing by so quickly, caused one of the many torches along the walls to blow out. Before the Tuk'ata hit the ground, Garrett sent a similar blast towards it, encasing it in some kind of leathery urn, which was red and slimy and dripped of blood constantly.

Garrett ran over to Hera and helped her off the cold sandy floor, a look of concern in his eyes...

"Are you hurt?"

[DarthHERA]

Shifting her eyes from the now cacooned Fenix - who was encased in what looked like a bleeding leathery case - she looked at Garrett. His concern surprised her. If anything, she thought he would have been angry that he'd had to take such measures against his pet in order to save a stranger.

Dropping her eyes to her hands, she saw both had been punctured badly by the sharp teeth of the Tuk'ata as she had fought him off. A light exploring of a wet sitcky sensation at her side, her fingers revealed a gash along the side of her abdomen - probably had happened when Feix had pounced and pinned her down.

But she was lucky to even be alive, and she knew it. She owed Garrett, and though it made her uncomfortable to be in his debt, she was releived he'd arrived when he had. The driving force behind the beasts attack was unlike anything she had come up against before - and she was no stranger to weilders of dark and powerful gifts.

"Im, fine...Cant say the same for your pet."

She looked over again at the dripping mass against the far wall.

"Whatever it is that you are after here, Garrett, there are some very strong defences set in place to see you dont easily get it."

Wincing as she dabbed at her side, she remarked, "Thats some pretty unusual magic you weild.."

[Garrett Blade]

Garrett simply smiled at Hera.

"Don't touch it...and try not to think about it."

He removed a small vial from a pouch attached to his belt. It was made of a jade-green coloured glass that was difficult to see through even with the sharpest eyesight. A cork secured the contents inside. Garrett turned Hera on her side slightly, to get a better look at the wound. It was quite severe, and could kill her if he didn't treat it right now. he removed the cork and poured the contents onto the wound. The liquid was clear and seemed almost identical to water, but it's reaction with the wound suggested it was acidic, as smoke hissed from the deep gash.

"This will prevent any infection from the darkside energies embedded within the wound. Had Fenix been dead, there would be no trace of it now, but since he's not, it's safer to do this. It should take a few moments and for what it's worth - I apologise for the pain."

A single eye of Garrett's began to water slightly but he blinked away the tears. He sat down beside Hera and closed his eyes. As she watched him, she did not actively notice that the wound in her side had began to seal up, though the pain did not ease in the slightest. Thoughts began to swirl in Garretts mind. Images of the past. Memories of his life. As he did, his temperature began to rise rapidly. His breathing became heavier and he began to sweat. Quite literally, the blood inside his body began to boil. Without opening his eyes, he took a dagger from his boot and drew it across the palm of his hand. The hot blood began to flow freely as he held out his palm to Hera, level with her mouth...

"A Tuk'ata's attack is like a venom in the... the way the... infection can spread so quickly. This should neutralise it before it can affect any internal organs..."

[DarthHERA]

She looked at his bleeding palm extended toward her, and screwed her face up in aversion.

Her side was throbbing, and it had been an act of sheer will not to strike out in reaction to the acidic 'remedy' Blade had splashed all over her moments before.

"Im supposed to what? drink that?"

Garrett nodded, but said nothing more. He had explained the reason behind it, if Hera wanted to trust him, it was up to her, he wasnt about to try to make her. Convincing a distrusting Sith in a matter or seconds was a challenge - convincing a distrusting woman was near impossible, and so he let the choice rest with her.

She pushed his hand away and got to her feet. She noticed her wound had sealed up and the flesh was clean again - and this surprised her.

Garrett stood also, watching her closely, (Hera noticed he didnt look so good himself all of a sudden) his hand closing into a fist to stem the blood flow.

Hera felt unsteady and she could tell something wasnt quite right. She ran the back of one hand across her forehead to try to focus again, and it came away damp from beads of perspiration that had formed in the exertion of the simple movement of getting up. Still Garrett watched her, and in his eyes she saw confirmation of what she was feeling. He had been speaking the truth about the rapidity of the venom's course through her body.

Without taking her ice-blue eyes from his, Hera took his hand and lifted it to her mouth. Pressing her lips to where he had cut his palm - blood still seeping hot and red from the wound - she ingested the poison-nulling flow.

[Garrett Blade]

"Quite disgusting I'm sure you'll agree........but it's better than slow decomposition."

Garrett looked away as she drank from his wound. He thought she might feel awkward if he stared at her during the procedure. With his free hand, he drew a plam-sized symbol in the dust with his index finger, and uttered a few words under his breath.

It was deadly quiet this low down in the catacombs. And to think that they went even deeper than this. The only sources of light were from the fiery torches throughout the windy tunnels, save for the fading glowrods of explorers long dead. The silence was so great that Garrett could almost hear the dust as it blew along the floor. He even thought he could hear Fenix's beating heart inside the leathery urn, but perhaps he was imagining that. He returned his attention to Hera who still held his hand in hers. Blood dripped down the side of her mouth as he pulled his hand away gently...

"That should be plenty. Any that does not neutralize the toxins will pass out of your body naturally so you've no need to worry about any diseases as a result."

As if it were second nature to do so, Garrett waved his bleeding palm over the symbol he had previously drawn on the floor, which not glowed white-hot. He clentched his teeth and screwed his eyes up at it burned the wound closed. He did the same to Hera's hands, which had puncture wounds from Fenix's razor-sharp maw. Garrett leaned against the wall to catch his breath. He felt slightly weak as a result of helping Hera...

"Take a moment just to rest...again! It'll take a few......seconds before the pain will subside. it may come back in a......day or two for a few hours, but it'll.......pass. I'll just take a moment to catch my breath..."

He put his arm horizontally against the wall and rested his head against it, with hsi eyes shut. He gripped his staff tighter in his hand, which he had just retrieved from the floor next to him. He dropped the staff again and reached into his pocket. Pulling out an exquisite-looking purple pieve of fabric, he handed it to Hera...

"It looks expensive, but it's.....nothing more than a mere cloth - a hanky if you like. You can clean yourself u.....up if you like...with the water running over there..."

...he pointed to the hole in the aquaduct, which he assumed she and Fenix arrived in this area by. Water was flowing from one of the lower cracks below the hole. He bent down to pick his staff up again.

[DarthHERA]

Hera took the fabric that Garrett handed her and did as he suggested.

Dipping it fully into the stream of water that flowed down the rockface, she first held it to her forehead. The coldness of the water as it ran over her face felt good. She took the time to clean her hands and, though it wasnt really necessary, she wiped her side where it had recently been healed as well.

The cleansing effect of the blood she'd swallowed had already begun. She could feel it in her own system somehow. What a strange and somewhat intimate thing to experience with someone and though she didnt feel awkward at all, she couldnt really say she felt completely at ease either.

She rinsed the cloth well and wrung out the extra moisture. Turning again, she walked over to Blade who was resting, some of the normal color returning to his face.

She took his hand again in hers, the same that he had cut and then healed, and placed the cloth again into it, dabbing where the cut had been.

She realised it had taken a great deal from him to aid her the way he had and she felt a kindness toward him that she rarely felt for anyone. Hera was a "taker." If someone had something she needed, there was no question in her mind to just help herself, yet this man had willingly helped her at expense of himself and she felt the unfamiliar sensation of gratitude.

"Are you feeling better?" It was her turn to ask.

Garrett said that he was and pushed himself away from the wall.

Hera looked over at Fenix, his confine still dripping behind them. Perhaps when they had what Garrett had come for, they would be able to free the Tuk'ata and destroy whatever it was that had possessed the animal.

As Garrett collected up his staff again, Hera stopped him before they moved off.

"Uh...Thankyou, Garrett."

It seemed inadequate, but she didnt really know what else to say to him.

[Garrett Blade]

"Don't mention it..."

...he replied, turning round to smile at her as he slowly made his way towards the corner he had skidded round just before. The right of the arch came down and round to form the stone corner. The stone blocks were sandy and a grey-blue moss grew on the surface. The crakcs were large and probably deep. Small inscriptions could be seen, written in some kind of red ink. He walked with a slight limp, but the pain would be gone in a few moments. As he neared the corner, he looked back, sensing that hera's thoughts dwelled on Fenix for a moment.

"He'll be fine. That urn is practically impenetrable. When he wakes up, he won't remember a thing about the last hours events. Lets get going."

As he moved he felt a sharp pain in his chest, and raised his hand to rub it slightly. His palm also hurt a little, but he tried to ignore it, since it didn't really matter. He was weak, but not too weak. All he needed was time to regain his strength. Thanks to his studies, he was able to regenerate faster than normal human beings.

[DarthHERA]

Hera had watched Garrett as he had started off ahead of her and noticed that he seemed to not be fully recovered. She said nothing though, but kept an eye on him to make sure his condition didn't worsen.

She, herself, had recovered well. She felt bruised, but that was all. The magic Blade had used was very potent - she had recovered that fast only once before, and that was a direct reaction to the healing talisman channelled through her master, Ogre Mal Pannis upon her own ascention to master.

She would like such healing ability.

Hera cast a covert glance at the staff Garrett held in his hand, careful not to let him see her. ..very curious...

He looked back to her and Hera averted her eyes. He reassured her that Fenix would be alright and then urged them forward.

Her eyes dropped once more to the staff.

[Garrett Blade]

As Garrett walked, he held his palm out in front of him. A small orb of light could be seen, with a golden aura and a white-hot core. He gazed into the centre. He could see the exterior of the Maosoleum, and the light was fading on it. He clasped his hand shut and the orb vanished as quickly as it has appeared. That means that it must have been around three hours after noon when he arrived at the Maosoleum, for they had not been inside for more than 4 hours.

"Dusk is approaching!"

Garrett ignited his lightsaber whilst simultaneously striking the floor with his staff, causing it to burst into flames around the blunt head which resembled a clenched fist. As he did this, one of the torches on the wall near to him suddenly went out. There was no wind in the tunnel. So how could it have happened?



"It would be a good idea to ignite your lightsaber. And here, take this..."

He removed his quarterstaff from its leather sheath attached firmly to his back. It was precisely 6 foot long and blunt at both ends. He grabbed hold of it and brought it down hard on his knee whilst holding it horizontally. With a flash of red, it broke into two sections, one 4 foot and the other 2. He placed the 2 foot long piece in a free slot on his utility belt, and gave the other one to Hera.

"Hold it good and tight now!"

Garrett picked up a skull that was idly laying around and placed it on the end of the 4-foot long quarterstaff. He then struck it with his own staff. With a burst of flame, the skull was now burning ferociously, and was fused solid with the quarterstaff.

[DarthHERA]

Hera took the staff obediently. Garrett then placed the skull atop and subsequently ignited the flame that now blazed boldy - the flames flicking and darting in and out of the holes that once were eyes, notstrals, ears and mouth.

It cast its bright glow in a circle of light slightly ahead of them as they both walked on. Hera had taken her lightsaber in her other hand as Blade had suggested and ignited the one end of the dual-bladed "Atropos." The brilliant blue of the saber casting its own small beam of light in the ever darkening mausoleum.

"Garrett, is this place a church or a tomb? I have read of places that are both. Is what you are looking for buried with the dead? If so, then it would stand to reason it would be found in the lowest levels of this place - that is typically where the dead are laid to rest, right?"

He continued on, reading the signs and inscription etched in the ancient walls. Hera grew impatient at his silence and tried herself to make sense of the writings. Peering intently at them, but not understanding a thing, she grew annoyed. She tugged on his cloak impatiently.

"What are they telling you?"

[Garrett Blade]

"Hands off!"

He said, jokingly, wrenching his garments free of her grasp with a smile on his face. He held the torch close to the wall and leaned forwards slightly. The close proximity of the lght caused the wall surface to illuminate brightly, whilst the deeper crevaces of the inscriptions became as black as death. On this particular section of wall, the writing was somewhat erratic. There were numerous grammatical errors as well as a fair amount of spelling mistakes, but Garrett was able to make very accurate interpretations regardless. It took him a minute or so to decipher the three square feet of wall section he was concentrating on. During that time, he could see Hera's impatience as she tapped her foot on the cold floor. He found it cute, which was odd for him.

"Well, whoever this 'Akka' is, he thinks that the moons are going to collide in the next 4000 years. I guess he meant the Gemini Moons that collided to form the Siamen Moon in the Sumitra Sector."

As he spoke, his gaze stayed on hera, who was not paying attention to him, but rather what he had to say, whilst she inspected the inscriptions. Perhaps she was searching for any patterns in the writing in hopes of understanding it as she listened to what he said. Garrett smiled as the foot tapping slowed down until it stopped and Hera turned to him. He looked up at her before continuing. "It goes on to say...", he said as he returned his gaze to the wall...

"...that...well actually it doesn't go on to say anything related. It changes to a completely different topic. 'Walrus to he who dares eat bottom'....."

Garrett's eyes widened as he took a step back, a look of confusion on his face. His lips began to form a smile, but he froze them and tried to maintain a stern, analytical look across his visage. He did not turn to see Hera as he suspected a smirk would greet him followed by a blatant laugh in the face. Instead, he moved closer to the wall and tried again...

"...hmmm...'Walrus'.....a,b,c...ahhhhh! That's a D! Forgive me. Second thought, don't - that was a stupid mistake! It reads...I think...'Death to he who dares venture fourth!'"

He breathed in slightly.

"It sounds like they're trying to scare us, don't you. And besides, that's a pretty tacky thing to write in a place such as this!"

Garrett accidentally took a step forward to maintain his balance as he turned his body to face Hera. Suddenly, a thin layer of dust fell away from the wall. Throughout the corner of his eye, Garrett noticed smething change on the wall. He looked closer, and an intrigued, evil smile crossed his lips...

"Sneaky...buggers..."

[DarthHERA]

Hera looked ... and looked... but she couldnt see it. She glanced at Garrett to see if she was looking in the right spot, which she was, but no smile of revelation came to her face. So she peered closer and got a nose full of dust for her trouble.

What is he talking about??

She was getting frustrated. Unlocking secrets and unraveling mysteries in patient thought and study was not her style. She was more the slam'n'grab type. Of course, she could be controlled and discreet when it warrented it...but solving riddles of the ancients who (and Hera was convinced of this) were most likely sauced on spice and stim and all manner of galactic ales that were available even way back then when they put their mystical insriptions to wall.

"I dont see it! Sneaky where?" She threw her arms up expressively and Garrett had to dodge to avoid flame and saberblade.

She walked around and stood on the other side of him, again making an attempt to "see" from another angle. What she did see was Garrett grinning. He was enjoying himself. The mystery, the key to find what he wanted..the small thrill he got when he saw how clever the ancients were in their encryptions - not realising that he was the more clever for desciphering them. She studied him closer. She had known him only a few hours, but she had experienced a closeness with his healing ability and him saving her life, more than with some people she had known for years. Strange.

He was dusting off more of the wall and his eyes moved hungrily over the markings before him. She started to laugh lightly, good naturedly.


"You sorcerers are an odd lot"


Looking again at the wall, she sighed loudly.

"I say we forget fossicking around down here and just start shooting holes in the wall and see what happens. If there are more guardians, we grab one and make him take us to where the part is. "Death to he who ventures forth" be damned."

[Garrett Blade]

"It changed."

Garrett stepped back from the wall in awe at the mystics before him. He pointed to the exact words that had changed with the tip of his crimson saber, being careful not to actually touch them with the blade.

"It now reads 'Death to you who hath ventured forth.' It's as if the walls have eyes and are...taunting us!"

Suddenly, Garrett's eyes widened as more dust began to fall away from the wall without it being disturbed in any way. A scraping sound echoed past the light of their torches, through the darkness and beyond, yet no tool could be seen against the wall. One by one, each word changed. Every single letter began to alter itself by unseen hands. As if that was not strange enough. The new letters appeared to have some sort of red tint inside their crevasses. Garrett followed the writing as it changed at a gradually increasing speed. For some reason, only a section of the wall four metres long was changing. The remaining inscriptions around seemed to be unaffected at all. Though it was hard to tell, since the torches did not do a good job of illuminating anything beyond a one metre radius. Was it just Garrett, or had the place gotten a lot darker all of a sudden? And there was some kind of red aura in the air, probably due to the red tint in the writing as it became more intense.

"Lets see what it says now..."

As Garrett moved forward to read, his head snapped around to look behind him...

"Did you hear that?"

[DarthHERA]

Hera had heard the same noise and was already moving away from the wall toward the darkness at the edge of the meter of light form the torch.

The red hue from the writings gave a surreal effect of where they stood and both Garrett and Hera were primed for the unexpected.

They heard the scratching sound again and as Hera moved off, Garrett watched. Seeing nothing but an unusual shimmer of red in the dim light, he turned once more to the wall.

Stepping back suddenly, startled, he was confused to see Hera's retreating back, her torch held forward, light saber in hand moving off to investigate. Garrett twisted his head around over his shoulder.......and in astonishment, saw the exact same image heading off in the other direction.

Both to his front and back, Hera moved off into the ever receding darkness - the wall that had once been so close to Garrett had seemingly vanished and he was now the dividing pillar between the mirror images of his fellow Darksider.

"Hera" he called out - and both reflections turned around in unison to respond.

"What?

..................................................


What did he want? He was just looking at her in the most curious fashion. And so she waited for him to speak, but he just kept looking, turning his head back toward the wall as if he could see something beyond it and then back again.

She shook her head, not understanding, and continued on to investigate the intermittent scratching sound that kept teasing her further out..just beyond her realm of light...


.................................................. ......


Garrett held his flaming staff higher in order to see better.
She had answered him, but seemed completely oblivious to the fact that there were two of her. Or that the wall had vanished. And as she shook her head and turned her back (or rather as "they" shook their head and turned back) he called out again but this time she gave no sign she had heard him.

[Garrett Blade]

He was confused. The corridor began to spin rapidly around him. The shadows swallowed him as he began to hear voices. They were laughing at him. Children, men, women, aliens and monsters. All laughing at him. He tried to laugh back at them like a madman in an attempt to scare them away but it was no use. He began striking out randomly in the darkness, hurling flames and crimson bursts at nothing but shadows. Then, his flame went out as he cracked his head on the stone wall, and everything went black.

Suddenly, he was awake again. But something was very different. The stone walls had been replaced with glass, and the floor was metallic and covered with sparse patches of thin sand layers. He peered through the nearest glass wall, and noticed Hera on the other side. She looked concerned for him, but he didn't know why. So he payed it no mind. He turned around and immediately took a step back from what appeared to be a giant cockroach, some eighteen feet long. He simply stared in amazement at the creature, which seemed extremely passive in his presence. Then, he was tapped on his right shoulder and so looked to see who it was. He was greeted by not one but seven Hera's, who were, for some unexplained reason, all naked. Garrett leaned away from them slightly, with wide eyes...

Yeeeeeeeeeees!

He quickly checked through the glass. Hera was still on the other side, fully clothed as she had been before the blackness.

[DarthHERA]

Hera continued to meander forward. The noise was far less noticable now - in fact, she was beginning to think it was just a trick of acoustics in this huge ever expanding temple labrynth.

She had left Garrett way behind her in the darkness. She wasnt worried about him though - he had proven himself more than capable and was far more at home amongst these mystic surroundings than she was.

The flame was still burning brightly and it was flickering to the left - which meant a draft, which meant another room or opening in that direction. Gripping her lightsaber still in her other hand she moved on.

Hera stepped into what appeared a small chamber off the main corridor she had been travelling down. It was paved instead of a dirt floor and the walls had large ornate sheilds hanging on them. In the center was a raised dias with a chest sitting on it. Extending her force sense searching for..well for anything really..she approached cautiously.

The chest was made from what appeared to be marble and was sealed completely. It had four brass handles, one on each side, and was marked in similar gliphs to those she had seen earlier on the walls. There was no key. In fact, there was no place for a key. The chest was basically a block with no visible opening. Hera stuck the flaming staff into a crack in the paved stones, propping it efficiently, and crouched for a closer look. She ran a hand along the edges and then over the surface in general. It was smooth as glass, but to her surprise, warm..

Standing again, and taking the staff once more, Hera retraced her way back to where she had left Blade to tell him of her discovery. Instead of seeing him with his nose up against the wall playing etch-a-sketch with the writings, Garrett was sprawled face up on the floor. His torch gone out and his eyes glassed over and unseeing.

He twitched once in a while, in his dream state, and an occassional odd smile curled his lips. Hera could only guess at what it was he was seeing.

Deactivating her saber, she cliped it back to its place at her hip and knelt beside him. She pulled rougly at his shoulder.

"Garrett. Wake up."

Again the weird smile..

(The dream fought to keep him in its grip. The giant roach was emitting an enchanting song that effected Garrett's soul so profoundly, the sweetness of it after his soul being filled with such evil all these years causing almost all his reason to be lost. The seven Hera's each were doing their best to fog his mind from finding its conscious logic. They whispered to him, calling his name softly. They touched his face lightly, stroked his hands and massaged his legs, causing him to offer no resistance to the trick being played on his mind. The deadly lull continued, causing his mind to slow, his heartbeat to drop....not long now and he would be lulled to a catatonic state and shortly thereafter, death.)

Hera noticed his breath was very shallow and that his color, even in this light, was deathly. She needed to act. She wondered what was happening to him..and why just him. Red dust was still filtering down around them, but it had not effect on her. She had been exposed to the same things as he, but she was fine. She looked at the writings on the wall for answers, but it was all just markings to her - it meant nothing.

It meant nothing.

She glanced at them again. The realisation struck her like a thunderclap. The writings. It was the words themselves that had somehow effected Garrett. The fact Hera didnt understand them and could not take them into her mind was the very reason she was untouched like Garrett was.

Garrett had stopped breathing, the dull smile still fixed on his face.

Hera needed to snap him out of it. To violently arrest him back to reality. The harsh reality. The opposite of pleasure was pain. Hera didnt hesitate.

She stood once more and taking the staff Garretts had given her, she smashed the skull against the wall, destroying it completely and leaving a sharp savage point, still flaming. With a twist of her wrist, the staff arced 180 degrees and with a powerful thrust, Hera stabbed Garrett in the fleshy part of his chest, between shoulder and ribs, right under the scapula bone. A deep and anguished gasp was heard from Garrett as she found her mark and the flame extinguished into his flesh, plunging them again into complete darkness.

[Garrett Blade]

Too many questions raced through Garretts mind right now. Where the hell was he? What the hell is a giant cockroach singing for? What exactly are those naked Hera's up to? What was the other Hera doing behind the glass? It was too much for him to comprehend given his previous circumstances. He'd more or less started ignoring the Hera behind the glass as she was just standing there looking bored and impatient with him. And then, the others forced him to the ground. Without touching him. He couldn't move. Whatever they were, they were extremely friendly. Garrett found it awkward when they began to massage him, since Hera didn't seem like the type of person to do such a thing to somebody she'd just met. The cockroach was getting to the chorus now, and Garrett was tempted to join in but he was distracted. The naked Hera's seemed to merge into a single entity, and a spear of sorts formed in her hand, which was subsequently driven into his chest near his shoulder. The glass surrounding him shattered instantly, the cockroach skuttled away, and everything went black again.

Suddenly, Garrett sat up and found himself back in the dark catacombs, with a wooden shaft impaled in him, and a single, fully clothed Hera holding it. He chose to ignore the fact that he was bleeding, and instead, cocked an eyebrow, leaned away slightly and spoke...

"Hera?"

[DarthHERA]

As an afterthought, she realised that the scene that Garrett woke up to was quite incriminating. Had it been reversed, and she the one to come to consciousness with a javelin in her chest, the culprit still holding onto the other end, her reaction would not have been a calm query, but something quite (and altogether violently) different. Perhas it was because Blade was still a little dazed, or that his nature was not quite as explosive as her own, either way, his quiet query made Hera feel a little guilty.

She pulled back hard on the spear, reefing it out of Garretts flesh without warning and explained defensively, "I was helping you."

Garrett clutched at his chest with his hands as the pain of the staff's removal shot through his body and stiffled a yell through gritted teeth.

Dropping the staff, Hera knelt and unhooked the same vial that Garrett had used to heal her, from his side. She handed it to him and offered, if he preferred, that she could sear his wound closed with her lightsaber. "It wont heal it, but will stop the bleading atleast."

He shook his head, preferring to use his own remedy, not quite taking to Hera's way of "helping" so far.

She watched as he tended his wound and continued to explain.

"I found you in a sort of trance like state. Your breathing stopped. Those decipherings of yours are messing with your head and ensnaring you somehow."

She paused and looked him over, examining the wound carefully. "Your injury is not too bad. You will recover completely."

She turned her head in the direction she had gone earlier.

..."I think I might have found something important further down there."

[Garrett Blade]

The blood that flowed from the wound began to slow down and gather around the gaping hole that had been left upon removal of the makeshift spear. It glowed as the liquid solidified to form a hard, sticky surface., which then fell away and revealed flesh once again. Garrett stood up slowly, flexing his arm a little. He grabbed his staff and picked his lightsaber off the ground and returned it to his utility belt. The small piece of quarterstaff that had been on his back was now broken into three pieces under the influence of his own weight. He removed them from the sheath on his back and followed Hera. As he walked behind her, he stared at her suspiciously. Perhaps suspiciously was the wrong word. But thanks to that strange experience whilst he was unconscious, he wasn't sure exactly what was going on. He was half-expecting some kind of giant mole to burst through the wall and start a game of sabbac. But it didn't come.

As he walked, Garrett didn't pay any attention to the writings on the walls. He just looked at Hera, who led him to whatever it was she had discovered. He briefly looked at his wrist. He wasn't wearing a chronoband, so time was also a mystery to him. He was tempted to ask "How long was I out for?" but for some reason, chose not to. Something stirred deep inside him, and felt very odd indeed. So odd, that the blunt end of his staff emitted an aura that was extremely hard to detect. But he noticed it.

"What is it that you found, Hera?"

[DarthHERA]

"Its this way.."

She led Garrett further along into the darkness of the corridor. Both the flames they had been carrying earlier had been extinguished, but she knew the direction from which she had come back from when she had found Garrett in his dazed state.

Oddly now though, there was a faint glow coming from the end of the corridor which hadn't been there previously. Its light was increasing as they moved forward. The two didnt realise it yet, but the glow increased proportionately to their closing proximity to the room containing the chest. It was, in fact, the chest itself that was glowing and as its luminesence increased, Blade's staff began to reverbate in his hand.

Hera entered through the doorway, Garrett right behind her and she stepped aside to allow him to see the raised dais with the marble chest on top of it.

"I found that."

[Garrett Blade]

"Oooh, the plot thickens! I'll just be a minute..."

Garrett raised his staff above his head and chanted a single phrase. But nothing happened. Instead, his staff jumped out of his hand and was somehow attracted to the chest. Garrett stepped forwards to retrieve it, but as he reached out with his hand, the chest emitted a purple aura and lashed out at Garrett with some kind of energy strike. It felt like electricity as he was thrown back against the wall. He cracked his head against the stone but managed to subdue the pain. Only his hand hurt like hell. He shielded it instinctively with his other hand and complained to himself...

"Ow, ow, ow! Bugger!.....I wouldn't touch that if I were you..."

Garrett approached the chest once again, raising an eyebrow warily. He was angry. Angry for getting the shock of his life. And angry that he didn't have his staff. The cheek of it! In a fit of anger, Garrett sent a bolt of electricity at one of the shields on the walls, which subsequently absorbed the energy.

[DarthHERA]

As Garrett sent a shot of electricity into the sheild, which was subsequently absorbed by it, Hera felt her anger rise.

She was growing tired of their efforts being thwarted by the magics and snares of this place. She pulled her blaster from its holster and as Garrett (though too late) yelled for her not to shoot, she sent blast after blast into the glowing chest.

[Garrett Blade]

As with the shield, the chest absorbed the blaster bolts. But before anything could happen, which Garrett was suspecting, he jumped towards Hera and collided with her, sending them both to one side. As he reached her, a blaster bolt emerged from the chest and hit Garrett in the hip. They landed on the floor by one of the walls. As Garrett looked back, the chest, like the shield before, was starting to glow. Thinking quickly, he pulled one of the shields down from the wall and strapped it to his arm just in time to deflect the following array of blaster bolts coming from the chest. It was as if the chest was retaliating against them. As he looked around franticallt for some way out of this predicament, Garrett noticed a large crystal embedded in the ceiling directly above the chest. He took Hera's blaster from its resting place on the floor next to her, and aimed at the crystal. But the shot had no effect except ricochet away from it. But then, as a blaster bolt from the chest was deflected by Garrett, the angle of the shield caused the bolt to soar upwards in the direction of the crystal. But this time, the bolt did not ricochet. It was absorbed by the shield. Garrett had an idea...

"Hera, you okay? I need you do to me a favour please. Distract that...whatever it is for me. Use your lightsaber to deflect the shots, just don't hit me. I need a few minutes..."

He ducked as a bolt flew over the shield and singed the wall behind them

"I'm going to align the shields on the corners of the room so that the bolts will hit that crystal up there. I'm out of ideas so it's worth a shot. Ready?"

[DarthHERA]

Listening as Garrett explained his plan, and getting up from the ground, she was careful to stay somewhat behind the sheid and out of the way of the richocheting blaster bolts.

"...Ready?"

She ignited both ends of her blue lightsaber and smiled at him, stepping around to move in front of him.

"I'm always ready"

And as Garrett moved off, she moved with him effectively protecting him by deflecting the shots as they continued to target them. Some of them she cleared easily, others were more of a challenge and hit off at an angle, causing them to richochet once again, a couple of times landing not very far form Blades head. She called warning to him, "You better be quick - I could use a little practice with my aim." As if to emphasise her point, one blaster bolt got away from her and grazed Garrett's shoulder, eliciting a yelp of pain and a curt admonishen for her to "do better"

As they moved methodically across the chamber, Garrett snatching down the sheilds as they went, Hera noted that the nature of the blasts were changing. They weren't simply returned fire from the blaster but seemed more powerful and were accellerating in speed and frequency. Twisting her blade first up and across, then over and down, she was hard pressed to keep up. The energy was increasing and a couple of times the impact of them knocked her back to step awkwardly into Garrett.


"Are you done yet?" Hera was beginning to stress. She was having trouble keeping up and she realised she was finding it more and more difficult to anticpate and intercept the blasts.

The chest was glowing white hot and Hera caught a sheer of part of a bolt on one of her hands, causing her grip to falter and her protection to waiver...

"Hurry up, Blade!"

[Garrett Blade]

"One more to go..."

In a leap of faith, Garrett ran and somersaulted over the glowing chest. He landed and flipped to the foor as a blaster bolt almost skimmed his head. He climbed to his feet instantly and dived up to grab the fourth shield. It fell from the wall just as easily as the other three had done before. He quickly positioned the shield. But then, he stopped momentarily as another idea entered his head. He made his way back over to Hera, using the shield as protection. She hadn't been too badly hit yet, but that could change quickly. He grabbed her and placed the shield between them and the chest...

"Remove the power cell from your blaster and throw it at the chest when I say. Take the shield and stand in between those two shields in the corners. I don't need the fourth shield - just my lightsaber."

As he went to move away, she grabbed his arm. He assumed the following look was a look of "What are you up to?".

"Let's see if this chest knows reality from illusion..."

He darted over to the empty corner with alarming speed and grace, igniting his red saber as he moved. He brought it up in front of him, ready to deflect any incoming shots. Then, he closed his eyes and concentrated. And from out of thin air, three more Garretts appeared in front of the three shields in the corners of the room. Each one held a lightsaber identical to Garrett's. The original Garrett called out to Hera...

"Now!"

Without hesitation, Hera threw the power cell onto the top surface of the chest. It melted upon contact with the marble slab. A second or two later, an unbelievable amount of blaster energy flowed out of the chest. There seemed to be an endless supply. Four lines of fire radiated from the chest, one at each of the Garrett's. With a simple twist of his wrist, Garrett managed to deflect every blast that came his way up to the crystal embedded in the ceiling. The other three Garrett's had no effect on the blaster bolts. They simply passed right through them as if they weren't even there. The reality was that they weren't there. So obviously, this was no mysterious pandora's box of magicks afterall. It was mere machinery that relied on light vision, otherwise it would have ignored the dopplegangers. The bolts that apssed through the illusions hit their respective shields, and were deflected up at the crystal. As each bolt hit the crystal, its light grew in intensity until it was as white hot as the chest below. Without warning, a great beam of energy thrust itself down upon the chest, ompletely obliterating it. But there must have been a similar crystal inside the chest, for the beam carried on out of the chest and hit the wall facing the entrance to the chamber. The wall shattered easily, and then crumbled to the floor like a house of cards. As the thick dust cleared, Garrett moved over to Hera...

"You okay? Did you get hit at all...are you hurt?"

[DarthHERA]

Hera dusted of the rocks and rubble that had landed on her after the demolition of the adjoining wall.

Garrett was again asking if she was ok, and she smiled at how much care her kept showing her.

"Im fine - hand hurts a little."

Peering into the clearing dust and the room beyond the fallen wall, she observed dryly "Thats quite the light show you put on. You owe me one blaster." The smile took any edge from her comment.

As the air cleared somewhat, and the thick dust dropped and settled around their feet, they could see an unusual peice of equipement locked in a forcefield contained cage.


Hera nudged him, unwittingly tapping his seared shoulder, as always seemed to be the case when one had a burn or wound, invariably someone slapped or tapped right on the injured spot.
Not noticing Garretts wince, she asked him,
"That what you're here for?"

[Garrett Blade]

With asking Hera if she was okay, he hadn't taken note of what was on the other side of the wall. He walked through the descending dust curtain and into the much larger room. The floor was paved with dark red stone tiles, bare of an inscriptions. And to Garretts surprise, there were no inscriptions on the walls of this room either. Only a large scripture hanging on the wall facing them, behind the large altar which the object resided on. Four pillars near the corners of the room stood firmly, holding the ceiling in place. The walls were riddled with torches simply scattered about them, at varying heights. There was no order to them at all, as some hung right next to each other. He walked slowly into the centre of the chamber, looking behing to check Hera was still with him.

"I do believe it is!"

He stared in amazement at the contents of the pinkish energy barrier. But his stare quickly turned sour as he noticed several doorways around the walls, each one almost identical to those found in the antechamber when they first arrived. Only these doors were at least twice as high. As a precaution, his hand moved to his lightsaber on his hip as he edged forwards to get a closer look at what appeared to be a piece of arcane machinery. All around him, the shadows flickered in time with the fires that surrounded them. Some of them seemed to form images. They had shape and almost formed in the darkness. Perhaps even movement. Sentient movement.

Connecting each of the four pillars was a small trough, mere millimetres deep and wide, that ran between them. Each led to a very small hole in the base of the pillar. The lines formed a square around both Garrett and the altar itself. Hera was standing just by the doorway. He called to her without turning round...

"Come and take a look at this..."

[DarthHERA]

She stepped forward into the squared area where Garrett was. She had noticed the odd movement of the shadows also, but so far they were simply that, odd movement and not a threat. Though she had a feeling (big surprise) that it wouldnt stay that way.

"I hope this machine of yours is worth our agrivation Garrett. It could still get us both killed yet, you know."

He wasnt really listening to her. His attention was on the part which was free-standing on the altar, surrounded by the energy field.

As Garrett looked over the arcane peice - so close, but still so out of his reach that Hera could almost taste his desire for it as it emanated from him. She did a slow rotation where she stood beside him, examining their surroundings. She was looking for possible exits, or weapons, anything that might be used to advantage once the next booby-trap was triggered. And by the looks of the setup on the altar before them, it would indeed be triggered.

Coming full circle around, Hera's eyes caught the hanging tapestry emblazoned with scripture.

"I can read that, Garret. Its not encrypted...or whatever you like to call it"

Blade looked up and tilted his head. "Well, thats odd."

Hera agreed. "Very" She mouth the words of the text silently to herself.

She turned her eyes onto him and they were a light green color, not her usual blue.

[Garrett Blade]

Garrett also tried to mime the text. But ironically enough, he couldn't understand a word of it.

"That writing is terrible. I can't make it out at all!"

He squinted his eyes slightly, but not so much as to make him look silly in front of Hera. As he leaned his head forward to try and read, his eyesight drifted towards something green out of the corner of his eye. It was the green tint in Hera's own eyes. he hadn't really noticed them before. They really were quite beautiful. He wondered as to how she would react if he told her that, but kept it to himself. He was about to return his attention to the tapestry when he also noticed a slight green hue coming from them. He couldn't be sure if her eyes were green before, but he knew they hadn't been glowing as the tunnels had been lit up by their torches, painting the walls and floor a fiery orange.

"Hera? I didn't know your eyes glowed green..."

As he said this, one of the doors on the sides of the chamber behind them opened by only a few centimetres - not enought for them to notice.

[DarthHERA]

"My eyes don't glow green." She said matter-of-factly. Hera thought it an odd comment - looked like Garrett was going to have one of his "episodes" again. This worried her. She did not want to have to stab him again.
Touching his arm lightly she looked at him closely.
"You feel ok, Garrett?"

The pair, a little unsure each for the other, looked at one another. Which one of them was not seeing things as they were?

As they stood there for a brief moment, a slender extended claw inserted itself through the slight gap in the ever opening space of the doorway from the chamber behind them.

The Bradel without breath or sound put the gentlest of pressure on the door, widening its line of view to the intruders across from it.




***************************



ooc:


* http://www.wcug.wwu.edu/~randyman/ROLEPLAY/creatures/bradel.htm = The Bradel

(I had trouble getting the html right on this, sorry)
The information on the creature supplied is from a fantasy site, so dont worry about all the orcs/elfs info. Just the details on the Bradels capabilites etc. (Hope this is ok)

[Garrett Blade]

Garrett blinked a few times. Her eye's didn't glow gree - yet he could see them glowing green. Was he seeing things? Or was she not thinking straight? Or was she lying to him - and possibly part of all this? Whatever the conclusion, Garrett didn't like it one bit. It was a bit too strange for him. He didn't like situations where he wasn't in control to some degree. He'd feel more at ease if there was a sudden attack by another legion of undead nasties or something similar. But even the thought of that wasn't right. As if something worse was in the cards. That was when he heard it. A minute scraping sound - stone against stone. But it was so minute that he couldn't tell exactly where it was coming from. Definitely one of the doors along the sides. Doors along the sides? he hadn't even noticed them - they bleded in so well with the walls.

"Quiet! I can hear something!"

He seemed to order hera to do as he said. But he never intended it to seem like that. Whether or not she took it to heart was another question. His eyes darted around the room, searching for any indication of the noise. Then he heard it again. He spun around to face a door on the right wall behind them. A small gap was appearing at the bottom of the door. They must slide vertically rather than open horizontally or on a hinge. And what looked like a wooden branch of sorts could be seen underneath the door. Was it lifting the door open? Garrett stepped forward to get a closer look. He moved his hand to his lightsaber on his belt. But it wasn't there. And he didn't have his staff? Where were they. He turned back to Hera...and there they were. Just beyond her, encased in the same frcefield as the machine part. But how? His attention was diverted as the door opened even more.

(ooc: This is great. I'm glad you decided to incorporate something new and different - first time I've seen a creature such as this - very interesting. But I would like to add to it - in that this "Bradel" can walk on walls and ceilings. And sorry this reply's been a while coming - I had no inspiration for a post whatsoever. I guess I've could have done a better post than this, but it's okay I think. I'll make up for it in my next one)

[DarthHERA]

"Quiet! I can hear something!"

Hera lifted her hand off Garrett's arm....Oh yeah, he was feeling fine. A little too fine the way he was getting comfy ordering her around. She scowled at him and would have set him straight if, when Garrett turned toward one of the walls, the skin at the back of her neck hadn't begun to prickle..

As he turned back looking for his lightsaber and staff, the prickle had changed to a full-scale twitch along her skin and she instantly ignigted her weapon.
Something was coming thru that hidden doorway and it wasnt happy they were here.

Seeing Blade's weapons were now also encased within the protective forcefeild, Hera complained, "Well, thats just great" as if somehow it was Garrett 's idea to put them there.


The Bradel put some more pressure and the door slid smoothly across to open completely, revealing its form silohetted against the darkness. The creature's two eyes fiery red glaring at them. Without sound it managed to convey to the two in front of it that they had intruded and this was the end of the line.






ooc: No probs on the delay..I been awol sortof myself. And your additions to the Bradels capabilities are all fine too. :)

[Garrett Blade]

Whatever that thing was - it was big! Taller than Garrett, and he was 6ft 2. It must have stood around seven feet tall. And what the hell were they? They weren't arms, that's for sure. They looked like spikes or something. Garrett could smell the poison in it. The creature appeared to be made of wood, judging by it's texture being highlighted in the torch light as it stepped into the room. Garrett edged his way forward past Hera, placing himself between her and it. He whispered to Hera...

"I'll cause a distraction while you try and get our weapons..."

Our weapons? Hera questioningly looked back at the bubble-thing on the altar. Her lightsaber was there too! But how? Before she could respond to him, he moved...

"Now!"

As he spoke, Garrett lunged forwards with his fists at the Bradel. But before he hit it, the creature leapt up into the air. But for some reason, it didn't come back down. Garrett looked around frantically. He ducked quickly as a spike almost impaled his head. He looked up from a crouching position to find the Bradel on the ceiling. That was a first for him!

"Hera, watch your head!"

Garrett shifted over to one of the pillars, keeping low enough to stay out of it's reach.

[DarthHERA]

Hera crouched low, keeping one eye on the creature above her and the other on their sabers, so close but so out of reach.

...how the heck did they get into this predicament?...

Hera prided herself on not letting that lightsaber out of her hands, probably everybit as much as Garrett did his own, and it angered her to see it suspended within the forcefield.

Garrett was signalling her to keep moving forward with his hand as he crept around to come at it from its blind side.

Hera had no idea how successful she would be to breach the forcefield - but she had an idea that could possibly work. She could feel the Bradel watching her intently as she moved slowly, deliberately , and with a careful movement - non threatening in any way - she took the Morphal Crest from about her waist, her self-forged creature/weapon turning it to its liquid form at her bidding.

Instead now of wearing what appeared to be some metalic ornament around her waist, she was now handling a live, deep-blue fluid creature, capable of morphing into whatever she instructed via visualising it in her mind and solidifying it into that image. She had created it quite a long time ago and had found it an invaluable asset during the Master trials Ogre Mal Pannis had put her through.

As she pushed the 'Morphal Crest" forward, it protruded through the forcefield, the energy of it being conducted and absorbed to a degree by the creature. Hera intended once close enough to make the crest into a type of pole with a hooked end in order to flick out the lightsabers towards her and Garrett when another, very slight movement broke into her vision field.

Another wood-like claw extened from the far wall and as Hera slowly did a 90 degree scan, she realise the Bradel clinging from the ceiling was not alone. In fact, there were two others of its type in the room also and they seemed to be communicating telekenetically back and forth as their movements were almost syncratic.

Hera nervously called to Garrett before he made another agressive move on the first being.

"Er.....Garrett. We might wanna rethink this a little...."

[Garrett Blade]

"Why is................that..."

Garrett could feel the second guest looking at him. He turned his head slowly to see the other Bradel on the far side of the columns. He heared a hissing noise from above, and instinctively rolled out of the way. The sharp pincer narrowly missed him, hitting the stone floor hard. The tile hit was cracked slightly. Apparently these creatures pack some punch.

"Whatever you do. Don't let them hit you."

Garrett reached out with his hand towards one of the torches on the wall nearest him. ut before he could pull it towards him, the second Bradel lunged towards him. He spun around against the pillar he was crouching next to, and ducked again as the other one swooped down to bite his head, before returning to the ceiling. Now, both Bradels were on the ceiling, waiting for the right moment to descend for the kill. Hera called over, asking how the distraction was going...

"Peachy! We;re having a lot of fun...... Bugger!

He jumped up as one jumped down in front of him. He began fidgeting as he moved backwards, luring it away from hera...

"How are things on your end?"

[DarthHERA]

Garrett was doing a good job of distracting...With as minimal movement as possible, Hera continued the stretch forward the Morphal Crest.

It curled its liquid blue end around both their sabers within the field its a fluid grasp. The third Bradel was now moving toward her warily. It had not yet been provoked..though give Garrett enough time and that wouldnt be the case, Hera thought dryly.

"Just a bit longer, Garrett... Almost...got...them"

Without warning, the third Bradel struck. Its long wood-like claw swiping a deadly scythe at Hera's body. She threw herself to the left, the Morphal Crest solidifying at her mental command and as the force-field booted the solid form from its interior with a powerful electric kick, both sabers were flung out with it, still encircled in its grasp.

The Bradel advanced and Garrett rushed forward to block its attack, throwing himself headlong into the alien's torso toppling it backward and allowing Hera to get back to her feet.

Engaging the force, Hera stretched out her arm and threw the other two creatures on the ceiling with a violence they had never encountered before, landing them in a crashing entangled heap on the far side of the room.

[Garrett Blade]

In the subsequrnt rumble on the ground, the first Bradel managed to pin Garrett to the stone floor. It was extremely heavy, though profoundly light as the wooden body would seem to suggest. The arms and legs were far from smooth, and the rougher parts dug into Garrett's body. Not exactly comfortable, though Garrett had found himself in more unpleasant situations in his time. He tried to jerk his body upwards or to the side in an attempt to shake it off him. But unfortunately, the carbon catastrophe was too heavy for him. He subconsciously sensed Hera make a subliminal decision to help him, but he called out before she'd even realised she was going to come to his aid...

"Get the weapons. And keep an eye on the other two..."

She looked back towards the entrance near where they had landed. But they were gone. Where the hell could they go? it wasn't exactly a large room! Whilst she momentarily pondered that, Garrett began to concentrate. It didn't take him long to focus all his rage and anguish into a potent-enough fluction within himself, since he'd tried it plenty of times before. A slight headache was the result though - as he hadn't tried it so quickly in the past. Without warning, his body burst into flames. Spontaneous combustion wasn't a normal occurence in normal people. But Garrett wasn't exactly what one would call a "normal" person. The raging red tint of his body could be seen faintly through the bright conflagration or yellow and orange. As fast as his body had ignited, the flames passed on to the Bradel. The entire of it's wooden body was instantly consumed by the hungry flames. It writhed uncontrollably, adding to Garrett's discomfort. Whilst it was distracted, Garrett forced his arm out from underneath the creature...

"Oh look - you've made me all hot and bothered now!"

He slammed his fist against it's toasting body, knocking it's weight to one side enough for Garrett to stand up again. He stepped back slightly, watching as it shook violently in a pitiful and futile attempt to extinguish itself. Garrett raised his right foot off the ground and bent his knee slightly, preparing for a kick...

"Did you order original recipe?"

THUD!!!

An arm broke off, the joint falling to the floor as a small pile of ash.

"...or extra crispy!!!"

THUD!!!

Another limb left the body, crumbling into the same black powder as the arm. And with one final boot to it's chest, the Bradel's body exploded in a small cloud of ash. The smoky remains billowed up into Garrett's face. He couched slightly as he waved his hand about to clear it away. He too had stopped burning, and showed no burns on his exposed skin nor his clothes. Hw turned back round to face Hera...

"I'm knackered, I 'aven't even started yet!"

[DarthHERA]

Hera had never seen anything like it before. Garrett was completely engulfed in flames, but not consumed by them. ..holy frell..

She had glanced around and couldn't at first see where the other guardians had gone which she had thrown to the floor. Pulling her eyes from Garrett and the flaming spectacle, she saw after a moment, the red beady eyes of the Bradels peering out of the dark recesses of the room. They too watched as Garrett destroyed the first Bradel. Their only movement was an odd tilting of their heads, which looked like some form of communication.

Garrett got back to his feet, and Hera force-called their lightsabers to her hand. Tossing one to Garrett, she then called the Morphal Crest to her, the living weapon returned to liquid form and ravelled again around Hera's waist, then, re-solidifying and sitting snugly around her body.

She moved furtively toward Garrett, the Bradels remained where they were, watching.

"Thats a neat trick, Blade. Talk about lighting up a room with yer smile" She grinned, and then the smiled faded as she looked directly at him..

Garrett looked at her curious for just a moment, and then he moved cautiously again toward the peice of equipment that they had come all this way for. The Bradels stepped forward just a little, but seemed content for now to see what transpired.

The two Sith stood either side of the force-feild...still with the dilema of getting the machine part out. It was large and awkwardly shaped, needing two people to lift it.

"We could try the Morphal Crest again, somehow...?"

Hera glanced over at the Guardians...still where they were a moment before....

"You know Garrett...do your eyes always have green flecks in them...?"

Blade frowned andit was only then that he realised Hera's eyes were almost completely green.

************

The first Bradel spoke telepathically to his companion



"The poison should overcome them soon"

The red eyes remained on the Sith.

"The female wont last much longer."

The other responded, his head bobbing only very slightly.

"Our brother would have liked to feed on their corpses...Instead we will do it for him in his stead."

As the deadly, yet undetectable, poison continued to filter into the room from the troughs around the force-feild dais, the two intruders only hint that there was something wrong was the green elements of the gas that, as it seeped into their skins, began to show telltale signs in the iris of their human eyes.


ttt

[Garrett Blade]

"No...they don't..."

Garrett diverted his gaze away from Hera momentarily. He was more immediately concerned with the guards. Their presence wasn't exactly soothing. They were several metres away, one of them near the edge of the shadowy corner of the room where a torch had gone out. But that wasn't all that worried him. Either Hera was hallucinating. Or there was something wrong with himself. In either case, it wasn't going to help them get out alive - let alone get the machine part. Igniting his lightsaber, Garrett stepped forwards to the forcefield. As he did so, the Bradels raised their posture, taking on a more offensive stance. Garrett was finding it difficult to breathe, though not too bad. Garrett stopped as one of the Bradels emerged fully from the shadows once again.

"I'll be somewhat annoyed if I don't leave with the first piece! Without it, I haven't got a chance in Hell of finding the others."

Eyeing one of the guards, Garrett deactivated his lightsaber and backed away from the machine piece. As he did so, the Bradels seemed to back down ever so slightly, yet noticeable enough to be significant. Perhaps they needed to rethink their approach.

"I think we should back off a bit. They seem to be protecting the machine part. Maybe they'll be more passive if we back off and catch them offguard. Do you think we can lure them out of the room?"

Garrett's mind flicked back to the laser-thing in the ante-room. Perhaps they could once again use it to their advantage.

ooc: welcome back! :)

[DarthHERA]

ooc: Thanks! :D




She was running out of ideas.

The creatures had backed off, but only because she and Blade had made no new advancement on the machine part. The two sides looked each other over.

"De taunt"

Stalemate in other words. Hera whispered it, hating the word. To her it meant the same as "defeat."

She looked with deep green eyes directly at Blade. She felt a tightness in her chest, making her breath rasp and wondered if it was as loud to Garrett as it seemed to her.

She thought to herself that if he could use the laser again somehow, he would be able to grab it. In the meantime, she was getting angry of being denied what they were here for.

"Lets get your peice, now Blade."

He could tell that this would be an all out attempt. A do or die. Together, if they combined their power, they would be unstoppable.

Blinking slowly, an outward sign of her inward concentration and focus, Hera tapped into the aggression and darkness that motivated her whole being. The Bradels clinging to the rocky roof and walls tilted their heads in apprehension and confusion as all around them, the cavelike surroundings began to rumble and shake, small at first but building quickly in intensity as the force was directed and targeted at them. The floor beneath Hera and Garrett began also to rumble and become unsteady. She needed Blade to add his strength in the force to shake the whole foundations of this place.

The peice would either leave with them, or never leave at all.

[Garrett Blade]

"I hope you kow what you're doing Hera!"

That was rich coming from him - the master of bad, foolish and suicidal ideas.

Something tells me this is going to be a really bad idea.

Garrett spun his staff aloft his head several times before thrusting it into one of the cracks between floorstones. The blunt end began to glow red again, and started to emanate a red hue throughout the room in a gas-like way, even though it was pure energy. It covered the floor, walls, ceiling, pillars and even the altar and Bradels - leaving only Hera and Garrett himself untouched. Garrett them began to concentrate and add his own power to Hera's. The shaking and quaking increased in intensity.

[DarthHERA]

The power generated was astounding. As they joined their abilities and command of the DarkSide, the physical realm revealed the awesome destructiveness of the force.

The cave floor heaved and rocked, splitting in outcry of the assault by the two darksiders. The roof moaned over top them and huge cracks openend overhead in a thunderous roar showering Garrett and Hera with rocks and rubble.

Watching Blade, seeing what he was capable of made Hera very glad her ship had needed repairs and that she was here to witness it all. She extended her concentration, touching his own mind just a little and despite all the noise and uproar, Garrett could sense Hera's spirit, even only briefly, in his own thoughts.

The structure wouldnt last much longer, that much was obvious. the machine part was still encased within the forcefield, and if Blade wanted it, he better move pretty soon.

The Bradels were all withdrawing, like rats escaping before the ship sank, they drifted back into the darkness beyond. They nodded telepathically to each other.


"Our task is done. They will not last. The female is almost gone..Leave them to their fate."

It looked like success.

Hera should be ecstatic. The power of the darkside, the destruction all around from her own hands, the retreating of the Aliens..should all serve to excite her. And she was, she was. She just felt so...weak. Drained. It was so damn hard to breath.

Hera's eyes had lost their brightness, the green now fading to a dark black colour. She didnt feel good at all.

"Blade.."

How he heard hear over the noise was beyond her.

"....something's really wrong."


She saw Garrett look at her with concern, and then all was quiet, blackness.

[Garrett Blade]

Hera's head cracked the deck before he could get to her. Had he not been concentrating on maintaining some control over the mayhem around them, he would have caught her beforehand. He lifted her head up off the ground and shouted her name several times, ignorant of the falling rubble. It was no use. She was out cold. And if he didn't do something quickly then the both of them would be in a much worse state in a matter of minutes. Garrett took Hera in both arms and turned towards the machine piece. Then he sighed.

Roughly three minutes later the Mausoleum collapsed amidst a huge cloud of dust and sand. The machine piece buried deep in its ruins. Garrett cleared the rubble off of himself. Hera had been shielded by his body when the entrance chamber had crashed down on top of them. She was still unconscious. Then it hit him. The smell assaulted his nostrils relentlessly. How could he have been so ignorant before. Poison. Garrett figured that she only had a few more minutes. So running wasn't going to help. But there was no rush. Garrett lay Hera on a large stone slab. He then took the knife from his boot and slit his wrist open. He allowed the blood to form a pool in the sand before licking the wound - causing it to miraculously heal instantaneously. He then held his hand out above the small pool of blood. Seconds later, he staff emerged from the crimson abyss. He then kicked the sand a little over the pool, closing the vortex.

Turning back to Hera on the stone slab, he held the staff high above his head. As he thought intensly, the winds began to pick up around the ruins and himself. A huge sand storm was beginning to pick up around them. How convenient that they were on Korriban. The sky above was dark and uninviting. Just then, a bolt of lightning leapt down and struck one of the statue-tombs of the Sith Lords. It then ricocheted off and onto another. This happened five or six times before striking the two Tuk'ata statues that were unscathered by the Mausoleum's destruction. Their eyes lit up, and from them emitted a beam of intense white energy, striking the sharp end of Garrett's staff. Wasting no time at all - ironically - Garrett thrust the staff deep into his chest; the point fully penetrating his body and emerging on the other side. As he removed the staff, the storm subsided, the winds died down, and the energy dissipated - leaving traces of energy around Garrett's body. He then stepped up to Hera and laid his hands on her.

Three days later, Hera was on Coruscant and Garrett was last seen eighteen hours ago on Chandrila. She was in a bed. Garrett's bed. In Garrett's apartment on Coruscant. Well...more of a place to lay low when on the Capital World. The room wasn't dark, but it wasn't blindingly bright either - just right. On the bedside there was a datapad with a note on it.

Hera,

Thanks for all your help on Korriban - I couldn't have done any of it without you. You were in quite a state at the end of it all - but I patched you up once we got back to my apartment. Apparently you were poisoned - we must have set off a trap in the Mausoleum. But if the medications worked then you should be on the mend. Just be sure to finish the dosage and get plenty of rest for the next few days. Your muscles will be weak for the next week or so, so I'd stay out of trouble if I were you. I'm sorry I couldn't stay - urgent business to attend to. There's fresh food in the kitchen and a few changes of clothes in the closet - just don't go prancing around the 4th Sector whilst wearing them...I haven't paid for them! Do me a favour and lock the door when you do leave. And perhaps I'll see you again in the future...

Eternally grateful

Garrett.

[DarthHERA]

She placed the datapad back on the side table and stretched herself out in the delicious comfort of the bed.

She still felt weak, but somehow she felt good. Go figure.

Her last real memory was of Garrett's smiling face assuring her everything was going to be alright and encouring her to drink more of the most wretched tasting medicine created.

She didnt remember when, or how, she got to Garrett's apartment. And lifting the sheet, she sure as heck didnt remember getting changed into the satiny little number she now had on.

Hera smiled, remembering how sweet Blade had been to her, and all the provision he had made in order for her to recover. She had everything she needed. She'd take a few more hours sleep, maybe another day if she wanted, and then she'd move on.

**************************

The room was spotless - like no one had ever been there - as she placed a small peice of paper on the pillow. She wondered if Blade ever did get the part of that Infernal Machine in the end. She would ask him when next she saw him. When ever that would be.

The door locked behind her with a solid click, and Hera made her way out of the apartment building and headed for her home Base.

The short note Garrett would find when he arrived home summed up pretty much how she viewed the whole adventure, even taking into account the injuries, even that dog of his..

"Its been my pleasure -Hera "