Talo’Ra lay in bed, staring at the ceiling of the captain’s quarters with blank yellow eyes. Emotions warred within her about what had happened just hours before. Elation, misery, hatred, and anger all battled it out in her heart. She knew which ones would win out eventually, but misery gave all of them a run for their money.

The act itself was nothing new to her. She had killed before and would again. With gusto. Fighting on the battlefield or executing prisoners of war was one thing. However, this one had been different. It had been personal. This life had meant something to her, and she snuffed it out. She knew that eventually, she would forget about it as just another step in her climb to power, but for now, she wanted to feel her remorse.

She waited until the darkest of night at the Academy of Korriban to land. Even in the middle of the night, the valley of Sith tombs was well lit. Droids worked to clear a path to what scholars suspected would be a new tomb entrance lost to time. Above that, monstrous turbo laser cannons and smaller turrets were mounted to defend against all comers.

She flew her ship in a wide loop around the site where so much knowledge was jealously hidden by past masters, waiting to be rediscovered. After landing in her designated spot, she left the ship open. This way the ground crew that was always on standby could do their job of refueling and performing maintenance. There was little danger of one of them committing sabotage, their lives and those of their families would be forfeit if they did.

Keeping to what shadows she could find she went back to her quarters. Once there the apprentice sent a message to her master. With no preamble, or honorifics befitting his station, she simply wrote ‘It is done’ and hit the send button. She grinned slightly at the disrespect she showed him at every turn now. It would continue to be a great sport until he died at her hands.

When she awoke in the morning, she was only slightly surprised to see no messages from her master. He was known to disappear for days or weeks on end in service of the Dark Council. Perhaps this was one of those times. In the meantime, she would put this freedom to good use. Combat training sessions would be the order of the day if she were going to stand toe to toe with the Blade Master of the Order. No small task.

Days passed as she put herself through a grueling training regimen. Acolytes looking to prove themselves took her up on the offer to duel them in the Arena. Lords and Darths often attended the Arena for the spectacle of a fight and the opportunity to find a suitable apprentice. They observed the activities in the stone ring or chatted among themselves about whatever occupied them.

Every so often one would take an acolyte aside and interview them. This would serve to assess both their wits and potential power with the Force. Those who made the grade were taken as an apprentice. The rest were left to try and impress, or be thrown out eventually, for being a failure.

Talo’Ra often fought with her peers, the apprentices Ruqua, Ganlaan, and Ukodi. Ruqua was a Cathar and also Degriro’s apprentice. Her feline grace and reflexes made her a fierce fighter. She was handpicked by the Blade Master to be his successor to that position. She did not disappoint with her dual blade style. It was easy to lose track of where the second blade was when dealing with whichever she chose to attack with first. Lightning-fast attacks, supported by Force abilities, made her all but impossible for other apprentices to deal with.

Ukodi was another matter. He favored stealth and surprise attacks. It was not uncommon for him to use a cloaking device to disappear at the start of a duel. He was crafty and was learning the trade of the assassins quickly. Mind tricks, misdirection, and poison were favorites of the assassins, but he was no slouch in sword fighting either.

Ganlaan, when he could be pried out of the med-bay, was an altogether different animal. His blade skills were passable, but where he excelled was in using the Force. He was quickly gaining mastery of high-level abilities and highly intricate uses of the Force. One time he reached out with the Force and turned off her lightsaber, mid duel. It was the only time he had beaten Talo’Ra with a blade. Every other loss to him was from his use of lightning, chokes, and Force waves.

The message she had been expecting finally came eight days after her return. She had just finished eking out a victory over Ruqua with a surprise lightning attack and was checking her communicator. She froze when she recognized his encoding. At last, it was time. Apologizing to the Lords in attendance for leaving early, she explained her summons and bowed.

Rushing away from the arena, she went to her room to clean up and prepare. She emerged in loose-fitting clothing and soft but sturdy boots that allowed for maximum movement and flexibility. She had a task to fulfill and nothing would get in her way of achieving it. Buckled on her waist were both of her lightsabers and ever-present medical satchel.

She took her meal on the ship she now owned once it was in space and on its way to Nar Shadaa. The rest of the time she attempted to get some sleep to be as fresh and rested as she could. During this downtime, it occurred to her to wonder why it had taken so long for this meeting to be called.

Was he hoping she would cool down with time and not kill him? That was almost certainly not it. He knew his skills were formidable and therefore would never back down from a fight. If he was smart, he would fear her, but she knew he didn’t. He was severely underrating her since she had returned from slavery. That would be his undoing. She hoped anyway. The young woman ruthlessly tried to stamp out any doubt in her mind that she would be able to defeat her master.

Doubt still managed to wriggle its way into her mind as she thought of his storied skills. This continued until the ship came within sight of the spire where his hideout was housed. A fire lit in her brain and it burned away all doubt, all fear. Fiery rage filled her mind and she wouldn’t be surprised if smoke were coming out of her ears.

The heavy door on the landing pad had been replaced and seemed to have been reinforced. Amid the brain-melting anger she was pleased that she had cost him dearly for repairs. She stalked into the compound, itching for a fight, and expecting an ambush at every step. She was straining her senses through the Force to find where the traps were, trying to glean enough forewarning to react and possibly save her life.

Her arrival in the meditation chamber with him standing there as usual and with no signs of anything out of the ordinary was anticlimactic. She had expected wall turrets, goons jumping out, a fortified station. Something. Some kind of acknowledgment of her greatly increased threat level. Not normalcy.

His nonchalant stance as if nothing out of the norm had happened was irritatingly normal. As if he did not consider her a threat at all. For a moment, the psychological trick almost worked on her. She was right on the verge of calming down and reconsidering her chosen course of action. Things clicked into place as she figured out the ruse of false calm and unconcern. Very clever she thought, but it wouldn’t work.

Her focus was crystal clear as she made the barest of bows to her master, never taking her eyes off him. Her yellow eyes made her look as if a Correllian Sand Panther were stalking its prey. The uniform he had chosen as a Darth was blood red, complete with a new helmet and mask that hid his features.

He stood unmoving for almost a full minute before greeting her. Every move designed to give the impression of her insignificance to him. He was uncertain if it would fool his apprentice. He knew of her intelligence, reasoning skills and guile. She seemed remarkably in control of herself considering how she had left his compound after her last trial. Yes, remarkably calm. He almost couldn’t determine her intentions through the Force. She had grown strong indeed.

His voice was slightly muffled as he spoke through the mask he wore. “Apprentice, I received your message where you claim ‘it is done.’ What is done? I require you to be specific.”

Grinding her teeth, she answered, “I have killed Master Yarnous with my lightsaber, as instructed, ‘master.’ This last word she filled with so much venom, it was a marvel that he didn’t fall to the ground convulsing.

“Show me your weapon.”

She produced the actual murder weapon for him to inspect, -at a distance, and kept a tight grip on it. There was exactly zero chance she would let him near enough to it to take it from her. He held a hand out toward it and didn’t make another move. After a moment he lowered his hand and put it behind his back to stand at ‘parade rest’.

When he didn’t react any further, she was almost thrown again. She reminded herself that he was doing his best to put her off. The Force was also tickling the back of her mind. She now knew that if she went berserk at this moment, it would end badly for her. She needed to use her mind as much as her skills if she were to win the day.

She lowered her own hand and clipped the lightsaber back to her belt and waited. Her eyes were wide and unblinking as she waited for her prey to make his move. Five minutes passed as they both waited until he finally said, “So you do know how to exercise self-control. Good. There is hope for you yet. A Sith must know how to employ patience.”

He paused again to see if she had a reply. When she offered none he continued, “I have sent scouts to ascertain the truth of your claim, and they have confirmed. The worthless insect known as Yarnous has perished. I can feel his murder in your weapon. I can sense your feelings are in disarray. There is no doubt. Your third trial, the Trial of Sacrifice: Passed. Severing your ties to the past to unchain your future.”

Her muscles involuntarily tensed at the mention of Yarnous’ death. Insult was added to injury with the comment about the man’s life being useless. It almost made her lose control, but the Force cautioned her to wait. She visibly trembled with pent up rage.

Seeing that his tactics did not provoke the attack he knew was coming, he spoke again. “Your final trial, the Trial of Ascension is at hand. To prove your worth, all you must do is defeat your master in combat.” The last word was barely out of his mouth when she launched herself at him, fiery orange lightsaber in hand.

His response was lightning fast and countered her blow easily. He pivoted the parry into a counter-attack with his own lightsaber, when she leapedleapt over his head in a flip. The tip of her lightsaber sheared through the side of his helmet, leaving a furrow on his head. Her flip over his head ended with her feet hitting the ground behind him, but she did not stand idle. She ran forward two steps and leapedleapt further away to avoid his attack. She used the momentum of that jump to run several steps on the wall before landing on the floor. When she landed she turned towards him and unleashed a torrent of lighting at him.

The field of her blast was so wide that he was only able to partially avoid it with his own side flip. The flip turned into a roll as he was blasted with the edge of her lightning blast. He grunted in pain when the lightning coursed through him. He knew that a charge that hot would have caused serious damage if he’d been in the middle of it. He regained his feet and whipped around trying to find where the apprentice had gone. She was no longer where she had launched the lightning attack. He jumped forward into a roll a split second before a thrown saber blade whirled by where his head would have been. The room filled with blinding light for a brief moment when Degriro’s red saber with a black core batted her orange blade away. He had been aiming for the hilt but missed and only deflected the blade.

Talo’Ra recalled her orange lightsaber to her offhand and ran directly at him. He had regained his feet and was reacting to her actions. For as big and bulky as he was, he was extremely quick and agile. He dodged out of the way of her initial attack and was surprised that she hadn’t overextended her slash. Instead, she feinted to his left before slashing savagely to his right. He only barely got his block in place in time.

The Blade Master countered with a vicious blow of his own that knocked her lightsaber free of her grasp and a follow-up backhand that should have taken her arm. She had dropped to her knees under the giant Pure Blood, having let go of her original blade. A quick draw later and she had her new lightsaber, the one he didn’t know about in hand. She ignited the blade and struck out with a slash to the inner thigh of his left leg, then scrambled out of the way as he crumpled to the ground.

His cry of pain was gratifying as she regained her feet and spun around. He was already disregarding the pain and standing up when she let loose with another blast of lightning right into his chest. The strike sent him flying backward to slam into the wall. Even in this daze, he knew he was fighting for his life. He reached behind him and grasped a throwing knife and hurled it at her.

The knife buried itself in her side, breaking the concentration needed to continue the stream of lightning. Dropping to her knees again she cried out in pain, a combination of a scream and a growl. Her first instinct was to yank it free, but her medical training told her to leave it there for now so that it didn’t bleed worse than it already was. Her master reached out his hand, grabbed at the air and made a yanking motion.

Talo’Ra felt herself be propelled forward towards a column. She managed to twist around so that her back slammed into it, rather than her chest where the knife still was. The blow scattered her wits for a moment and the Pure Blooded Sith stood up shakily on his feet. He lurched in her direction where she was trying to roll over and get back up.

His lightsaber was poised to strike when she flopped on her side and kicked away from the column, propelled by the Force. It propelled her several feet away while she made a wild swipe at him with her new blue bladed, black core saber and missed. He pivoted to follow her and put an end to this. She blasted a powerful Force Wave at him and it knocked him backward off his feet.

She scrambled to all fours, then up to her feet. Things were getting a little hazy from the injury and putting her all into the fight, her reserves were getting low. She charged in at him and their blades met in that spectacular flash of light again. He thought he had her now since she was extended into this attack. He parried her blade and swung for her midsection. There was a thump as her orange blade landed in her hand and ignited just in time to stop his blow. Her blue blade cut the hilt of his lightsaber in half, rendering it useless.

Their size difference made her have to take two large steps to put a foot on his chest and then cross her blades just under his head. She was going to savor this moment before she took it as a souvenir. The chunk of helmet she had cut off revealed one of his eyes as he looked at her. He coughed out, “Good my apprentice. Your training is now complete. Strike me down and your trials are over.”

She was about to oblige his request when she hesitated. A new thought came into her head. “No.,” she said with an exhausted gasp.

“What do you mean ‘no’? You have me where you want me!” he wheezed.

She simply smiled at him. “I said no. I will not kill you after all. I have beaten you and your life is in my hands.” She paused with a grimace as a wave of pain and nausea rolled over her from her injuries.

She panted out, “But now, I want. You. To live.” Another wave of pain caused her to shudder and one of her blades sizzled on Degriro’s neck.

She sputtered a laugh at that and said, “Know why tough guy? No guesses? Well I’ll te-” another stab of pain interrupted her diatribe.

“-tell, you... It’s because now, you’ve been beaten by a girl.”

Withdrawing her blades from by his neck she staggered backward a few steps before righting herself. She painfully hobbled towards the door while never turning her back on him and lightsabers still ignited. At the door she started laughing at his collapsed form. “Beaten, by a girl.” She started coughing in her laugh and managed to choke out. “I’m telling EVERYONE.”

She lurched down the hall a short way before disengaging her sabers and clipping them on her belt. This freed up her hands to put pressure on the gaping knife wound that still had a passenger in it. She reached into her satchel and pulled forth a wad of gauze wrap. The internal injuries and blood loss were catching up to her and she needed to move quickly. She wrapped the gauze around her middle and the knife to hold skin and blade in place. The bleeding wasn’t stopped, but it had slowed to an ooze: Good enough for now.

Once done she continued down the hallway with one of her lightsabers in hand in case it was needed. All she encountered on her stumbling trip to the landing pad, were wide-eyed servants. They either stood still in shock or scattered like scared birds. At last, she reached the pad after having walked for an eternity from where she left her master.

She struggled up the ramp and down the hallway to the cockpit. It was as she had left it with a pre-planned course set. The autopilot button had been primed and all she needed to do was confirm. She didn’t even look at it and hit the button with bloody fingers. Trusting that the Force would have warned her if someone had tampered, she let the ship do its thing as she sat in the pilot’s chair, absolutely exhausted.